Peking Duck

I started the idea of documenting my cooking since "shelter in place" started back in March, and it's only fitting we kick off the site with this recipe! :)

Every time Aaron and I go back to Taiwan, we always have to visit his favorite peking duck restaurant, not once, not twice, but at least 3-4 times. For a quick 10 day visit, that's a lot of duck! The allure of peking duck is definitely worth 13 hours of plane ride.

With shelter in place, I find myself more willing to try and experience dishes I have never tried before. So when I see Mary's duck for $16 for a whole duck, I said: hell yeah!

The secret of peking duck is really the crispy skin. When you eat peking duck at a real Chinese restaurant, the chef will carve the duck table side. They wrap the duck skin in this paper thing pancake with thinly sliced cucumber and scallion, and then this fragrant sauce puts the whole thing over the top.

I have thought about making peking duck in the past, but it sounded super daunting and my quest on finding easy recipe has not been successful. Also I can pretty much always find restaurant or Asian supermarket to help satisfy the cravings, but that's not the case now! So after researching and watching a ton of youtube videos, I decided it's time for me to embark on my peking duck journey.

First step is to boil the duck skin. You can just boil a kettle of water, and then rinse the duck skin (everywhere including under the wings...etc) front and back total 3 times. After that, pat the skin dry and that's when you apply the layer of honey water (honey, water, and Chinese wine, I don't have Chinese wine on hand so I used sake) all over the skin. And then it's time to "dry" the duck. I put the duck on a wine bottle, and this process needs at least 6 hours. You can do it first thing in the morning and it will be ready for dinner.

While you are waiting, pre-heat the oven to 400 degrees. When the "drying" process is complete, the skin would feel like a thin layer of dried out glue. Rub the inside of the duck cavity with salt and five spice powder, and then stuff the duck with aromatics (1/2 an apple and 1 orange), lower the oven temp to 350 and put the duck in breast side up for 40 minutes. After 40 minutes, turn the duck around for 20 extra minutes, wrap the tips of wings and legs with tin foil. Last, turn the duck around breast side up again for 20 minutes. My duck is around 4lbs, the roasting time will need to get adjusted accordingly based on the size of your duck.

Duck has a lot of fat, when you are roasting it, put a thin layer of tin foil on the roasting pan to catch the grease/drippings, I will save that to roast potatoes later on. Since the baking time is quite long, add 1/2 a cup of water on top of the tin foil.

Now the duck is ready, remove it from the oven, take the aromatics out. Thinly carved the skin/meat off the breast first, kinda like how you carve a turkey I guess. And then the wings and the legs.

Now you ca enjoy the duck just like this, or you can make the thin pancake and wrap the duck inside it. I have not successfully made the pancakes yet, once I figure out the tips and tricks, I'll share with everyone.

So to summarize, I would say the tricks to peking duck's crispy skin is definitely the boiling and then the drying process. I am going to make it again this weekend, and yes, it's that good!!