Are you feeling lucky, ducky?

For the past two years I’ve been making roast chicken for Christmas and to be honest, there’s only that much you can do roasting chicken. In 2005 it was a classic roast with lemon and thyme and in 2006, the unfortunate bird shared oven time with some lovely Chorizo.

This year it had to be different. No more wondering how to sex up boring white meat. No more fussing over which particular pork product I have to use to liven up the fowl. Enough is enough!

This year’s bird will be red.

After parting with $16, I ended up with a 2.4 kg duck lying comfortably on my chopping board, legs wide open and cavity exposed just waiting to be filled. Sexy. After a thorough wash, I prepared an aromatic rub of fresh grated orange zest, rosemary and sea salt and smothered it gently all over the bird, outside and inside. Then she had a good 3.5 hour rest in the fridge before the oven is fired up.

It’s actually a relatively simple dish, but it takes about 2 hours to fully roast the duck to the right state – salty crispy skin with moist and juicy flesh that falls right off the bone. When roasting duck, it’s important to remember that duck render a lot of fat when cooked. And the fat is simply gorgeous for roasting potatoes and making gravy.

I placed the bird on the middle shelf of the oven, on the grilles itself, with a tray of vegetables below to catch the drippings. The tray of vegetables, with the duck neck is later cooked with stock just to extract every ounce of goodness, and later added to a roux to make a tasty, heart-stopping gravy.

Pics are below, not the best but hey after 2 hours of roasting, I couldn’t wait any longer.

I hope you had a good Christmas. Happy holidays!