musings.schelley.org

Memorial Day weekend kind of snuck up on me, and I discovered that most of my friends were either out of town or busy (teeth extractions, couple stuff, visitors). I found myself with lots of time, or as I described, "great voids of nothingness". Which meant it was time to cook.

Two vidalia onions. My first thought was some sort of onion tart. Carrie makes a excellent tart, but alas, she was chasing DILF's in Hawaii and not available for recipe sharing. I scanned a few cookbooks, but couldn't find a recipe that I liked. Then it dawned on me: pissaladiere from Cook's Illustrated. Basically a fancy French pizza, the dough was slightly chewier and flatter than a regular pizza. Sans cheese and sauce, it was topped with nicoise olives, anchovies, thyme, a few sprinkles of truffle salt (my addition) and caramelized onions. The pissaladiere was absolutely delicious - chewy crust, the saltiness of the anchovies and olives offset nicely by the thick layer of sweet vidalias. I shared with a few neighbors at the Park Rose Terrace; someone else contributed bbq spareribs. Weird combination, but delicious.

While looking for onion recipes, I stumbled across a recipe for ginger duck in Amanda Hesser's very excellent Cooking for Mr. Latte (there's a story behind that cookbook that maybe some day I'll share on this blog). In December, Dad gave me a duck and two breasts (he's a duck hunter). The dish required two days, I was inspired, had time and had always had good luck with recipes from the book.

Alas, so much about the recipe was right. The flavors - the duck stuffed with celery and shallots, cooked gently in a broth of ginger and soy - were right. The broth was delicious, rich, gingery, slightly salty. After resting for a day, the duck was roasted, basted in the broth. And, the broth was also used to cook some of the most delicious rice pilaf I have ever tasted.

While I loved the rice, the duck, on the other hand, the poor, poor duck. I'm sure the duck lived a good life, and sadly, I just didn't cook it right in death. It was overcooked and dry. I hadn't realized until later that the recipe was intended for a farm-raised duck, versus the wild duck that I cooked. With the winged migration (exercise and all), my duck was much leaner, and in the butchering process, it's fatty skin was removed. Which meant not only less fat, but no skin to turn into crackling goodness during the final roasting stage.

Regardless the dinner wasn't a waste. Have I mentioned how fabulous the rice tasted? I also made zucchini fritters, which were not only delicious, but fresh and bright and cut the richness of the duck broth enhanced rice. Oh, and I drank a 2003 Stama Cabernet with.

PS: Pete, Capitol Hill and Venus Cafe miss you.