Easy Duck Confit

Name: Easy Duck Confit
Prep time: 2 h 5 min
Cook time: 2 h 5 min
Total time: 2 h 5 min
Yield: 2
Cuisine: Mediterranean, French, European
Ingredients: 1 serving Duck legs (at least one per person); 1 serving Salt; 1 serving Chicken; 1 serving Beef; 1 serving Pork; 1 serving Fish and Seafood; 1 serving Pasta and Noodles

You can never have too many main course recipes, so give Easy Duck Confit a try. This recipe serves 2. One portion of this dish contains around 89g of protein, 54g of fat, and a total of 1035 calories. This recipe covers 26% of your daily requirements of vitamins and minerals. It is an affordable recipe for fans of Mediterranean food. A mixture of pork, salt, fish and seafood, and a handful of other ingredients are all it takes to make this recipe so tasty. From preparation to the plate, this recipe takes approximately 2 hours and 5 minutes. It is a good option if you're following a dairy free diet. If you like this recipe, take a look at these similar recipes: Confit Duck, What Is Duck Confit, and Duck Confit.

Instructions

Pat the duck legs dry with paper towels.

Ingredients you will need

Duck Leg

Equipment you will use

Paper Towels

Prick the skin of the duck all over: Find a needle or a very pointy knife and prick the skin of the duck all over. Focus on the skin that covers fat. Do your best to avoid piercing the meat itself by pricking the skin at an angle over the drumstick and the center of the thigh.

Ingredients you will need

Chicken Drumsticks

Whole Duck

Meat

Equipment you will use

Knife

You are doing this to give the fat that lies under the skin a place to seep out. If you don’t do this, it will be far more difficult to get crispy skin.

Salt the duck legs and let rest at room temp: Salt your duck legs well, more than you think you ought to, actually.

Ingredients you will need

Duck Leg

Salt

Let them rest at room temperature for at least 20 minutes and up to an hour. Don’t worry, they’ll be fine.

Put the duck legs in a small casserole, skin side up. How small? You want it just big enough to hold the legs. Put a thin sheen of oil or melted duck fat on the bottom of the casserole, then place the duck legs in close together but not overlapping.

Ingredients you will need

Duck Leg

Duck Fat

Cooking Oil

Slowly heat the duck in the oven:

Ingredients you will need

Whole Duck

Equipment you will use

Oven

Put the casserole in the oven and heat it to 300°F (150°C); if you have a digital oven, you could even go down to 285°F (140°C). Do not preheat the oven. You want to cook the duck as gently as possible.

Ingredients you will need

Whole Duck

Equipment you will use

Oven

Walk away and watch football, go shopping, read a book or something. How long? Every duck has a different level of fat, so I can’t tell you exactly. But it will be at least 90 minutes, and two hours is better. After 90 minutes, check the duck: It should be partly submerged in melted fat and the skin should be getting crispy.

Ingredients you will need

Whole Duck

Turn up the oven heat to brown the skin: When the skin is starting to look crispy, turn up the heat to 375°F (190°C). Check after 15 minutes. You’re looking for a light golden brown. If you missed some spots with the needle and there are places where the skin won’t crisp that’s OK—better that than burnt skin elsewhere.

Equipment you will use

Oven

Let cool and strain the fat:

Remove from the oven and let cool for 10-15 minutes before eating. Save the accumulated fat for cooking vegetables, other meats or for keeping your skin shiny. I strain the fat through cheesecloth, but you really only need to do this if you are saving the fat for several weeks or months; strained, it will keep for 6 months tightly covered in the fridge. Well wrapped, the duck meat itself will last up to 2 weeks in the fridge.

Ingredients you will need

Vegetable

Whole Duck

Meat

Equipment you will use

Cheesecloth

Oven

What to do with your lovely duck legs? Why eat them. You can just gnaw on the legs and let the luscious fat dribble down your chin, or pick off the skin and eat it—it is hard to re-crisp it later—and then strip the meat from the bones and use it in a salad, with beans or rice, or in with pasta.

Ingredients you will need

Duck Leg

Beans

Pasta

Meat

Rice

Equipment

Ingredients

Servings:

1serving

Duck legs (at least one per person)1serving

Fish and Seafood 1serving

Pasta and Noodles

Recommended wine: Bordeaux, Champagne, White Burgundy

Bordeaux, Champagne, and White Burgundy are my top picks for Duck Confit. French wine is just as diverse as French food, but you rarely go wrong with champagne. If your meal calls for a white wine, you might also try a white burgundy. For a red, try a red bordeaux blend. One wine you could try is Chateau Feret Lambert Bordeaux Superieur. It has 4.3 out of 5 stars and a bottle costs about 15 dollars.