Duck Recipe

The duck sat on my freezer for too many days. Meanwhile, I kept looking for recipes in the web. Most of them seemed too complicated for my grad-student kitchen. And then, I just decided to give it a try. I mean, you can't really go too wrong with the South Asian spices. Slow-cooking makes everything delicious, and somehow I happen to know duck wings should be cooked longer than chicken wings. So, here is my duck recipe. I still need to find a snazzy name for it. But for now, I will stick to the ubiquitous curry.

Ingredients:

duck wings

mustard oil

pearl onions (pink)

garlic (two fat cloves)

ginger paste

two green chilies

tomato (1)

clove powder

cinnamon powder

cardamom powder

fennel seeds

curry leaves (so that it tastes vaguely South Indian)

coconut powder

cumin seeds

paprika

coriander powder

Marinate:

Time: at least 30 mins.

--Wash the duck pieces. Pat them dry. In a large bowl, mix mustard oil, red chilli powder, salt, sugar and all the other spices(clove, cardamom,cinnamon, fennel seeds). I have no clue about the amount. I sprinkle whatever looks good to the eye and feels okay in the fingers. Throw the duck pieces in. Make sure the oil and the spices get smeared on the duck pieces evenly.

--Heat the oil. When it's hot enough, throw in the cumin seeds. Let them sizzle. Then throw in the onion-pieces. I had them finely chopped. The big advantage of the pearl onions is that, you will have to work real hard to not have fine pieces.

--Then once the onions turn transparent, throw in the green chilies, garlic pieces and the ginger paste. Add a little bit of sugar and salt. Continue stirring and frying for about 10 mins.

--Then add the chopped tomatoes. Stir until they all turn into a mush. Throw in the duck pieces.

-- Fry them along with everything else for about 20 mins.

--Pour some water in the marinate bowl (not a whole lot. Just a little). Mix the leftover spices with the water well.

--Pour the water in the duck and spice mix.

---Stir some more (for around 7 mins.)

--- Throw the curry leaves in. Stir some more (around 5 mins.)

---Cover the pot.

--- Take the cover off after 5 mins.

---Add some more water. Add some coriander and paprika. A little bit of all other powdered spices referred above. Stir them well. Reduce the heat to "low." Let everything slow-cook for 45-60 mins.

Duck done. Now eat. With rice. Plain or biriyani-ed. I settled for the plain. Biriyani would have involved too much work for one evening. It was delicious. If there's any part of this recipe that doesn't suit you, or any ingredient that doesn't work for you, feel free to change it. Make it your own.