Duck ragu
If you’re a bit nervous about cooking with duck, this is a great recipe to get you started – completely failproof. With slow cooking, the duck just falls off the bone, and is SO tender and delicious. Duck is a great protein – with about five times the iron of chicken, as well as more vitamin A. This recipe comes from the folk at Luv-a-Duck, but after making it myself, I can confirm it’s a keeper! I also threw in some cherry tomatoes because I had them handy.
Ingredients
4 Roast Duck Legs (you can buy these pre-roasted leg with thigh pieces ready to use)
3⁄4 cup duck Stock (or whichever stock you have on hand)
2 tbsp duck fat
1 brown onion, diced
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 carrot, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
2 tsp thyme leaves
1⁄2 cup red wine
400g can chopped tomatoes
2 tbsp tomato paste
375g fettuccine pasta
Shaved Parmesan cheese, to serve
Method
- Heat duck fat in a large heavy base saucepan. Add duck legs in two batches, skin side down, and cook until browned all over. Transfer to a plate.
- Add onion, garlic, carrot, celery and thyme and cook for 5 minutes or until starting to brown. Pour in wine and simmer for 2 minutes. Return duck legs to pan. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, stock and bring to the boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, covered for 1 1⁄2 hours or until duck falls away easily from the bone. Using tongs, remove the duck legs and roughly shred. Return meat to sauce and discard bones.
- Cook pasta in plenty of boiling water until al dente. Serve with duck ragu sauce and shaved Parmesan.
