Duck pie

Today we present a dish that is as forceful as it is daring, tasty and surprising. It is brought to us by Eva, author of Bake-Street , who prepares us a Duck Pie (or duck pie) in a black sesame dough that will serve you for so many other cakes.

The duck pie is a cake with a unique flavor, also different since we are not used to eating duck on a day-to-day basis. This recipe has all the characteristics to make it an ideal recipe for family gatherings!

Many times we have to receive friends or family at home and it is difficult for us to decide what to prepare, not to mention that we have to get up early so that the food is ready when they arrive.

And if I tell you, can we prepare this wonderful Duck Pie the day before, well two if we count the marinade of the meat, and on the big day we will only have to spend a few minutes to decorate it? As you read it, a perfect second course (because I see it as powerful as the first course), different, tasty, aromatic and very striking.

To present it , this ceramic mold by Emile Henry is perfect, it has a good diameter and is quite tall, allowing us to make a generous filling. We can also cut the cake, in the same mold and remove the portions without the dough adhering to it. Not to mention how precious it is to present it.

This Bertinet recipe has been very popular at home, in fact it reminds them a lot of the flavor of pate. If it were the case that we have some cake left over, we can refrigerate it and consume it over 6-7 days without problems.

Ingredients (for a 28 cm diameter mold, 12 servings)

FOR THE BLACK SESAME DOUGH:

300 g of wheat flour
150 g cold butter
6g sea salt
1 egg L
40 g of very cold water
4 teaspoons of black sesame (approx. 11 g)

FOR THE FILLING:

500 g of clean and boneless duck thigh, we will need about 800 g approx. (2 thighs)
500 g of lean pork
300 g of cured bacon
6 juniper berries
8 allspice beans crushed in a mortar
1 teaspoon freshly ground green pepper
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
200 g of Port or Jerez
18 shallots, unpeeled
olive oil to confit the shallots, about 700 g approx.
2 eggs L
150 g of light liquid cream
sea ​​salt and freshly ground pepper

FOR THE GELATIN

4 sheets of neutral gelatin
200 g of homemade chicken broth
100 g of Port or Jerez

STOP DECORATE:

3 large purple beets
3 slices of pumpkin, 600 g approx.
Lemon thyme, thyme and fresh rosemary sprigs
flake sea salt
virgin olive oil

ELABORATION

FIRST DAY

Prepare the black sesame dough:

In a bowl we incorporate the flour together with the salt and the black sesame, reserve.

Grate the cold butter to be able to integrate it better. Once it is ready, we add it to the flour mixture and begin to integrate with the fingertips until we obtain a sandy mixture.

Add the egg and mix lightly. Add the very cold water and mix again.

Transfer the dough to a work surface and finish working the dough by making the fraisage. I explain how to do it.

We rest the "heel" of the hand on the dough and slide forward little by little, so that the dough blends together but without obtaining an elastic result. We are not interested in developing gluten to prevent it from swelling.

Once it is homogeneous, we will form a disk, cover it with film and put it in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour. The ideal is to leave it prepared the day before.

We marinate the meat:

We are going to work with duck thighs, so if we are confident with our chicken (and we don't know how to bone very well!) we will ask him to bone both of us and remove the skin. It will advance us work and we will not harm the meat.

Dice the duck meat, the lean pork and the cured bacon. Add to a large bowl and incorporate all the spices, the Port or Jerez (our choice), a little salt and the thyme. Mix very well so that all the meat is seasoned, cover with plastic film and put in the refrigerator until the next day.

We confit the shallots:

To confit the shallots we will need a wide saucepan, about 700 g of olive oil and the unpeeled shallots.

We wash the shallots very well with water, to remove dust and possible dirt, and dry. We put them in a wide saucepan and cover with olive oil, the amount of oil will depend mainly on the size of the shallots.

Pallarès iron knife with boxwood handle

Place over a very low heat, on an induction hob with values ​​from 1-9 we will set it to 3, lightly cover the pan and let it confit very slowly. It will take us around 40-45 minutes.

To know if our shallots are ready, we will only have to prick them with a knife. If it goes in smoothly, they are ready.

Remove from heat, remove with a slotted spoon and let cool completely in a bowl.

Note : The oil in which we have confitted the shallots, we can easily reuse it to fry potatoes for example, it will give them a very peculiar flavor.

SECOND DAY

We prepare the dough:

We must temper the dough for a few minutes before preparing to stretch it, so that we will take it out about 30 minutes before working on it.

We place two baking papers and the dough between them, in this way it will be very easy for us to stretch the dough without it adhering to the work surface and transfer it to the mold. With the help of a rolling pin, stretch the dough until it exceeds the diameter of the mold by about 4-5 cm.

Remove the upper paper, lightly sprinkle the dough with flour, place the mold on the dough trying to center it and turn it over as if it were an omelette. In this way we will place the dough without manipulating it excessively and running the risk of stretching it or adhering to our hands.

We remove the paper and let the dough adjust to the mold. We must not press it to adhere to the mold, just adjust the edges and remove the excess.

We introduce in the cold while we prepare the filling.

Prepare the meat for the filling:

We take the marinated meat out of the cold and proceed to grind it in a meat grinder. If we don't have it at home, we can do two things: when we buy it, chop it for us, so we'll have it ready, or cut it very finely with a very sharp knife.

Place in a large bowl, reserve.

In a small bowl, mix the cream together with the eggs, beat until the mixture is homogeneous. Pour over the meat, season with salt and pepper, and mix again.

To know if it is well seasoned, we can try the mixture directly or cook a small amount in a small pan , wait for it to temper and then taste it.

Preheat the oven to 180ºC with heat up and down.

While we clean half of the shallots, we reserve the rest to decorate the upper part.

Remove the outer skin and cut the shallots in half lengthwise. We booked.

We remove the mold from the cold and proceed to fill. We will place a little meat and we will arrange the shallots as we fill the mold. Do not mix the shallots with the meat mixture because if you stir it up, the segments will separate and when cutting the cake it will not be as striking. They will be like scattered layers of onion.

Once we have filled the mold, cover it with a sheet of baking paper and put it in the oven for 1 and ½ hours or 1 and ¾ hours. We must make sure before removing it that the meat is fully cooked.

When there are 30 minutes left to finish cooking, we will remove the baking paper so that the dough browns.

Remove the pan from the oven and let it cool completely. It can be around 2 hours.

Prepare the Porto jelly:

Fill a small bowl with very cold water and add the gelatin sheets to hydrate them.

In a saucepan we add the chicken broth, if it is made at home much better, together with the Porto. Place over medium heat and leave until it starts to boil. We remove from the heat.

Remove the gelatin leaves, drain very well and introduce into the hot mixture. Mix very well with the help of some rods until they are completely dissolved.

Let the mixture warm a bit before pouring it over the cake.

You will notice that the meat has separated a bit from the dough, nothing happens. Pour the gelatin over the cake, and that hole will be filled by the gelatin. We put the mold in the fridge until the gelatin settles, it will take around 4 hours.

We can leave it until the next day, the flavor will improve a lot thanks to its maturation.

THIRD DAY

We prepare the top decoration:

Place the beets whole and unpeeled in a saucepan, cover with water and leave over medium heat for around 25 minutes. We must cook them but without being too tender, when introducing a knife , it must enter but put up a little resistance.

Remove from the heat, remove from the pan and let cool on a platter.

In another separate saucepan cook the pumpkin. Cut into thick slices, without removing the shell, cover with water and place over medium heat. It will take less time to be ready, around 18-20 minutes. Be careful that it doesn't get too soft.

Remove and let cool on a platter.

Preheat the oven to 200ºC with heat up and down. Prepare a large baking dish and line with paper.

Cut the beetroot in half and from this half we will get 4 segments. We repeat the process with the rest of the beetroot.

Prepare the pumpkin, remove the rind and cut the slice in half. Then we will cut into squares.

Place on the baking tray, drizzle with a drizzle of olive oil (it can be the one we reserved from the shallots), season with flake salt and arrange a few sprigs of lemon thyme, thyme and rosemary.

We bake around 17-20 minutes. We take out and let it temper.

While we clean the rest of the shallots, we remove the outer skin and cut in half lengthwise. We booked.

Emile Henry ceramic mold and Pallarès kitchen knife with beech handle

We decorate the cake:

Arrange the beetroot segments, the pumpkin and the candied shallots alternately on the surface. We decorate with some branches of thyme and rosemary and we already have our Duck Pie ready to enjoy.

Enjoy!