Roasted duck

This is my first time to roast a duck. Compared with my old way to cook duck, it saves a lot of time and the duck comes out so perfect, with crispy skin and pleasant sweet taste. Around one cup of fat has been removed from the duck, so, you see, it is relatively healthy. 
The duck I bought is about six pounds. Rinse it and then rub it with a lot of coarse salt and five-spice powder (don’t worry, it won’t be too salty, because all the excess season will be removed later), including the outside and inside. Wrap it with plastic wrap and chill at least overnight.
Boil around 2 qt water, pour boiled water all over the duck (don’t miss any tiny part) as soon as the water is boiling (the temperature is very important, water needs to be as hot as possible). Mix 2 tbsp brown sugar, 2 tbsp syrup and 4 tbsp apple cider vinegar and brush it over duck. Place duck on  a rack with drip pan and let sit in the fridge for at least 24 hours, turn over the duck in 12 hours to dry both sides.
Before roasting, let duck stand at room temperature for 1 hour. Preheat oven to 375F, add 1 liter water in drip pan and roast duck uncovered for 1 hour and 30 minutes, turn duck over and brush with syrup every 30 minutes. When duck is cooked through, turn off oven and keep it in the oven for another 30 minutes.
One popular way to enjoy this yummy duck is thinly slice duck breast (keep the skin) and wrap it in steamed pancake (extremely thin, kinda transparent) together with julienne scallions, cucumber. Dip sauce is sweet with garlic flavor. I am too busy to make the pancake, maybe next time, I will do it.
Don’t throw away the skeleton. Use a fine sieve to remove the fat in drip pan and simmer bones in the broth for 1 hour. Remove bones. Adding some veggies in the soup, for example, lobok (daikon),  Chinese lettuce and tofu, brings comfort soup in this cold winter.
Enjoy and Happy New Year!

Duck

Here it is: our dinner, delicious duck, which was cooked in a very traditional Chinese way -- soy sauce + sugar. Soy sauce provides special taste and smell, while sugar is the secret of shinny color. Duck fat can be easily separated in the end, so this is quite healthy.

(1) A whole duck, cut into small dices, rinse and dry with paper towel.

(2) Marinate duck with 2 tsp salt and several tbsp dark soy sauce, let sit in the fridge overnight.

(3) Heat the pot under medium power.

(4) Add some vegetable oil, and put duck dices into the pot, stir until brown.

(5) Add two white part of green onion, one star anise, two pieces of ginger root and 2 tbsp rice wine, reduce heat to medium low or low, cover and let cook for 30 minutes.

(6) Remove cover, stir and condense sauce until only clear yellowish fat left in the pot.

(7) Sprinkle 4 tsp sugar on duck dices, quickly stir to let duck dices be evenly covered with melted sugar.

(8) Drain to remove fat and transfer cooked duck onto plate.

Serve immediately.

Party dishes

　Volcano celery:

(1) Rinse and slice celery.

(2) Prepare a large container of ice water (the mixture of water and ice cubes).

(3) In a pot, add half pot of water and 1 tbsp vegetable oil, bring to boil.

(4) Put a portion of sliced celery into the boiling water.

(5) When celery slices float on water, drain and transfer them into ice water.

(6) Repeat step 4 and 5 until all celery slices are done.

(7) Squeeze and dry celery, then place on a plate.

(8) In a dry pot or skillet, heat under medium power and add some oil.

(9) When pot is hot, add several tbsp chilli paste, stir until aroma develops.

(10) Pour hot paste onto the celery, blend well before served.

Duck breast

　

(1) Rinse duck breast and dry with paper towel, skin can be either removed or kept.

(2) In a hot skillet heated under medium power, add 6 tbsp salt and 1 tbsp Sichuan pepper, stir until salt turns to slightly yellow in color.

(3) Massage duck breast with hot salt&pepper, let sit in the fridge overnight.

(4) Rinse to remove excess salt and pepper, dry with paper towel.

(5) Put breast into a pot; add water (just over breast), some white part of green onion, pieces of ginger, and wine (rice wine or sherry).

(6) Bring to boil and then remove the foam.

(7) Cover the pot, let simmer under low power for 30 minutes; then turn off power, let stand for another 30 minutes.

(8) Transfer breast onto the rack, let cool and then slice before served.

Rice with pork and carrot

　

This rice tastes like fried rice, very yummy.

* It is quite different to cook different types of rice. Some rice should be soaked very well before cooked, some rice needs to be cooked with cold water, however, some should be added to boiling water. Check the direction on the package first.

(1) 3 cup rice, rinsed and drained.

(2) 1 slice of pork belly, shredded and marinated with dark soy sauce + 1/2 tsp salt + a pinch white pepper.

(3) 1 carrot, diced.

(4) In a hot pot heated under high power, add some oil and pork. Stir until pork is cooked through and strong aroma can be smelled (the white part of pork shrinks and meat color changes to dark brown).

(5) Drain pork and transfer to the container with drained rice.

(6) Return pot on the hot stove, add carrot and stir until carrot fully absorbs oil.

(7) Transfer carrot to the container with drained rice and pork, blend well.

(8) In a 4 qt. pot, either mix rice/pork/carrot with 4 cup water or just add 4 cup water, bring to boil. If rice has already been in the water, stir rice with wooden spoon and then cover the pot, reduce heat to medium-low, cook for 20 minutes. Otherwise, pour rice mixture into boiling water, stir well and cover the pot, reduce heat to medium-low, cook for 20 minutes.

(9) Turn off power, let sit on the stove for another 5 minutes.

Duck fat: Healthy or not?

It is my second time to make braised duck . I was curious how much fat a duck has, so I kept all fat separated or removed from either browning duck or before condensing sauce in the cup -- in the end, I obtained totally about 1 cup fat. That's crazy!

My friend told me that I can intake duck fat as much as I would like to, because duck fat is unsaturated. But how can I believe that after finding the fat solidify in the fridge?

Okay, now here is the answer (I grabbed it from internet):

Look at the data, actually, in duck fat, about 2/3 is unsaturated fat, however, there is still 68 g of saturated fat. It is a wise choice to discard this cup of duck fat.

I later took another look at butter, chicken fat... etc. Yeah, chicken, if there is no hormone fed, is a very healthy diet. It seems that shrimp is not as good as I expected. Probably, I should take more smelt than shrimp :P

Braised duck

Before opening the package, I have one question for you:

How many legs does one duck have?

If your answer is "two", I am afraid you will be disappointed this time.

There is only one leg in the package.

Who took the other one away? :=(((((

(1) Marinade

Under medium power, heat oil and stir in 1 tbsp all purpose flour; add 6 tbsp brown sugar, 6 tbsp dark soy sauce, 1 tsp salt and blend them well. Shut down power, blend in 1/2 tbsp sesame oil, let cool to room temperature.

Cut off leg and wings; separate breast from back.

Rinse and dry with paper towel.

Rub duck with marinade and let sit in the fridge overnight.

(2) Braise

Heat under medium power, in a hot empty sauce pot, add duck with skin side down, brown duck.

Add 3 cup water and two star anises, bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and cook for 30 minutes.

Remove oil layer with small size sieve.

Turn duck skin side down and condense sauce under medium power.

Transfer duck to cutting board.

Let duck stand for about 5 minutes so that it can be cool enough to handle.

Cut duck into slices and serve with warm sauce.