A cool article in the NYT a few weeks ago highlighted the ancient flavor enhancing and food preserving technique of smoking. Bonus – the article cited research that says smoking is relatively safe compared to BBQ since you do not char the food. It’s the burnt bits of meat that are implicated in cancers.
I do love lightly smoked foods – especially using the Chinese technique of smoking foods with tea.
For our Chinese New Year’s family dinner last night I made tea smoked duck legs. I’m proud to say that Mom declared them “really good.” While I don’t have a formally measured out recipe here is a sketch for the benefit of dear sis (who made incredible seared diver scallops with black bean sauce and a red bean mochi cake – yum! And sil made the traditional Korean New Year dumpling (mandu) and rice noodle (duk) soup…double yum!)
I marinated eight duck legs overnight with Shao Hsing wine, soy, sea salt, five spice, grated ginger, some orange peels and a pinch of allspice.
For the smoking mix I combined 1/4 c each brown rice, brown sugar and oolong tea (other teas that would work: jasmine, lychee) with a broken up 3″ cinnamon stick, 2 broken up star anise, 8 cloves, a few pieces of orange peels and a big pinch of chili flakes.
For my smoker I used a disposable aluminum half hotel pan with a rack. I place the smoking mix directly on the bottom of the pan and laid a loose piece of foil over the smoking mix to prevent the duck drippings from falling directly onto the smoking mix. I put the rack over this and lay the duck legs on the rack. Then I sealed the pan with foil.
I happen to have a portable stove so did the smoking part outside – key to avoiding divorce court since we don’t have an exhaust hood! I put the pan onto the burner on high heat. When I saw a few whisps of smoke escape from the edges of my smoker I turned down the heat to medium and smoked for 25 minutes. Then I turned off the heat and let it rest for another 10 minutes.
Phew! This is a lot of work!
Ok now I took the duck legs and coated in this glaze: 1/4 c hoisin sauce, 2 T pomegranate molasses (a good sub is 1 T honey), 1/2 tsp of grated ginger, 1/4 tsp of ground sichuan peppercorns, 1 tsp of orange zest, a splash of soy, a splash of balsamic and sriracha chili sauce to taste. Really, any favorite glaze will do here.
The final step: Finishing in the oven. I put the duck legs on a rack on a sheet pan and roasted in an 300F oven for 45 minutes to an hour. This step is to finish cooking the duck legs while rendering some of the duck fat and crisping up the skin. Sometimes I will put under the broiler for a few minutes to brown the skin if the skin is a tad too light. After removing from the oven I brushed on some more glaze.
These were a bit hard to serve for a family style dinner – I just separated the thigh from the leg and put on a platter. No one was shy though and just grabbed a leg or thigh and started chomping away.
I’ve done this with salmon (leaving out the finishing in the oven step, just brush on some glaze after it comes out of the smoker) cornish game hens and pork ribs. Next time I am going to use boneless duck breast from Liberty Ducks which I saw up at Baron Meats on Claremont Ave in Berkeley.
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[…] Smoking it A cool article in the NYT a few weeks ago highlighted the ancient flavor enhancing and food preserving technique of smoking. Bonus – the article cited research that says smoking is relatively safe compared to BBQ since you do not char the food. It s the burnt bits of meat that are implicated in cancers. I do love lightly smoked foods – especially using the Chinese technique of smoking foods with tea. For our Chinese New Year s family dinner last night I made tea smoked duck legs. I m proud to say that Mom declared them really good. While I don t have a formally measured out recipe here is a sketch for the benefit of dear sis (who made incredible seared diver scallops with black bean sauce and a red bean mochi cake – yum! And sil made the traditional Korean New Year dumpling (mandu) and rice noodle (duk) soup double yum!) I marinated eight duck legs overnight with Shao Hsing wine, soy, sea salt, five spice, grated ginger, some orange peels and a pinch of allspice. For the smoking mix I combined 1/4 c each brown rice, brown sugar and oolong tea (other teas that would work: jasmine, lychee) with a broken up 3 cinnamon stick, 2 broken up star anise, 8 cloves, a few pieces of orange peels and a big pinch of chili flakes. For my smoker I used a disposable aluminum half hotel pan with a rack. I place the smoking mix directly on the bottom of the pan and laid a loose piece of foil over the smoking mix to prevent the duck drippings from falling directly onto the smoking mix. I put the rack over this and lay the duck legs on the rack. Then I sealed the pan with foil. I happen to have a portable stove so did the smoking part outside – key to avoiding divorce court since we don t have an exhaust hood! I put the pan onto the burner on high heat. When I saw a few whisps of smoke escape from the edges of my smoker I turned down the heat to medium and smoked for 25 minutes. Then I turned off the heat and let it rest for another 10 minutes. Phew! This is a lot of work! Ok now I took the duck legs and coated in this glaze: 1/4 c hoisin sauce, 2 T pomegranate molasses (a good sub is 1 T honey), 1/2 tsp of grated ginger, 1/4 tsp of ground sichuan peppercorns, 1 tsp of orange zest, a splash of soy, a splash of balsamic and sriracha chili sauce to taste. Really, any favorite glaze will do here. The final step: Finishing in the oven. I put the duck legs on a rack on a sheet pan and roasted in an 300F oven for 45 minutes to an hour. This step is to finish cooking the duck legs while rendering some of the duck fat and crisping up the skin. Sometimes I will put under the broiler for a few minutes to brown the skin if the skin is a tad too light. After removing from the oven I brushed on some more glaze. These were a bit hard to serve for a family style dinner – I just separated the thigh from the leg and put on a platter. No one was shy though and just grabbed a leg or thigh and started chomping away. I ve done this with salmon (leaving out the finishing in the oven step, just brush on some glaze after it comes out of the smoker) cornish game hens and pork ribs. Next time I am going to use boneless duck breast from Liberty Ducks which I saw up at Baron Meats on Claremont Ave in Berkeley. […]