368725 Wed Feb 07 14:28:50 -0800 2007 10 31 Home Cooking 0 2269898 I just started getting the online newsletter from Rancho Gordo in Napa, CA. I was turned on to their website when I asked for great mailorder food companies on the General Board here. So, today I got my first newsletter from them and it had a recipe for easy "cassoulet" made with left-over duck. After a weekend trip to one of our SF Chinatowns, I had coincidentally worrying what to do with that embarrassment of riches: A roast duck carcass and plenty of duck fat to go with it. Steve, the Rancho Gordo newsletter chef's easy imitation cassoulet is happily simmering away on the back of my stove as i type this. It already tastes wonderful. But I'm going to let it simmer another 45 minutes until the beans are perfectly soft. He recommended flageolet beans (I only had kidney and limas), a mirepoix (chopped: carrots, garlic, celery with leaves, onions), he used left-over duck confit, the beans, sliced sausages, fresh cracked black pepper. My additions were some nice red wine & 4 bay leaves, and flat leaf parsele for the last step before baking it off with buttered bread crumbs on top. The Rancho Gordo company and website are really worth checking out. They produce a lot of heirloom varieties - even of things you don't often see like beans, also herbs & spices, fruits and veg. They have an archive of recipes and answer food questions very kindly. I have to say I really like their website in general - it has a lot of very cool retro food imagery. Wed Feb 07 14:28:50 -0800 2007 23824 niki rothman 1 2270146 This sounds like a great excuse to buy too much Chinese roast duck. (I so rarely have "left-over" duck confit!) Would you be willing to paraphrase the recipe? I couldn't find it on their web site. Thanks, Anne Wed Feb 07 15:31:04 -0800 2007 2269898 12541 AnneInMpls 2 2270529 The "recipe" - it was more like a description in a small article - was in their newsletter which I received for the first time today. I'll tell you what I did. Simmered the beans with bay leaves, water and wine. When they were half done I added the duck left-overs, a mirepoix of chopped garlic, celery, parseley, carrots, and plenty of onion and chopped sausages. I added fresh ground black pepper. That was pretty much it. It tastes really rich and smooth - smooth taste not texture - texture is chunky. The only thing I would do differently would be next time I would make the duck broth the day ahead and pick off all the meat and discard the waste - skin and bones before adding everything else. It was kind of a drag picking through the final dish for all the detritis. And when I serve it I'm going to have to make a warning to watch out for tiny bones. Mine didn't get thick enough to bake it with the buttered breadcrumbs, which Steve recommended. So, mine is a thick soup. All in all - highly recommended for feeling you are a great cook for not wasting all that yummy duck fat & little pieces of meat. Will make a nice lunch with garlic bread and salad with a mustardy vinagrette. Wed Feb 07 17:11:57 -0800 2007 2270146 23824 niki rothman 1 2270573 I've been wanting to try making cassoulet, and this sounds like a good starting point. I ate cassoulet for the first time in late December, and it was a revelation. Could you say a bit more about the beans, I'm not familiar with flageolet beans. I'll have to buy beans in any case, so what do you recommend. I've never cooked with duck except to roast a whole one, with disastrous results... should I buy duck in Chinatown (I'm in Chicago), already cooked, or confit or something at Whole Foods? (how much duck?) If I follow your paraphrase above, I'm making duck broth with the bones/skin, etc., cooking the beans with the broth, bay, wine, until half done, adding the mirepoix, sausage (cooked with the mirepoix?), pepper, duck meat, cooking until done, topping with the buttered crumbs and browning. Perhaps I need more research at the restaurant where I had the first cassoulet... do you think I could persuade my husband of that? for Valentine's Day, that'll be my request. He can't say no to that ; - ) I couldn't believe how much I liked cassoulet, I'm getting hungry just thinking about it. I really only ordered it the first time because nothing else on the menu grabbed my attention. Now if it wasn't so expensive, I'd be addicted. Wed Feb 07 17:25:07 -0800 2007 2269898 14063 Anne H 2 2270637 Good questions, Anne. Sorry, but I'm kinda tired and have to go make dinner now. I WILL be sure to answer in the morning. Bear in mind - This recipe is NOT orthodox cassoulet by any means. It was a fine way to use leftover Chinese roast duck. Wed Feb 07 17:45:53 -0800 2007 2270573 23824 niki rothman 2 2272278 Hi Anne, I wish I could give you more and better advice. I've never made cassoulet before and have always wanted to try it, like you. You could email Steve at Rancho Gordo and ask him about flageolet beans and why they are good - they sell them. I used what I had on hand - limas and kidney. Both dry. Probably confit would be more authentic but also more expensive. A whole roast Chinese duck in SF goes for around $10, There is the issue of the 5 spice powder flavor on the Chinese duck, which I was worried would ruin the taste - but It didn't have a very strong presence at all. The thing about what I made was that it tasted rich, and had a beautiful smooth slightly thick texture that I think came from the duck fat and the beans breaking down. As for procedure - I would do it differently next time if I was starting with the Chinese duck trimmings, I would boil them down with the bay and then discard the waste carefully. Then I would take the meat out and reserve, add the beans and cook half through, then add the veg., wine and finish cooking and re-add the meat at that point and salt & pep. to taste. If I was going with duck confit I would add the duck when the beans were half done again (figuring 1 1/2 - 2 hours to fully cook the beans) because if you cook the duck 2 hours you will kill the flavor and turn it into ropa vieja. But cooking it (simmering) 45 - 1 hr. should be about right to infuse all the flavor - then remove the meat and toss the bones, re-adding the meat. Also add some nice sliced garlicky sausage like kielbasa for the last 1/2 hour, and skim off extra fat. Fresh flat leaf parseley at the end is nice. I did it with Chinese duck just because I had one that we bought to eat with Chinese food, and coincidentally saw the "recipe" for the quicky "cassoulet" in the Rancho Gordo newsletter. Experiment and have fun - when you get it right it will be wonderful to be able to add an easy cassoulet type dish to your repertoire. Thu Feb 08 09:06:33 -0800 2007 2270573 23824 niki rothman 1 2272405 And another thing...THE issue about using the Chinese roast duck, which is a bargain, is the 5 spice powder. It is NOT a flavor you want to predominate in your cassoulet. I was probably just lucky I didn't use a whole duck or it would have been horrible. I just used a rather well picked over carcass, so you don't even notice the 5 spice. I'm a frugal cook, so I'm not going to fork over a whole lot of money for a couple of pounds of duck confit. Roasting is roasting - if you are going to aim toward a great cassoulet, and i honestly think it could be done relatively easily. Then you get a duck. Stick it is a pan roast it at 400 for a half hour to sear then turn it down to 325 until it's tender. Then cut it up and use that for your cassoulet. Simple, and should work fine. Duck takes a long time to get tender so don't rush it. Save the fat (good for the BEST home fries with onion and garlic). While roasting the duck, add a little water to the pan (carefully - splatters) if the fat starts to burn. Thu Feb 08 09:37:17 -0800 2007 2269898 23824 niki rothman 1 2272592 Good for you, Niki! I did the same thing with the leftover carcass of a wild goose this week. I had roasted it and was down to scraps on the carcass. Made stock. Picked off the meat. Threw the bones back in and reduced the stock. Mirepoix with more veggies than normal in some goose fat. Feeling really pressed for time, I used canned cannellini. Added the shredded goose back it and simmer a few minutes. I work out of my home so I got two goodhot winter lunches out of a goose that had been free from a friend who hunts. Leftover duck and goose make terrific soups, gumbos, rice dishes, beans, pastas, lots more. I only roast waterfowl about half the time anyway. There's too many other good things to do with them. Thu Feb 08 10:19:21 -0800 2007 2269898 32444 MakingSense 1 2273888 Thanks, Niki, for the recipe/method! This sounds great - caution about the five-spice powder noted. This sounds easier than the unauthentic cassoulet I made recently - it was pretty good, but not particularly quick. I made Sara Moulton's Duck Confit in an Oven Bag first, which stretched out the process, and I made it two days ahead so I could reheat it and let it sit. Re the beans: I wanted white beans in the cassoulet, so I used dried navy beans, which were very nice. (Or else it was cannelini beans - something white, anyway.) I usually used canned beans, but I could really taste the difference with the dried beans. I think I'm turning into a bean connoisseur, so I'm very glad to learn about Rancho Gordo. Good beans are a treasure. Here are the links to the recipes I used, for comparison purposes. Cassoulet with Duck & Sausage: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/recipe_views/views/107409 Duck Confit in an Oven Bag: http://www.journalnet.com/articles/2003/03/02/features/food/food01.txt Caution: The duck turned out really salty, so either reduce the amount of salt or be prepared to rinse it off the cooked duck. Anne Thu Feb 08 15:13:47 -0800 2007 2269898 12541 AnneInMpls 2 2275363 You know what, raw beans - dry beans - are so much better than canned beans - better taste, better (lovely) texture. Canned beans have a grainy quality. And why bother with canned beans anyway? You just put the beans in a pot with water and simmer for 1 1/2 hours or so and they are perfect. Just add enough water that it won't boil dry. They taste so much better than canned. And you can make a lot and then put them in baggies in small amounts in the freezer for future millions of uses. Fri Feb 09 06:55:47 -0800 2007 2273888 23824 niki rothman 3 2279790 I never thought of freezing the cooked beans - that's a great tip! Thanks, Anne Sat Feb 10 14:04:59 -0800 2007 2275363 12541 AnneInMpls