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Canvasback Duck, Currant Jelly
Pick, singe, draw and neatly wipe two fine, fat canvasback ducks, season inside of each with a teaspoons salt, evenly divided, then run in the head from the back of each duck. Nicely truss, place a small branch celery inside of each bird and lay in a roasting pan. Spread a teaspoon of melted butter on the breast of each, sprinkle a very little salt over them, set in brisk oven to roast for sixteen to eighteen minutes, remove, untruss, take out celery from interior of each and dress on a hot dish. Skim fat off surface of gravy and drop in two tablespoons hot water, lightly mix and boil on range for one minute, strain gravy over ducks and serve with six pieces fried hominy and currant jelly sepa-separately.
A Gilded Age restaurant treatment of America's most prized wild duck, written for cooks who had whole birds delivered with heads on. Two things need translating before anything else: the bird itself, and how briefly it goes in the oven.
- Sourcing the birdCanvasback is a migratory game duck; under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act it cannot be bought or sold in the United States, so the only legal source is a licensed hunter's own bag. A 2-3 lb domestic Pekin or Muscovy duck, or a pair of mallards, stands in, though a farmed bird carries far more fat and will need longer.
- "Brisk oven"The book gives no figure; a hot oven, conventionally read at somewhere around 450-500F. The short roast only works at high heat: the point is to color the skin and warm the breast through while leaving it red.
- Sixteen to eighteen minutesPlausible for a lean wild duck of about a pound and a half, and it produces meat that is rare to the point of bloody, which is how canvasback was generally served. A farmed duck of twice the weight will need 45 minutes or more, and its breast is usually pulled at 130-135F and rested.
- "Run in the head from the back"The head was left attached and secured in the trussing rather than removed, so the bird came to table with its head showing. A presentation detail, and easily skipped.
- The celeryCanvasback fed on wild celery (Vallisneria americana, an unrelated plant) in the Chesapeake, and the branch of celery in the cavity may echo that association; in any case it is flavoring rather than a stuffing, and is discarded before serving.
- The gravyOnly the pan drippings, degreased, loosened with two tablespoons of hot water and boiled a minute. There is no thickening and none is wanted; it should be a spoonful of dark juice per bird.
- Fried hominyNot canned whole hominy but stiff hominy or grits mush, poured into a pan, chilled until firm, cut into squares and fried in butter until crisp. Polenta squares behave the same way.
- YieldTwo ducks serve two generously or four modestly. The currant jelly goes on the side, not over the bird.
Canvasback was the most expensive wild duck in nineteenth-century America, and the Chesapeake birds commanded the highest prices of all because they fattened on the roots of wild celery, Vallisneria americana, which was believed to give the flesh its particular sweetness. Menus at Delmonico's and its rivals listed canvasback by the pair, typically underdone and usually with currant jelly and some form of fried hominy or fried cornmeal alongside; Alexander Filippini, who is generally associated with Delmonico's kitchens before compiling his cookbooks, is simply setting down the house standard. Market hunting on that scale was a major factor in the population's collapse, and the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 ended the commercial trade in wild waterfowl for good, which is why a dish that once defined American luxury dining is now rarely encountered on restaurant menus.