Cheater's Duck Confit

When the urge to make duck confit came upon me, the first thing I did was check what Larousse had to say on the matter. Well, okay, that's a lie. The first thing I did was bemoan the fact that, of all the urges I could possibly have, the urge to make duck confit was about the dumbest urge a person could have. Why can't I have normal urges like for a pint of Ben & Jerry's from the corner store? That'd be a hell of a lot less work.

Truthfully, it wasn't so much of an urge as it was a necessary evil. You see, I have in my possession a really great recipe that calls for duck confit, and which I intend to make tomorrow, so I needed to make the confit in advance, because, where the hell can you buy duck confit? Having read a heap of recipes, including that found in Larousse, I now know why. 1) it calls for ungodly amounts of fat; 2) the ungodly amount of fat for which it calls is duck fat. Where the hell do you find 4 cups of duck fat? This is where I decided to take matters into my very own hands and cheat at the game of confit. Because I reckon that most of the people who read Lex Culinaria (that's you!) would have about as much of an idea (and inclination) as I have as regards the procurement of 4 cups of duck fat. Which is to say, none.

Why should confit be kept for only those who have on hand 4 cups of duck fat? It should not, I say. Certainly not when lard can so easily be found on the shelves of your average grocery store.

So here we have it, Cheaters Confit.

Confit was originally used as a method of preservation. Goose or duck was simmered in its own fat and then sealed in a crock with enough fat to cover it completely. Kind of the same idea as the layer of melted butter on top of pate or the layer of paraffin over jams. Because the meat was soaked in salt and cooked in fat, it was pretty darn flavourful and very tender. So, keeping with the tradition of salting and cooking in fat, I've really adapted the recipe to use an alternate source of fat, and also to be done in the oven, although you could do yours on the stove top.

Cheaters Confit

(makes about 1.5 cups of shredded meat)

• 2 duck legs
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme (or 1 Tablespoon fresh)
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary
• 1 bay leaf, crushed
• 250ml (1 cup) melted lard (use the kind that's packaged for baking)
• 125 ml (1/2 cup) good quality canola oil

Combine the herbs and salt. Rub the salt mixture into the duck legs. Place the duck legs in a large Ziploc baggie, place in fridge and let marinate for 24 hours.

Remove duck from bag, rinse and pat dry.

Preheat the oven to 350F. Place duck in the bottom of a very small baking dish. The dish should be just big enough to hold the duck in a single layer, skin side up, covering the bottom completely. Cover with the lard and oil.  The fat should just cover the top. If it doesn't quite cover, pour in a bit more oil until it does. Put duck in oven and reduce the hwat to  200F. Bake, uncovered at 210F for 1 hour 45 minutes. Turn the oven off and let cool inside oven for a further 30 minutes.

Remove duck from oven. Pour off oil. Allow the meat to cool and then shred it. If you are going to keep the confit for a while, press the meat into a small glass or porcelain container and then cover with a layer of the melted fat. If you're going to use the meat straight away, don't bother with this step. In any event, keep the fat for roasting potatoes with!

Once you've made your confit ...what do you do with it? You could try:

Confit, pear and pecan salad

Duck confit Rilettes

Shredded confit duck and noodle salad

...or watch Lex Culinaria later in the week for a great recipe courtesy of Patrick Turcot, Executive Chef at the Fairmont Hotel Macdonald.

Comments

[sam]

when I was recently doing my Country French Cooking Class at Tante Marie's here in San Francisco we had a WHOLE BUCKET of duck fat at our disposal, I kid you not. Have you checked out Derrick recently, he was doing the duck fat math only last week. Crazy stuff!

Down here we can usually buy duck confit or duck fat in wholefoods, btw, plus our beloved Fatted Calf sells Duck Confit at the farmers market too.

[pepper]

Duck confit and duck fat can be ordered from places like foiegras.net and dartagnan.com, though not sure if the latter ships to Canada. There ought to be suppliers in eastern Canada too, though my standby hypergourmet.com doesn't seem to have it. Still, not cheap at all and takes time for online orders to ship. Your method looks like a faster and inexpensive way to get delicious results.

[Dianka]

I love Cheaters Confit, what a great idea! Thank you for sharing your secrets!

[Lyn]

Sam,
Lucky you. Sadly, I don't think the market here is big enough to warrant sale of confit or duck fat.

[Céline]

Believe it or not I had the same urge this week end. I have been thinking about duck confit since I found out they were selling jars of duck fact at a local deli here in Auckland.

Lard in confit!! how did it taste?
Did you ask butchers if they were selling duck fat?

Duck fat is very flavoursome and - according to French scientists - packed with unsaturated fat. Cassoulets and confits are healthy!

[Michel]

I'm surprised you can't find duck fat in Edmonton. There must be at least one gourmet shop in town. What's great about duck fat is that, when making a confit, you tend to end up with even more fat than you did before. Great for making pan-fried potatoes.
For the herbs, I like to put them, along with the salt, into a coffee grinder. It spreads much more easily.
And, because I have a Foodsaver, I usually make confit ahead of time, so that I always have some in the freezer. When it comes time to reheating the confit, I line a pan with sliced potatoes (to soak up the fat), place the legs on top, and cook at 425F.
You can also substitute rabbit for the duck when making rillettes. It's amazing.

[Ange]

God I love duck & like you was put off by having to find duck fat for a confit. Now that you have given this simple alternative might have to make my own too!

[Hilary Marlow]

What a shame I have to print all this off just to get my Confit de canard recipe!! Still I look forward to reading it all later!

[karen]

i had some not-so-very-good duck at a chinese restaurant a day ago. since i pushed more food around on my plate than i actually ate, i had a LOT of duck leftovers.
i thought it was a shame to throw out the bird, so i tried to think of ways to re-work it. well, i rendered a little fat by putting the peices skin side down in a hot skillet, then i added water and sort of blanched the bird so i could easily peel the meat from the bones, then i took that meat, my rendered fat, a tablespoon of salt, and 1/2 cup of marsala wine and cooked it until it was all reduced to a nicely saturated concoction of shredded duck meat. it's really pretty darn good!

[Sarah]

Message to Ange who posted a comment on May 23 2006:

Why didn't you just copy and paste the confit de canard receipe?