I am very loosely calling this blog a Cookbook Lottery. We had invited some family round for a dinner party and I was a little undecided what to prepare for starters. So I gave our guests the option to choose from a range of starters, mainly soups, all from
Heston Blumenthal's at Home cookbook. I must say I was quite happy with their choice. For those of you who have his book, you can find the recipe for Chestnut Veloute and Confit Duck on pg 66.
I had to start this recipe 48 hours in advance of dinner being served... Needless to say, I am no longer surprised at how long some of Heston's recipes take and I always read them fully at least a week before the day I actually want the food on a plate.
It all started on Thursday evening with roasting the star anise, juniper berries, cinnamon sticks, peppercorns and bay leaves for 5 minutes and then blitzing them in my food processor. The noise of grinding spices is strangely satisfying. To this mix I added lemon and orange zest, fresh thyme and a little salt. Once nicely mixed, I gave the duck legs a good massage with the spice and rubbed it into every little nook and cranny I could find. Satisfied that the duck was smothered in this heady mix of aromas, I placed the legs in a Tupperware and put it in the fridge overnight.
Friday evening, I removed the legs from the fridge and gave them a quick wash down to remove most of the spice mix. The legs were then placed into a small, but deep, oven tin and drowned in melted goose fat. Making sure they were totally covered, I added a stick of fresh rosemary and placed the tin in the oven at 75C for 18 hours. Yep, you read it right! Tomorrow at 1pm, I can remove my duck from the oven!
Saturday has arrived and it's time to remove the duck from the oven. Tell you what, the wafting aroma's of duck permeating our home have been driving both Sheila and I batty for the last 16 hours. Time to see what all the fuss was about. Removing the duck from the goose fat, I laid them out on a rack to allow the rest of the fat to drip off. Next was another little treat for me. It's not often I get to use my smoker, so I'm pleased it was hauled out of retirement and stoked up again. 40g of Applewood chips went into the bottom of the pan over a high heat. As soon as the wood caught and started to burn, I turned the flame on the stove off, placed the duck in the smoker and covered it with a tight fitting lid. I allowed the duck to sit happily puffing away for the next 30 minutes.
Whilst the duck was doing its thing, I started on the rest of the prep. Just one look at the photo below, and you know there is loads of alcohol in this dish. I have never worked with this type of chestnut before so was looking forward to what the dish would taste like.
A brown butter was asked for in the recipe and by leaving the butter on the stove a short while after melting allows the butter to brown and it develops a beautiful nutty flavour. I then strained this to remove the milk solids. The butter can now reach a higher heat when cooking and it won't burn too easily. Clarified butter one step further to brown butter... yum!
Next up was prep for the soup 'stock'. This involved cleaning and chopping fresh thyme, a banana shallot, smoked bacon and leek.
I added about 3/4 of the brown butter to a pot over a medium heat and then added the prepped veg and bacon. I allowed this to cook until the bacon was slightly brown and the onion was translucent, probably about 10 minutes in total. I stirred the pot often as I didn't want the veg to colour too much.
Whilst the veg was cooking, in between stirs, I removed the duck from the smoker and started stripping the flesh from the bones. I then put the meat to one side until later.
A little more prep involved roughly chopping the chestnuts...
...and finely grinding the hazelnuts.
Finally, time to add all the alcohol! Almost half a litre of sherry and port go into this recipe. Once in, with delicious fruity aromas wafting from the pan, I brought the liquid to the boil and then turned the flame down to allow it all to reduce down until syrupy. At this point, I added the chicken stock and brought the pan back to a simmer and I then added the chopped chestnuts... and back to a simmer we go!
After 5 minutes, I added the cream and the milk and then simmered for a further 15 minutes. My kitchen was seriously smelling delectable at this stage.
The soup received a good blending after the allotted simmering time and then I sieved it all through a fine strainer to remove any lumps that the whizzing blades had missed.
I returned the soup to a clean pan and left it on a low heat whilst I prepared the duck and the soup bowls for service. The stripped duck was placed into a warm pan with a little of the goose fat and allowed to warm up. I then used a little of the left over brown butter and brushed the rims of our soup bowls onto which I sprinkled the ground hazelnut. This created a pretty little effect for service. Next, I placed a portion of the hot duck into the bowls and then ladeled in the soup. It really did look appetising and it smelt just fantastic!
Many appreciative oohs and aahs greeted me as I brought the soup into the dining room. It definitely lived up to its 48 hour prep hype and it tasted just gorgeous. It helps when you use oodles of cream and lashings of alcohol, I suppose! It really was a great tasting dish though and great fun to prepare.
Next was main course. More Heston Blumenthal. Spotting a recurring theme yet?
Braised Chicken with Sherry and Cream served with Crushed Potatoes and Chilli Broccoli, all from his cook book. Once again, a fantastic tasty dish. The chicken was moist and creamy, the broccoli fresh with a little zing of heat and the potatoes very earthy and herby, however I felt the recipe used a little too much olive oil.
Sheila pulled out the stops with her Coffee and Whisky Creme Caramel served with Bitter Caramel and Dark Chocolate Coffee Beans. Brilliant, light way to finish such a rich dinner. The creme caramel was smooth and tasted lightly of coffee and whisky, but it just came alive when you added a small crispy chunk of caramel to the spoonful. Yum!
Thank you Heston for a scrumptious dinner. I will definitely be visiting your cookbook again in the near future!
