X

Grilled Duck Breast on a Honey Roasted Carrot-Farro-Herb Salad with Cider Jus

grilled_duck_breastMakes 4 servings

Suggested Accompaniment

Serve with a pinot noir

Ingredients
Two 12-ounce Muscovy Duck breasts
Honey Roasted Carrot Farro Salad (recipe below)
Cider Jus (recipe below)

Directions
First score the fat side of the breast by making shallow, crosswise cuts. (This helps the fat melt away into the pan.) Season the breasts well with kosher salt and finely ground black
pepper.

Heat a heavy bottomed skillet, preferably cast iron, on a grill over medium heat until very hot. Add the duck breast. skin side down and cook for 5-7 minutes or so, rendering the skin crispy. Turn the
duck over and cook it for a minute or two on the meat side, basting it with some of the fat from the pan. Transfer the duck, meat side down, directly on to the grill for 1 minute. Remove and let rest for 5-10 minutes.

Mound a kitchen spoonful of the Honey Roasted Carrot-Farro-Herb Salad in the middle of each plate. Then slice the duck breasts in thin strips across the breast, fan half a breast over each mound of salad
and spoon a liberal amount of the Cider Jus over the duck.

Roasted Carrots-Farro-Herb Salad
Ingredients
½ cup honey
2 pounds carrots, peeled and slant-cut on a bias as well as turning them as you cut. They should look like triangles
1 teaspoon cumin seed
2 medium red onions, julienne (1/4” thin strips)
1 tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped
2 tablespoons lemon juice
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
1 cup raw Farro, (cook for 15 minutes in water then drain)
¼ cup toasted pistachios
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
¼ cup whole tarragon leaves
½ cup whole parsley leaves
1 cup baby arugula
several chives, cut into 1-inch lengths
several chive blossoms, broken into pieces (optional)
several borage flowers (optional)

Directions
In a large skillet on high heat boil the honey until it thickens and starts to turn a dark amber color. Add the carrots, salt and pepper to taste and the cumin seed. (The carrots will very quickly start to
exude liquid.) Add the onions and thyme, reduce the heat and cook for 10-15 minutes until the carrots are cooked and almost all of the liquid has been absorbed or boiled off. Transfer to a bowl, add the
lemon juice, olive oil, faro, pistachios, vinegar, tarragon, parsley, arugula, chives, chive blossoms, borage and salt and pepper to taste.

Cider Jus
Ingredients
2 cups apple cider
1 cup chicken broth
2 tablespoon minced shallots
2 sprigs of thyme
1 teaspoon anise seed or 2 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1 stick of unsalted butter, cut in small pieces, kept cold
juice 1 lemon
salt and pepper to taste

Directions
Place cider, broth, shallots, thyme, spices and vinegar in a heavy medium saucepan. Bring mixture to a boil and then reduce to a simmer and cook until mixture is reduced to about 3/4 cup of liquid
remaining, about 20 minutes. Whisk in the butter a few pieces at a time. Season with lemon juice, salt and pepper. Strain, pressing on solids to extract liquid. Discard solids.

Cook’s Notes
I asked Joey to recommend his favorite California brands of olive oil and honey and he responded: “I know it won’t be a big discovery for many people, but I really like McEvoy and Davero olive oils and Marshall’s Honey.”

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Sponsors

3 Responses to Grilled Duck Breast on a Honey Roasted Carrot-Farro-Herb Salad with Cider Jus


  1. Marvelous and wonderful inspiration for trying new food. Thank you Sara Moulton And Joey Altman.

  2. Jan Currey says:

    Can the cider sauce be made in advance?

    • moulton says:

      You can prepare the sauce up to the point of adding the butter. Then when it is time to finish the sauce just reheat it and whisk in the butter.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*  
  

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.