I didn't plan to cook a feast yesterday, but that’s what happened.
Duck breasts marinated in allspice, honey, thyme, and orange, seared then finished in the oven. (Thanks Julia and Bruno for the inspiration.)
Potatoes roasted in residual duck fat, rosemary, Aleppo.
Arugula from the garden, a few radishes from the pious Christian farmers, a local greenhouse cuke.
Carrot cake, snow-capped with buttered-cream cheese.
The day before, I yanked the breasts from the freezer, a set of tits still attached to the clavicle, and a flashback to Christmas, when the butcher said, “I don't have just leg quarters for the confit, but I can cut up a whole duck for you.”
As the meat thaws, I see that the nice young man who sold me the whole bird did some knife work too, scoring the cellulite pincushion into a crosshatch pattern.
I'm realizing, as the dimpled fat gurgles in the pan, I probably should have removed the bony undercarriage, jutting and splintered like a ship gone awry. I'm nervous; it's been decades since I met up with a duck in the pan, thirty-year-old me in my whites absorbing every crumb of knowledge in that old brownstone on East Ninety-Second Street.
The fat cackles at me. Relax girl, have a sip of wine. You've got this. Why are you so out of sorts?
Was it the ghost of Easter past rattling, a longing for the branches of my tree, when we would dress up and eat ham?
It had been a day of kitchen mishaps. I was so pleased with the cake batter, chopped dates instead of golden raisins, a generous add of ground ginger for heat. When the timer dings at minute forty-five, I find a cold oven and a confused cake in waiting.
The butter is soft enough to be whipped, or so I think. But when it meets up with the cream cheese, it balks, resisting the marriage with pebble-sized globules, both embarrassing and humbling, and requiring a trip to the store.
The duck is browning nicely, but I'm hard on myself, especially after the earlier flubs.
The potatoes are in the oven, not even close to being done. I take the breasts off the heat and let them idle like gurneys in a hospital corridor.
I’m grouchy. This is not a dish that I know by feel or touch. And we’re taking it to share with friends. And we’re (I’m) running behind.
“Why did I think this was a good idea?” I say to Russ, who always knows when things are not going according to plan in this cook’s head. “I don’t really know what I’m doing. What if the duck doesn’t turn out?”
There’s little he can do to console me, even though I would like him to try.
I turn the breasts skin-side-up and slide the pan into the oven. I decide to play it safe. Five minutes on the timer, then check. Repeat a couple more times. The thermometer says 145 degrees, but I don’t believe it.
We pack everything up, apron still around my waist. He drives. I brood.
The duck needs more time. But our friend has one of those fancy toaster ovens. Everything is going to be fine. Everything IS fine.
The knife glides through the meat. You can taste the allspice and thyme. It’s lovely. My ego rescued. But why it needed saving in the first place is the food for these thoughts.
You write like a dream - a smooth recipe of the perfectly honed phrases, much like you manhandling unruly ingredients in your kitchen and turning them into a feast. I am beyond honoured you should link to me. I don't deserve it. You are so much the better cook. Thank you.
Aww - you little honey bunny! It's just like Julia said. I'm always feeling right at home inside your head and your heart as you share both without the least bit of pretense or hesitation. The chasm that artists tend to fall into is really only a single-minded, determined desire to have everything come out just as we imagined, if not better. That scary chasm becomes a soft, delightful pastel mist where we friends meet. Takes so much practice to go with the flow, but you are always swirling along perfectly, never forgetting the most important things in life. xxoo