Duck Day!
And so Duck Day has drawn to a close, and with it, a few lessons learned.
While certainly not the most important of lessons, the first one learned?
Lesson Number One: Deboning a duck? Is really disgusting.
I started working around 11am - kind of late, but I ran out to the farmer's market for cauliflower and green beans and apples. I then had to stop at the grocery store for salad and cheese and wine, as well as a few other things, so I didn't actually finish up from all of this until about then. But I figured I should have everything on hand before I began, because I knew once the deboning started, I wasn't going anywhere for a while.
This turned out to be entirely accurate.
First, I set up my workstation. I cleared off the dining room table, put in appropriate music (French accordion, Edith Piaf, etc), and rinsed off Harvey the Duck. Harvey, as it turns out, was not entirely defrosted - there were little chunks of ice still in his body cavity - but it was enough that I could at least get started. So it's a good thing I bought him on Thursday, and left him in the fridge the full 36 hours.
I then covered the table first with newspaper, then a bunch of paper towels. Newspaper because it's absorbent, paper towels because who really wants newsprint on their duck? The newspaper turned out to be a FANTASTIC idea - afterward, all I had to do was fold it up and there went the mess (and yes, I did disinfect the table afterward). The paper towel - not so much. Once damp, they were determined to stick to Harvey. But I'm still glad I had something between Harvey and the newsprint.
Pre-Deboning:
So with Julia in the cookbook holder open to the page in question (you can just see the corner of the book in the picture below), I set to work. First step is you cut straight down the backbone of the bird. If you've seen the movie Julie & Julia - yes, it was exactly like that. Cut down, and the whole thing opens, easy as pie. And then you start scraping. It was something of a euphoric moment, if you're into scraping meat and tendons from bones. I'm normally not, but I got a bit giddy as the rib cage slowly exposed itself. There were some moments of utter panic, as I tried to figure out how to separate the drumsticks, but gradually I figured it out.
(A better grasp of duck anatomy probably would have been helpful.)
Here We Go!:
So basically, at this stage in the game, you're moving along the rib cage, scraping away meat and tendons. It surprised me exactly how fragile that ribcage really is. The ribs are extremely thin, and a few times, holding it as I scraped, my finger would slip and BAM - go right through. A bit disturbing. I tried to be gentle, and mostly I was. Eventually, I freed up one side of the ribcage, right down to the breast bone, and then I switched and worked on the other side.
Now, at this stage, Julia's instructions say the following, which I must admit is very prettily put:
By the time you have completed half of [the deboning], the carcass frame, dangling legs, wings, and skin will appear to be an unrecognizable mass of confusion and you will wonder how in the world any sense can be made of it all. But just continue cutting against the bone, and all will come out as it should.
Julia was not wrong, exactly, but personally, I think it looked even worse when I finally got down to the breastbone on the other side. AT this stage, you have to be very careful, because the slightest wrong move and you'll pierce the skin with your knife, which is bad. (If the skin is pierced, it won't make a nice neat duck wrap later on.)
So you gently pull at the carcass, and scrape along the breastbone. Julia made this out to be the MOST DIFFICULT THING EVER....but actually, I didn't think it was quite so hard. Or maybe by now I was was a pro.
Breastbone Half Done:
Hey, I did warn you about the graphic nature of these photographs, you know.
Anyway, after the breastbone is free, all that's left is to cut the tendons at the wings, and PRESTO - you have two - count 'em, Two - pieces of duck.
Kind of like pieces of eight (Arr, mateys, did you forget yesterday was also Talk Like a Pirate Day?), but with duck instead.
Them Bones:
But I still wasn't done. I had to remove the upper wing bone, as well as a few smaller bones that were still wedged in there. The drumsticks stayed - partially because Julia said they could, but mostly because by this point, I was absolutely SICK of deboning a duck.
Now, if you've ever worked with a bird, you'll know that the wings are actually in two pieces - the upper wing, the lower wing. (Think of your own arm - you've got the upper and lower bones. These have offical names, but for the life of me I can't remember them, so bear with me. I was taking out the upper part of the arm/wing.) Doing this basically required me to turn the wing INSIDE OUT, which in and of itself was an interesting process.
But once done....I could lay the bird out flat. Which I did. Perhaps I should have named him "Stanley" instead.
Flat Harvey:
It was then that I learned lesson Number Two:
Lesson Number Two: Julia lies.
You see, Julia said the process would not take more than 45 minutes.
I had spent an hour and a half.
Anyway, I moved on. Per Julia's instructions, I sprinkled Harvey with cognac, salt, pepper, and allspice, rolled him up, and tossed him in the fridge.
Conscious of the hour, I continued. (The recipe I used for the rest was Pate de canard en croute, on page 571, for those who would like to follow along or get exact measurements and all that.) Next up was the stuffing - a mix of ground veal, pork, sauteed onions, salt, pepper, and yet more allspice. Oh, and cognac. I had a slight problem with the cognac because I was supposed to reduce it from half a cup to a quarter cup - but I sort of got involved in dishes and didn't realize I'd reduced the half cup to a tablespoon. Luckily, I had enough left in the bottle to do it again - but no more cognac. (Which is just as well, I don't drink it anyway. But it left no room for error.)
Having made the stuffing, I pulled Harvey out of the fridge and proceeded to create a lump o' meat in his body. I sewed the seams together, wrapped him a few times to create what we later called "duck loaf", and boom, done.
(I SHOULD have taken a photo at this point - but forgot. Very sorry.)
Next came the pastry crust. Which is when I learned Lesson Number Three, which is distinctly tied to Lesson Number One:
Lesson Number Three: Julia drank an entire bottle of wine the day she wrote the Pastry Crust recipe. Also, see Lesson Number Two.
Now, I have a very good pie crust recipe. For some reason, though, I decided not to use it, but go with what Julia recommended instead. This is what Julia wanted me to mix together to form a pastry crust:
--6 cups flour
--1/4 cup shortening
--1/2 cup butter
--two eggs
--2/3 cold water
To give you a basis of comparison, my pie crust recipe calls for the following:
--2 1/2 cups flour
--1 cup mix of shortening and butter
--3-5 tablespoons of water
So basically, Julia is asking for WAY more flour, not nearly as much butter or shortening, and eggs. The ratios aren't even in proportion!
But, you sort of instinctively Trust in Julia when you cook from her book, so I sallied forth and mised it all up, tossed it in the fridge for an hour to think about itself and ponder the state of the universe (and give me a chance to do some cleanup and prepping of vegetables), and then I began to roll it out.
And this, friends, is exactly when I learned Lesson Number Four.
Lesson Number Four: Julia Child needs to be smacked with a Two-By-Four.
This lesson, I find, is a bit like childbirth. I've had to re-learn it every time I make something per Julia's instructions, but like childbirth, you forget the very worst parts afterward, and months go by, and all you remember of the experience of cooking from Julia Child is the fun of eating the food afterward. You forget the pain and suffering and screaming and tears and the desperate desire to smack her over the head with a 2x4 when her cheerful instructions and pretty drawings are NOT IN THE LEAST BIT HELPFUL when you're actually attempting whatever kitchen witchcraft she wants you to accomplish.
The pastry, in short, was awful. It was stiff, and not because it was cold. It was elastic, more so than pastry has any right to be. It did not want to roll out to be 1/8th of an inch thick, per Julia's instructions. It took all I had to get it to be 1/4 inch thick. I plopped Harvey in the center of my oval, and per instructions, attempted to pat the pastry around him.
I patted the pastry against Harvey.
The pastry, which clearly had not read Julia's cookbook and therefore had no idea that it was meant to stay where patted, flopped back to the counter.
I repeated.
The pastry, determined to remain ignorant, did not wish to stay.
(It was while yelling at the pastry that Bill called. Poor Bill. I think he was suddenly really, really glad that he was not here to see me yelling at the combination of cookbook Julia, dead Harvey, and stubborn pastry. Also, amused. I think he was laughing at me. Of course, I'm mailing him brownies today. That'll show him.)
Eventually, I gave up on the patting, and was reduced to wrapping that bird any which way I could. Including (and here I suspect Julia is rolling over in her grave) toothpicks.
For comparison's sake:
This is what Julia's pastry-wrapped duck looks like:
This is Mine (post baking, I should add):
It was around this point that I took some of Bill's frozen spaghetti sauce out of the freezer and put it in the fridge to defrost.
Just in case.
So, with Harvey in the oven for about two hours, I looked went to turn off Edith Piaf - because while I like Edith Piaf, I'd sort of had it up to HERE with anything French. I threw in Evanescence, turned up the volume, and went upstairs where I wouldn't have to look at the kitchen for a bit. After about an hour, I started on the rest of dinner: namely, mustardy geen beans, smashed cauliflower, and most importantly: chocolate mousse cake for dessert, which had to bake at the same temperature as the duck, so I figured I'd have it ready to slide in the oven when Harvey came out. (This, as it turns out, worked out PERFECTLY as a plan.)
(There may be pictures and recipe for the chocolate mousse cake forthcoming. I did not take a picture of said cake last night, but it came out very well. And as a bonus, was flourless, which was good because I'd used up a whole bunch of flour for Julia's ridiculous pastry crust recipe.)
Eventually, Harvey came out of the oven, looking pretty much as he does in the picture above. I left him to cool on the table, where only a few short hours before, he had been systematically deboned.
And he smelled divine.
After letting him cool down a bit, I tossed him in the fridge to chill, and kept at work at the veggies and cake and cleaning and such. And a few hours after that, people showed up.
And then it was time to figure out if the spaghetti sauce would be necessary after all:
Moment of Truth:
(That would be me cutting into Harvey. No one else was willing to do it - and actually, it was a bit nerve wracking for me, until I remembered that Harvey HAD NO BONES. Or at least, none to speak of, which means I didn't have to dodge anything. I just sliced into him like a meatloaf.
Which is why we started referring to him as the "duck loaf", because really, he kind of was.)
And the verdict?
Well. Harvey started out fairly large. All that's left of him is a bit of duck loaf the size of a large orange, and a drumstick.
Also, most of us agreed that Julia's pastry crust was awful. Next time - not that I'm saying there will be a next time - I will use my own recipe.
And so ends the tale of Harvey the Duck, and my experience deboning him. It was interesting, and now I can say I've done it, but next time? I'm sticking with chicken.
RIP, Harvey. You were very tasty.
While certainly not the most important of lessons, the first one learned?
Lesson Number One: Deboning a duck? Is really disgusting.
I started working around 11am - kind of late, but I ran out to the farmer's market for cauliflower and green beans and apples. I then had to stop at the grocery store for salad and cheese and wine, as well as a few other things, so I didn't actually finish up from all of this until about then. But I figured I should have everything on hand before I began, because I knew once the deboning started, I wasn't going anywhere for a while.
This turned out to be entirely accurate.
First, I set up my workstation. I cleared off the dining room table, put in appropriate music (French accordion, Edith Piaf, etc), and rinsed off Harvey the Duck. Harvey, as it turns out, was not entirely defrosted - there were little chunks of ice still in his body cavity - but it was enough that I could at least get started. So it's a good thing I bought him on Thursday, and left him in the fridge the full 36 hours.
I then covered the table first with newspaper, then a bunch of paper towels. Newspaper because it's absorbent, paper towels because who really wants newsprint on their duck? The newspaper turned out to be a FANTASTIC idea - afterward, all I had to do was fold it up and there went the mess (and yes, I did disinfect the table afterward). The paper towel - not so much. Once damp, they were determined to stick to Harvey. But I'm still glad I had something between Harvey and the newsprint.
Pre-Deboning:
So with Julia in the cookbook holder open to the page in question (you can just see the corner of the book in the picture below), I set to work. First step is you cut straight down the backbone of the bird. If you've seen the movie Julie & Julia - yes, it was exactly like that. Cut down, and the whole thing opens, easy as pie. And then you start scraping. It was something of a euphoric moment, if you're into scraping meat and tendons from bones. I'm normally not, but I got a bit giddy as the rib cage slowly exposed itself. There were some moments of utter panic, as I tried to figure out how to separate the drumsticks, but gradually I figured it out.
(A better grasp of duck anatomy probably would have been helpful.)
Here We Go!:
So basically, at this stage in the game, you're moving along the rib cage, scraping away meat and tendons. It surprised me exactly how fragile that ribcage really is. The ribs are extremely thin, and a few times, holding it as I scraped, my finger would slip and BAM - go right through. A bit disturbing. I tried to be gentle, and mostly I was. Eventually, I freed up one side of the ribcage, right down to the breast bone, and then I switched and worked on the other side.
Now, at this stage, Julia's instructions say the following, which I must admit is very prettily put:
By the time you have completed half of [the deboning], the carcass frame, dangling legs, wings, and skin will appear to be an unrecognizable mass of confusion and you will wonder how in the world any sense can be made of it all. But just continue cutting against the bone, and all will come out as it should.
Julia was not wrong, exactly, but personally, I think it looked even worse when I finally got down to the breastbone on the other side. AT this stage, you have to be very careful, because the slightest wrong move and you'll pierce the skin with your knife, which is bad. (If the skin is pierced, it won't make a nice neat duck wrap later on.)
So you gently pull at the carcass, and scrape along the breastbone. Julia made this out to be the MOST DIFFICULT THING EVER....but actually, I didn't think it was quite so hard. Or maybe by now I was was a pro.
Breastbone Half Done:
Hey, I did warn you about the graphic nature of these photographs, you know.
Anyway, after the breastbone is free, all that's left is to cut the tendons at the wings, and PRESTO - you have two - count 'em, Two - pieces of duck.
Kind of like pieces of eight (Arr, mateys, did you forget yesterday was also Talk Like a Pirate Day?), but with duck instead.
Them Bones:
But I still wasn't done. I had to remove the upper wing bone, as well as a few smaller bones that were still wedged in there. The drumsticks stayed - partially because Julia said they could, but mostly because by this point, I was absolutely SICK of deboning a duck.
Now, if you've ever worked with a bird, you'll know that the wings are actually in two pieces - the upper wing, the lower wing. (Think of your own arm - you've got the upper and lower bones. These have offical names, but for the life of me I can't remember them, so bear with me. I was taking out the upper part of the arm/wing.) Doing this basically required me to turn the wing INSIDE OUT, which in and of itself was an interesting process.
But once done....I could lay the bird out flat. Which I did. Perhaps I should have named him "Stanley" instead.
Flat Harvey:
It was then that I learned lesson Number Two:
Lesson Number Two: Julia lies.
You see, Julia said the process would not take more than 45 minutes.
I had spent an hour and a half.
Anyway, I moved on. Per Julia's instructions, I sprinkled Harvey with cognac, salt, pepper, and allspice, rolled him up, and tossed him in the fridge.
Conscious of the hour, I continued. (The recipe I used for the rest was Pate de canard en croute, on page 571, for those who would like to follow along or get exact measurements and all that.) Next up was the stuffing - a mix of ground veal, pork, sauteed onions, salt, pepper, and yet more allspice. Oh, and cognac. I had a slight problem with the cognac because I was supposed to reduce it from half a cup to a quarter cup - but I sort of got involved in dishes and didn't realize I'd reduced the half cup to a tablespoon. Luckily, I had enough left in the bottle to do it again - but no more cognac. (Which is just as well, I don't drink it anyway. But it left no room for error.)
Having made the stuffing, I pulled Harvey out of the fridge and proceeded to create a lump o' meat in his body. I sewed the seams together, wrapped him a few times to create what we later called "duck loaf", and boom, done.
(I SHOULD have taken a photo at this point - but forgot. Very sorry.)
Next came the pastry crust. Which is when I learned Lesson Number Three, which is distinctly tied to Lesson Number One:
Lesson Number Three: Julia drank an entire bottle of wine the day she wrote the Pastry Crust recipe. Also, see Lesson Number Two.
Now, I have a very good pie crust recipe. For some reason, though, I decided not to use it, but go with what Julia recommended instead. This is what Julia wanted me to mix together to form a pastry crust:
--6 cups flour
--1/4 cup shortening
--1/2 cup butter
--two eggs
--2/3 cold water
To give you a basis of comparison, my pie crust recipe calls for the following:
--2 1/2 cups flour
--1 cup mix of shortening and butter
--3-5 tablespoons of water
So basically, Julia is asking for WAY more flour, not nearly as much butter or shortening, and eggs. The ratios aren't even in proportion!
But, you sort of instinctively Trust in Julia when you cook from her book, so I sallied forth and mised it all up, tossed it in the fridge for an hour to think about itself and ponder the state of the universe (and give me a chance to do some cleanup and prepping of vegetables), and then I began to roll it out.
And this, friends, is exactly when I learned Lesson Number Four.
Lesson Number Four: Julia Child needs to be smacked with a Two-By-Four.
This lesson, I find, is a bit like childbirth. I've had to re-learn it every time I make something per Julia's instructions, but like childbirth, you forget the very worst parts afterward, and months go by, and all you remember of the experience of cooking from Julia Child is the fun of eating the food afterward. You forget the pain and suffering and screaming and tears and the desperate desire to smack her over the head with a 2x4 when her cheerful instructions and pretty drawings are NOT IN THE LEAST BIT HELPFUL when you're actually attempting whatever kitchen witchcraft she wants you to accomplish.
The pastry, in short, was awful. It was stiff, and not because it was cold. It was elastic, more so than pastry has any right to be. It did not want to roll out to be 1/8th of an inch thick, per Julia's instructions. It took all I had to get it to be 1/4 inch thick. I plopped Harvey in the center of my oval, and per instructions, attempted to pat the pastry around him.
I patted the pastry against Harvey.
The pastry, which clearly had not read Julia's cookbook and therefore had no idea that it was meant to stay where patted, flopped back to the counter.
I repeated.
The pastry, determined to remain ignorant, did not wish to stay.
(It was while yelling at the pastry that Bill called. Poor Bill. I think he was suddenly really, really glad that he was not here to see me yelling at the combination of cookbook Julia, dead Harvey, and stubborn pastry. Also, amused. I think he was laughing at me. Of course, I'm mailing him brownies today. That'll show him.)
Eventually, I gave up on the patting, and was reduced to wrapping that bird any which way I could. Including (and here I suspect Julia is rolling over in her grave) toothpicks.
For comparison's sake:
This is what Julia's pastry-wrapped duck looks like:
This is Mine (post baking, I should add):
It was around this point that I took some of Bill's frozen spaghetti sauce out of the freezer and put it in the fridge to defrost.
Just in case.
So, with Harvey in the oven for about two hours, I looked went to turn off Edith Piaf - because while I like Edith Piaf, I'd sort of had it up to HERE with anything French. I threw in Evanescence, turned up the volume, and went upstairs where I wouldn't have to look at the kitchen for a bit. After about an hour, I started on the rest of dinner: namely, mustardy geen beans, smashed cauliflower, and most importantly: chocolate mousse cake for dessert, which had to bake at the same temperature as the duck, so I figured I'd have it ready to slide in the oven when Harvey came out. (This, as it turns out, worked out PERFECTLY as a plan.)
(There may be pictures and recipe for the chocolate mousse cake forthcoming. I did not take a picture of said cake last night, but it came out very well. And as a bonus, was flourless, which was good because I'd used up a whole bunch of flour for Julia's ridiculous pastry crust recipe.)
Eventually, Harvey came out of the oven, looking pretty much as he does in the picture above. I left him to cool on the table, where only a few short hours before, he had been systematically deboned.
And he smelled divine.
After letting him cool down a bit, I tossed him in the fridge to chill, and kept at work at the veggies and cake and cleaning and such. And a few hours after that, people showed up.
And then it was time to figure out if the spaghetti sauce would be necessary after all:
Moment of Truth:
(That would be me cutting into Harvey. No one else was willing to do it - and actually, it was a bit nerve wracking for me, until I remembered that Harvey HAD NO BONES. Or at least, none to speak of, which means I didn't have to dodge anything. I just sliced into him like a meatloaf.
Which is why we started referring to him as the "duck loaf", because really, he kind of was.)
And the verdict?
Well. Harvey started out fairly large. All that's left of him is a bit of duck loaf the size of a large orange, and a drumstick.
Also, most of us agreed that Julia's pastry crust was awful. Next time - not that I'm saying there will be a next time - I will use my own recipe.
And so ends the tale of Harvey the Duck, and my experience deboning him. It was interesting, and now I can say I've done it, but next time? I'm sticking with chicken.
RIP, Harvey. You were very tasty.