Duck breast with a cep sauce - magrets de canard, sauce aux cepes

This is a classic french dish from the Gascony region, and is great to serve as autumn comes in. This dish really is wonderful, rich and f lavoursome. Ideally served with some steamed potatoes and perhaps a few green beans too!

Ingredients:

2 large boned duck breasts

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

50 g duck fat

50 g shallots, finely chopped

50 ml armagnac

100 ml dry white wine

200 ml Madeira

50 g dried ceps, soaked

25 g unsalted butter

Firstly take the duck breasts and make several incisions on the skin side, deep enough to go through to the fat below the skin, but not so deep as to reach the rich red meat underneath. Rub in plenty of sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and set aside.

Take a good quality saute pan and heat the duck fat over a low heat. Place the duck breasts into the pan, skin side down and cook for a maximum of 8 minutes (remember the heat is not too great, so the cooking is relatively long). Turn the breasts over and cook for a further 6 minutes. We're aiming to have a little pinkness left in the meat, but not rare! Transfer to a serving dish and keep warm.

Remove most of the fat from the pan, and then gently cook the shallots for 2 minutes. Whilst the shallots are cooking mix together the armagnac, wine and madeira and pour half into the pan. Increase the heat and reduce completely until virtually dry. Now add the remaining liquid and the re-hydrated ceps and reduce by half. Now add sufficient water to bring the volume up to 150 ml and cook slowly for a further 10 minutes (you will probably need to add about 100 ml of water).

Slice the duck carefully, ensuring that you retain the juices which should be added to the sauce. Take the sauce and pass it through a fine sieve into a clean pan. Add the butter, whisk and warm through. Serve the duck on individual plates and pour the sauce over and around. 

Serve immediately with steamed potatoes and green beans for a great autumnal treat!

Enjoy!

Comments

[pegasuslegend]

Very nice post thanks for sharing

[Marylou]

Will have to try something like this with my Mock Duck. Sounds yummy.

[Paul]

Marylou, what is mock duck?