On the first Tuesday of every month we like to head down to Guildford High Street to marvel at all the delicious, locally produced foods and compile a recipe for you based on ingredients we have managed to buy- here’s our offering for the March Farmers Market. We try and support businesses by buying some tasty little treats and picking up fantastic fresh food to cook great meals for under £5 a person. Doing this, it shows that you don’t need to break the bank to eat healthy food that is locally grown, sourced, produced and manufactured.
Duck is one of those great meats that is always so full of flavour and tastes delicious when you eat it, but is so rarely available. This may be due to seasons, cost or even lack of inspiration of what to cook it with, so I thought I would rustle up something pretty quick and easy to prove it can be done. I wanted to do a bit of a twist on the classic stir fry, by only using what I could find in the market (with the exception of the Chinese Five Spice and soy sauce) instead of the traditional ingredients. The best thing about cooking oriental food is that so many of the ingredients are interchangeable, so instead of pak choi, water chestnut and bean sprouts, I used classic British greens that tasted just as great along with the duck in oriental orange sauce.
Ingredients:
2 Duck breasts
Bunch of Spring Onions
Small white cabbage/Chinese lettuce
A few broccoli stems
A small bag of spinach
A large orange
Honey
Chinese Five Spice
Soy Sauce
Basmati rice (optional)
Seasoning
Cooking Time: 20 minutes
Serves: 2
Instructions:
- Grate the rind off the orange and put to one side, then cut the orange in half and juice. Mix the juice with a few spoonful’s of honey, a drop of soy sauce and a few dashes of Chinese Five Spice- taste test at this point to check it’s to suit and add more of any of the above if needed.
- Place duck breasts in a frying pan and drizzle most of the orange sauce all over. Sprinkle half of the orange rind over as well and fry for 3-4 minutes on a high heat, before turning breasts and cooking for another 3-4 minutes on the other side.
- If you are choosing to have a side dish of rice with this meal, then now is the time to rinse the basmati, boil the water and put on for approximately 12 minutes.
- Wash all spinach, broccoli, cabbage and spring onions thoroughly and chop off any tough stalks and ends. Cut, rip and tear greens into manageable chunks and add a reasonable amount of oil to a wok.
- Take duck breasts off the heat and place on clean chopping board, keeping the juices in the pan. Using a sharp knife, cut across the duck breasts into 2-3cm slices and leave to rest. The duck should be bright pink in the middle.
- Stir the rice if necessary and add broccoli to the wok on a high heat, adding the cabbage, spinach and spring onions after a couple of minutes. Stir continuously to avoid burning for another 2 minutes. Continue to cook on a lower heat for longer if you like your vegetables less crunchy.
- At this point, if you would like your duck to be very pink, then you can begin to plate up, if not, add the duck back to the pan, adding any orange sauce mixture you have left. Cook on a high heat for a couple of minutes until edges are crispy, sauce has reduced more and meat is less pink.
- Drain the rice and serve on the plate first, before adding your green veg to the side. Place your duck on top and drizzle over any remaining sauce and complete by sprinkling any remaining orange ring all over.
James Martin