How to cook duck soft and juicy in the oven
Juicy and soft duck in the oven - practical advice, recipes and recommendations for housewives.
For many of us in the family, it so happened that most, unfortunately, mostly use poultry (chicken) in the form of meat. Replacing chicken meat with duck or, the most familiar one, and homemade family dinner easily turns into a solemn or festive event.
And with the Christmas and New Year holidays approaching, housewives are thinking about how to cook duck, making it juicy, soft and rich in aromas of spices and seasonings.
Duck meat differs from chicken meat in that the duck cooking technology takes more time and effort. This is what scares women away from pampering their loved ones with a delicious dish. Suddenly, the signature dish will not work, and even after many hours of simmering in the oven, the meat will remain tough, bland and tasteless.
In our article, we will tell you where to start the cooking process, share tricks and tips, as well as popular recipes for a festive duck dish in the oven.
Where to begin?
At the very beginning, I would like to draw your attention to one fact - duck meat has a specific taste, and if it is not previously marinated or soaked, then the taste in the finished dish will prevail, despite the spices and seasonings.
Steps for cooking duck in the oven:
- Soaking (if necessary);
- Marinating duck meat;
- Rubbing the carcass with spices and seasonings;
- Roasting duck in the oven.
For the marinade, you can and even need to use semi-dry red or table wine, garlic, lemon juice and zest, your favorite spices or a set of Provencal herbs.
Do I need to soak duck meat before marinating it?
If the bird is wild, then it certainly needs to be soaked in a strong salt or vinegar solution for 24 hours. Note that we are not talking about vinegar essence, but about table vinegar, and it is desirable that it be grape. Apple cider vinegar, or made from white grapes, works well for this purpose.
To make a steeping mixture, 100 ml of aromatic vinegar is added to one liter of water. How to cook duck soft and juicy in the oven? It must be properly marinated and seasoned with spices.
A duck bought from farmers or in a store can be kept in a strong saline solution for a day. During soaking, the salt will penetrate the meat, soften it a little, and when baked, you get a golden and golden crust.
For soaking, it is recommended to use coarse rock or table salt of gray color. Subsequently, in the process of pickling and rubbing the carcass with spices, it is necessary to take into account that the duck carcass has already received a certain percentage of salt so that the dish does not turn out to be salty after cooking.
About the right utensils for cooking poultry:
The ideal option for cooking chicken or duck carcasses in the oven is considered to be deep, thick-walled dishes made of cast iron. The carcass is initially laid out on the back so that the breasts are evenly baked and acquire a golden color, and 45 minutes before being cooked, the carcass can be turned over.
Advice! An hour after baking, if you do the manipulation of turning the carcass every 20 minutes, then the meat will cook evenly, take on an appetizing appearance and remain juicy.
You can also use glass, ceramic or Teflon baking trays with high sides for cooking, but duck cooked in cast iron will be softer, juicier and brighter in taste.
Stuff the carcass or not?
This question is also relevant, especially for young housewives. It is extremely difficult to give practical advice in this case. However, it should be borne in mind that stuffed duck turns out to be more tasty and juicy, especially if fruits or vegetables are used.
What can you stuff a duck carcass with?
Several options are traditionally used:
- Apples, (Antonovka) cut into 4 parts;
- Buckwheat with mushrooms;
- Rice with dried fruits and nuts.
But you can go further, when, for example, the duck already needs to be put in the oven, and the ingredients for the filling when buying products for the celebration completely fell out of my head, and they are not available.
You can peel a few onions and cloves of garlic and stuff the duck with these simple ingredients.
Lemons and even oranges are also useful for stuffing duck; it is also enough to cut them into small slices.
Vegetables are also useful - for example, carrots or pumpkins, potatoes.
Vegetables and fruits are caramelized during the cooking process and in the future will serve as an excellent addition as a side dish to delicious and juicy duck meat.
To fix the filling inside the carcass, you can use a thick needle with culinary thread or fix everything with ordinary toothpicks. For the latter option, it is recommended to soak the sticks in water for several hours so that they do not burn out when baked.
Preparation for roasting duck meat:
After the carcass has been soaked and even marinated in spices, and the bird is already stuffed with vegetables or fruits, you should also take care of the crispy crust.
If the carcass is small, then most likely the meat will be harsh when baked. To prevent this, it is worth making small cuts on the skin throughout the carcass (this will help the bird acquire a ruddy appearance) and gently insert thin and long sticks of butter under the skin.
It will be great if the oil is fragrant - it is not difficult to prepare it. It is enough to remove the oil in advance to make it soft, and season it with crushed garlic, salt and black pepper, add parsley or fresh mint. You can use any seasonings and spices. Then put the butter on parchment, wrap it gently and remove to cool.
The fatty carcass of a duck is just enough to pierce in several places; for flavor, you can add cloves of garlic or sprigs of herbs. This will be enough.
Now all that remains is to put the duck carcass in a slightly oiled form and put the form in an oven preheated to 180 degrees.
Cooking duck in the oven:
After the duck has been in the oven for the first 20–25 minutes, it must be turned over and poured over with the juice melted during baking.
For the first time, the carcass is placed on the back, then during the baking process it must be turned over several times, repeating the manipulations with fat and juice. The more often you water the carcass, the juicier and softer the meat will be after cooking.
For the final 30 minutes, the duck should lie on its back so that the breast is nicely baked and looks appetizing. The total cooking time is approximately 25-30 minutes per pound of bird weight. It is impossible to give more precise recommendations, since everyone has different ovens.
Advice! The duck carcass is baked for a long time and the wings may burn a little during the cooking process, especially if honey was used for the marinade. Therefore, before baking, they can be wrapped in foil, during the cooking process they will reach readiness, and the remaining 30 minutes will be enough for them to acquire a ruddy appearance and crust.
Duck meat has a specific taste and extraordinary aroma. For cooking, a whole carcass is often used. Therefore, in order for the meat to come out more tender, juicier and tastier, it is necessary to soak it in a duck marinade.
It is important to prepare the right duck marinade before baking in the oven. Then the meat will turn out not only juicy, but also soft.
For cooking, you will need a special form - a rooster. The dish will turn out to be original in taste and very aromatic.
To get rid of the specific duck flavor, always marinate before cooking. Marinade with mustard and honey will help to make the dish more tender and saturate with a delicious aroma.
This recipe is especially good for wild duck.
Rub the marinade on a washed and always dried carcass. If applied to a wet bird, it will not soak.
The real science is making Peking duck. The whole result depends on a properly prepared marinade. Thanks to perfect marinating, you will taste juicy, aromatic and tender meat.
An excellent option for marinade with soy sauce and garlic, thanks to which the festive dish will turn out to be especially tasty.
What could be better and more spectacular than a baked duck? This exquisite dish will captivate all guests and delight the palate. But in order for the food to turn out the way you intended, the marinade should be properly prepared.
Duck in an orange marinade turns out to be especially fragrant and creates a festive atmosphere even during the cooking process, because from the first minutes of baking, an amazing smell spreads around the apartment.
Roasted duck with apples or oranges, served with a delicious side dish, is ideal for a festive dinner with the family. There are many subtleties regarding how to bake duck in the oven and what is the best way to serve it.
Experienced chefs know how to cook a bird deliciously in the oven so that it turns out juicy, tasty, with crispy skin. By following tried and tested recipes, you will end up with a sumptuous dish that looks attractive, just like the photo in the cookbooks.
Roasting time is an important factor that must be taken into account when cooking poultry. It depends on the size and weight of the carcass, baking technology (whole or in pieces). For example, fillets or individual parts are baked for an hour and a half at a temperature of 200 degrees. A whole duck is cooked from two hours (1.5-2 kg) to three hours (2-3 kg). The poultry is cooked either in foil or in a special sleeve that helps to quickly bake the meat from the inside.
Since baked duck (wild or homemade) is a traditional element of the festive table, a great variety of cooking methods have been invented. First of all, the carcass must be thoroughly cleaned of feathers, washed and dried. For a richer and softer flavor, meat can be marinated in wine, lemon juice, or spiced vinegar.
This recipe is recognized as a classic - apples perfectly emphasize the taste of duck meat. Fruits should be taken from hard varieties, late, green, sour in taste. It is better to use chilled poultry rather than frozen.
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There are many recipes on how to deliciously cook baked poultry as a whole. This is a standard method that requires little or no additional ingredients. The recipe is very simple, but the end result is a delicious holiday treat.
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The roasting sleeve is a very handy device. The poultry will be stewed in its own juice, and the baking sheet will remain clean. And to get a golden brown crust, shortly before the end of cooking, the sleeve must be carefully cut.
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You can stuff a bird for a festive dish with anything, say experienced chefs. One of the commonly used ingredients is potato, which tastes great with meat. This dish can be served with sauerkraut, pickles, any vegetable salad.
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Many cooks use cereals when cooking poultry, and buckwheat porridge is no exception. ”Duck stuffed with buckwheat in the oven is quite simple to cook. The groats must be boiled in salted water in advance (1 cup of buckwheat per 2.5 cups).
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For those who do not want to cut the carcass after cooking, you can prepare a dish from pieces of duck breast. Duck fillet in the oven can be combined with any side dish, and you can bake it with ginger and honey - delicious and concise.
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A popular poultry recipe from French cuisine is duck baked with oranges. The meat will turn out to be very tender and soft, and a crispy, ruddy crust will appear on top. You can add apples or any side dish if you like.
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Check out recipes like.
One of the most famous recipes is Peking duck. For cooking, it will be necessary to prepare poultry fillets, honey and a special dressing. The sauce is called "Hoisin", and it's easy to make it at home: you just need to mix sesame oil, soy sauce, wine vinegar, chili, and Chinese five spices.
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An excellent product that can be stuffed with poultry is regular long-grain rice, it will serve as a side dish.Duck with rice in the oven is quite simple to cook, and you need a minimum of ingredients.
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A variant of the dish for the festive table is duck in the oven with apples and prunes. These ingredients will add juiciness and tenderness to the meat. The best way is to use a roasting sleeve, so the meat will cook in its own juice.
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Here are some helpful tips from professional chefs on how to marinate duck for oven baking:
Duck has always been a signature dish on any table, especially on New Year's, and on the eve of the upcoming holidays, the topic of the best marinade for cooking this delicious bird becomes especially relevant.
Below we will tell you how you can marinate a duck for roasting in the oven and offer a recipe for making stuffed poultry with apples.
Ingredients:
Preparation
Cooking duck marinade. Add chicken seasoning, marjoram, basil, ground red and black pepper, salt to the odorless vegetable oil and squeeze six to seven cloves of pre-peeled garlic through a press, add the juice of one orange and mix.
While the marinade is infused, process the duck carcass. We rinse it, if necessary, get rid of the entrails, rinse and dry again. Rub the poultry generously with the prepared spicy mixture inside and out, and then put it in a bag along with the rest of the marinade and place in a cool place for several hours.
Immediately before baking, turn on the oven to warm up, setting it to a temperature of 220 degrees, and prepare the filling for the duck. Grind the giblets, we get rid of the apples and the core and cut into medium-sized slices or cubes and sprinkle with lemon juice, clean the remaining garlic and chop the plates. Mix apples with giblets and garlic, add marjoram, basil, pepper and salt, mix and fill the duck belly with the resulting mass. Then we sew the skin with a thread or chop it off with toothpicks.
We line a baking sheet or a large form with several sheets of foil, put orange mugs on the bottom, place the stuffed duck carcass on top, cover with two sheets of foil and seal.
We put the dish in an already preheated oven, bake for twenty minutes, and then reduce the heat to 180 degrees and cook for another two hours. Now remove the top sheet of foil and bake the duck for another forty minutes, periodically pouring over the released juices.
When ready, put the rosy bird on a dish and decorate with herbs and fresh oranges.
Ingredients:
Preparation
We prepare the marinade first. To do this, clean and squeeze the garlic, mix it with salt, add ground ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon and pepper, mix and add honey and vegetable oil. We grind the mass well with a crush or punch it white with a blender. Now pour in wine and wine vinegar and mix until smooth.
We rub the properly prepared duck carcass on all sides with the prepared wine mixture, put in a rooster or other container and pour the remnants of the marinade on top. Ideally, when the duck will be marinated during the day, but if you do not have time, you can start baking in twelve hours. During the entire soaking time, periodically turn the carcass over to the other side.
When starting to bake the duck in the oven, be sure to blot it from the moisture of the marinade with napkins. The process of cooking in the oven itself is identical to that described in the previous recipe, with the exception that after removing the foil, in this case, the duck will need to be watered with the remaining marinade.
Sooner or later, each hostess is faced with the need to set the table for a considerable number of people. Anniversary of a husband, graduation daughter or son, Christmas or New Year - but you never know there are reasons! And you always want the dishes to be not only tasty, but also beautiful, so that the feast would please the guests, and the spouse could be proud that he has such a skillful wife.
Almost a month before the planned celebration, a menu is written, kilometer-long lists of products that need to be purchased are compiled, the serving of dishes, table decoration, decorating desserts are thought out ... In a word, the mouth is full of hassle. And, of course, a rare holiday goes without meat. And here, too, I want to surprise the guests with something, so cutlets, chops in breadcrumbs and French-style pork are swept aside immediately, like familiar and a little boring dishes.
An ideal option that can amaze friends and family and become a signature dish on the table is baked duck. You just need to choose a specimen of this tasty and satisfying bird that is suitable by weight and find a decent recipe that describes in detail how to properly marinate a duck. After all, it is usually in the marinade that the secret of tenderness and exquisite taste of any meat is contained. Consider that you have already come to the right place! Today we'll just talk about how to deliciously marinate duck.
Naturally, you must first buy it. Here we will allow ourselves to give some practical advice, thanks to which you will calmly choose the best duck on the market, and not a single merchant can deceive you, passing off as a fat duck a specimen that died of old age two weeks ago. First, the bird should weigh approximately 2-2.5 kilograms.
This ensures that she is young, which means that she is devoid of the characteristic duck smell, which is not to everyone's liking. Secondly, ducks, it turns out, are of the egg-laying type and the meat type. You need the second - such a bird has more tender and tasty meat. Thirdly, in the context of the duck meat should have a rich dark red color. Following these simple recommendations, you will certainly acquire such a duck, which will be easy and pleasant to cook, and even more so to feast on it.
Now - directly about how to marinate duck for baking. There are an infinite number of recipes, but for a celebration, of course, the most original ones are needed. We suggest you figure out how to marinate a Peking duck. This is one of the most famous dishes of Chinese cuisine, one might say, the visiting card of the Middle Kingdom. It is served with tortillas, two sauces and onions, and, as a rule, guests unanimously recognize the bird cooked in this way as the queen of the table.
So, how to marinate a Peking duck. For this, in addition to the duck itself, you will need: sugar - 2 tbsp. l., soy sauce - 5 tbsp. l., honey - 1 tbsp. l., sunflower or olive oil - 1 tbsp. l., hot water. It should be noted that the bird is pickled according to this recipe for a long time, so it must be made in advance. So, the duck (of course, gutted and prepared) should be thoroughly washed under hot water. Rub a little with salt, not forgetting that the soy sauce is also salty. Mix sugar in a bowl, 4 tbsp. l. soy sauce and add a small amount of boiling water to them - enough so that the mixture is enough for grating the duck.
Thoroughly coat the bird with marinade and put it on a bottle or jar. Substitute a deep dish under it or put the entire structure in a saucepan - this is necessary in order to drain the excess sauce. Now you can forget about the duck for the next 12 hours (or better at night) - it should be soaked in the mixture and dry a little so that a delicious crispy crust forms during baking.
If the bird does not fit in the refrigerator, you can take it to the balcony. However, these are not all the secrets of how to marinate duck for the oven. After the required time has passed, mix the liquid honey with the remaining spoonful of soy sauce and vegetable oil. If your honey is thick, it should be melted in a water bath. Rub the duck well again with the mixture and this time leave it for forty minutes or an hour. That's all! Now you know how to pickle Peking duck, and you can easily cope with this task. Next, it's just a small matter - preheat the oven to 180 degrees, place the bird on the wire rack, and under it set a baking sheet onto which the juice will drain. Let the duck bake like this for about half an hour.
After that it should be turned over and baked for another 15-20 minutes. Then put it back on the back, increase the temperature to 220 degrees and finally bake until golden brown. It will take about 15 minutes more. When serving, it is cut into neat slices so that each of them will certainly have a crispy crust. Two sauces are relied on such a duck: one is ketchup mixed with squeezed garlic and mustard, the second is soy sauce mixed with garlic. Believe me, the guests will lick their fingers and will certainly ask how to pickle a duck in the Chinese style. And it's up to you to reveal this secret to them or keep it with you!
If you have a catastrophic lack of time, there is an easier option for how to marinate duck for the oven. You will need 2-3 tbsp. l. hot mustard, 2-3 tbsp. l. liquid honey, salt and pepper to taste. The bird should be washed, dried with a paper towel and rubbed well inside and outside with salt and pepper. Then mix mustard and honey in equal proportions and coat the duck with marinade on all sides.
After that, it can be immediately sent to the oven. Place the bird on a baking sheet with its back facing down, and before placing it to bake, add a glass of water. From time to time you need to look into the oven and water the duck with the resulting juice. The poultry cooked according to this recipe turns out to be juicy, tender, aromatic and, importantly, the time required is minimal. Serve it whole, with fresh vegetables as a side dish. Guests will certainly appreciate your efforts and will make hundreds of compliments to the baked beauty and your ability to cook delicious dishes.
We hope the recipes presented will be useful to you. Bon appetit, and let the holiday be bright and memorable!