france classic 1314 v1 | Page 34

main course dietary requirements: vegetarian: NO

vegan: NO, see alternative vegan recipes

dairy free: NO, add olive oil in place of butter for all

nut free: OK gluten free: OK week one tips

You can open the duck tin both ends and push the duck out like a cork.

Make sure your pea purée is smooth or it will not pipe, if you do not have a piping bag then spoon a pile of purée onto the other half of the plate and smudge it with the back of a spoon slightly across the plate.

Confit of duck with vin chaud sauce

Serves: 4 Cooked: at oven temp 375F / 190C

4 confit duck legs for the jus: 100ml water 200ml red wine 1 chicken stock cube finely grated zest and juice of 1 orange ½ teaspoon cinnamon 3 cloves

Preparation time: 15 minutes Cooking time: 25 minutes

2 tablespoons sugar salt and pepper ½ onion, peeled and chopped 1 clove garlic, finely chopped 25g butter

1 teaspoon cornflour mixed with 1 tablespoon cold water in a cup

sprig of fresh parsley to garnish

1. Make the sauce: put all the other ingredients apart from the butter, parsley and cornflour into a saucepan and bring to the boil. Bring to the boil and simmer without a lid until you have only 200ml left and then sieve the sauce. It should be syrupy and a good flavour. 2. Add the cornflour and re-boil. Adjust the seasoning and leave to one side. This can be made ahead of time and re-heated in the saucepan. 3. Keep the duck at room temperature overnight or all morning so the fat in the tin is soft not hard. Remove the duck from the tin and separate into leg portions. Wipe off as much fat as you can. Put the duck portions into an ovenproof dish. Cover with foil and cook for 20 minutes then remove the foil and allow the duck to crisp for a further 10 minutes. 4. Just before serving, re-heat the sauce, add the chilled butter cut into cubes and stir all the time as it melts. This will thicken the sauce further and add a gloss.

To serve: put two slices of roasted aubergine to one side of the plate curling them a little so they have height. Place the duck onto the centre of a warmed dinner plate, put the pea purée into the piping bag and cut the end off. Squirt a zigzag of pea purée in the other half of the plate, and spoon over the vin chaud sauce. Garnish with a large sprig of parsley or other fresh herbs. notes

What could be more French than Vin Chaud?( spiced hot red wine) a‘ must’ for après ski! We have used all the flavours to make this wonderful‘ jus’ to go with the duck. Duck confit is a speciality of SW France. Before the days of freezers this was the way meat was preserved over the winter. First it is steeped in salt for 24hours, then washed and cooked for 8 hours in its own juices and fats, then bottled and covered in fat to prevent bacteria getting in. Remove your British low grade feelings for tins, this is a French speciality and is delicious! budget tips

Make extra paté and use even a small amount to top croustades for canapés.

Too many duck portions? Sometimes you need to open larger tins of duck than you need, pick the duck from the bone, add a little of the fat and cook together, season with green peppercorns or lots of black pepper and a little soy and then press into a ramekin. This makes a duck rilette( like potted meat) fabulous as a little rich pate on a croustade as a canapé.