PEKING DUCK WITH PANCAKES AND PLUM SAUCE

Crispy succulent aromatic duck, this can be so easily cooked at home.  Traditional preperations for cooking Peking Duck are very important to the Chinese with air drying the duck before roasting and most importantly separating the skin from the meat by either pumping air between, sometimes with a bicycle pump, or as I saw on the cooking channel yesterday by a chef blowing the skin off the duck meat with his mouth, the reason for this is to allow the fat to render down away from the skin, this in turn gives you really crispy duck skin.

You don't really need to do all this to enjoy this dish at home, this method will give you succulent melt in the mouth duck with super aromatic crispy skin to enjoy wrapped in a pancake with home made plum sauce, spring onions and cucumber.

INGREDIENTS

1whole duck

ground five spice

sea salt

1 pack pancakes

PLUM SAUCE

10 whole plums de-stoned

80g sugar

1/2 tsp five spice

1/2 tsp chilli powder

Zest of one orange

Juice of 1orange

2 tbsp soy sauce

Rub the beautiful duck all over and in the cavity generously with lots of salt and then dust with the five spice powder.  Place in your pre-heated oven 170 degrees, I like to put the duck on the wire shelf in the oven with a tray lower down to catch the rendered duck fat, remove this periodically to stop the fat smoking in the oven, de-canter into a sterilized glass jar and keep in the fridge to use when you next roast potatoes, gorgeous.

Cook for around 2 hours until the meat just falls of the leg bone.  You can serve this duck whole at the table family style where everyone just forks in or you can remove the breasts whole and then carve them, with the rest of the meat from the duck shred and place on the side.  I reserve this duck meat for stir frys and other meals.  To cook the pancakes, place the raw pancakes as a stack in a steamer and cook for approx 3-5minutes, they are quite delicate so be gentle handling them, wrap in a warm tea towel or bamboo steamer if you have one.

THE PLUM SAUCE

Meanwhile while the duck is cooking, make the plum sauce, place the plums in a pan with the sugar, orange juice, zest, five spice, chilli and soy sauce, gently simmer until pulpy, adjust seasoning to taste.  I like to pick out the skins at this point, place in a bowl or jar and leave to cool.

This is such a gorgeous sumptuous family sharing dish, my only advice is double up on dips, pancakes and spring onions so that there is less of crossing over hands while everyone tries to dive in on the duck and plum sauce as fast as possible !