Day of the Duck, Part 2
Duck prosciutto is such a wonderful thing. If you want to save yourself a little work, just buy skin-on duck breasts and proceed with the salting and dry cure. In Day of the Duck, Part 1, I discussed the salting of the breast. To do this surround the breasts in salt and refrigerate, covered, for 24 hours. At the end of this period, remove the breasts from the salt. They will be a deep, rich reddish-brown and firmer than when you put them in the salt.
Rinse and dry the duck breasts. Sprinkle them with ground white pepper. With a paring knife cut an "x" about 1" from the top edge of the breasts and thread a 8-10" piece of kitchen twine through the hole.
Wrap in cheesecloth and hang in the fridge for one week. At the end of this period the duck will be firm, but should give just a little in the center. If you don't feel it is firm enough, leave it for a couple more days. Finally, slice it thin and eat it as an appetizer, with a lightly dressed salad, or just slice off a couple of pieces as the world's best snack.
Now for the duck legs. After they have cured in the refrigerator in the salt, crushed clove, crushed black peppercorns, garlic and bay leaf for two days, remove them and rinse them under cold water. Dry the legs with paper towels. Warm the beautiful white duck fat you made so that it is in a liquid state. Using a glass or oven-safe ceramic dish (Pyrex makes a great 7-cup oven safe glass bowl with a plastic lid which is perfect) in which the legs just fit, cover the meat with the fat. Make sure that the meat is completely covered by the fat. Put the dish into the oven at 170-200F for 6-10 hours. Remove from the oven and let cool to room temperature (again, be sure that the meat is entirely submerged in the fat). Store, covered, in the refrigerator for up to a month.
When you are ready to indulge in these scrumptious, tender delicacies remove from the refrigerator and allow the fat soften at room temperature. Scrape the fat off (you can save the fat and reuse it--just melt it, strain it and refrigerate it in glass jars) of the legs and sauté in a hot skillet so the outside is crisp and the inside just warmed through. Alternatively, you could put them on a baking sheet in a 425F oven and roast for 15 minutes or so, until the meat is just warmed.
There are so many things to make with duck confit. It is, of course, essential to cassoulet. You can simply place the warmed crisp meat on a salad. I have also made cheater duck sugo with it by taking it off the bone and breaking it up into mirepoix cooked in a tiny bit of duck fat, adding couple of chopped tomatoes and some duck stock, bay leaf, a couple of cloves, salt and pepper. The sugo is super on pasta or over warm, soft polenta.
NOTE: If you are interested in learning basic meat preservation techniques like these, I highly recommend Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn. The Zuni Café Cookbook by Judy Rodgers also has a good explanations of some of these techniques.
