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Duck, Roast
This universal favourite requires no praise. Without entering into the question of the best duck, we say at once, take a young farm-yard duck fattened at liberty, but cleansed by being shut up two or three days and fed on barleymeal and water. Two small young ducks make a better dish than a large, handsome, hardfleshed drake, which, as a rule, is best fit for a stew, or to be cooked en braise (see DUCK, BRAISED). If the poulterer does not prepare the duck, it must be plucked, singed, and emptied; the feet scalded, skinned, and twisted round on the back of the bird; head, neck, and pinions cut off, the latter at the first joint, and all skewered firmly to give the breast a nice plump appearance. For the stuffing, take half a pound of onions, a tea-spoonful of powdered sage, three table-spoonfuls of bread-crumbs, the duck's liver parboiled and minced with pepper, salt, and cayenne. Cut the onions very fine, throw boiling water over them, and cover for ten minutes; drain through a gravy strainer, and add the bread-crumbs, minced liver, sage, pepper and salt to taste; mix, and put it inside the duck. This quantity is for one duck; more onion and sage may be added, but we recommend the above as a delicate compound not likely to disagree with the stomach. Let the duck be hung a day or two, according to the weather, to make the flesh tender. Roast before a brisk clear fire, baste often, and dredge with flour to make the bird look frothy. Serve with a good brown gravy in the dish, and apple sauce in a tureen. Time: ducks, three-quarters of an hour to an hour; ducklings, twenty-five to thirty-five minutes. Probable cost, 3s. to 4s. each. Sufficient, two ducks for seven or eight persons.
A Victorian spit-roast written for a bird you plucked yourself. The stuffing and the sauce translate directly; the cooking method and the times do not.
- The times assume an open fireThree-quarters of an hour to an hour applies to a bird turning on a spit in front of blazing coals, radiant heat on all sides and fat falling away into the pan. In a domestic oven a 4-5 lb duck wants roughly 1 1/2 to 2 hours, and the stuffing should reach 165F (74C) at the centre before the bird comes out.
- "A brisk clear fire"Brisk means fierce and smokeless, not smouldering. The book gives no oven setting; if you are adapting it, a hot start around 425F (220C) for the first 20 minutes, then down to 350F (180C) for the remainder works.
- Buying the birdA "young farm-yard duck fattened at liberty" corresponds to a table duck of roughly 4-5 lb. The two or three days' confinement on barleymeal and water was a finishing regime to clear and firm the flesh; it has no equivalent at the butcher's counter and nothing is lost.
- HangingDucks were hung a day or two in a cold larder to tenderise. Modern birds are aged and chilled before sale, so this step is redundant; keep the duck refrigerated and cook it within its date.
- Basting and dredgingDuck renders a great deal of its own fat and does not need repeated basting in a covered oven. The flour dredge was for a frothed, crisp-looking skin at the fire; pricking the skin all over and pouring off the rendered fat once or twice does the same job better. Save the fat.
- The stuffing quantitiesHalf a pound of onions to three tablespoons of breadcrumbs is a very wet, onion-heavy mixture by modern standards, which is exactly the point of the scalding and draining. If you prefer a firmer forcemeat, raise the crumbs to about a cup; a teaspoon of dried sage is right for one bird.
- The liverParboil the liver only until firm, a couple of minutes, then mince. Overcooked it turns grainy and gritty in the stuffing. If the bird comes without giblets, leave it out rather than substituting chicken liver, which is milder.
- Yield and costTwo ducks for seven or eight is optimistic for a modern table; count a 4-5 lb duck as serving three, generously four. The price of 3s. to 4s. is Victorian sterling and has no useful conversion.
Roast duck with sage-and-onion stuffing and apple sauce is one of the fixed points of English cookery, and Cassell's treats it as needing no argument. The pairing follows the old kitchen logic that a fatty bird wants a sharp accompaniment: apple for duck and goose, as gooseberry for mackerel. What dates the entry is the concern with the individual bird's history - fattened at liberty, then shut up and fed barleymeal for two or three days to clean and firm the flesh, then hung to tenderise. That was the poultry-keeper's routine in a period when a duck reached the table from a yard rather than a chill cabinet. The note that a hard-fleshed drake is better braised is practical advice for anyone dealing with birds of unknown age, a problem that standardised commercial rearing has since removed.