Succulent Roast Duck Breast

For a long time I have been thinking about trying a duck roast, but I didn't want to tackle the whole bird. I went to our local butcher in Lindfield and asked him for a nice fresh duck breast piece. Our nice butcher cleaned and scored it for me. There I was carrying the freshest meat in a brown bag, dogs following me as I got home with this little treasure I had :-). I left it to rest in the fridge for a while. I wanted to surprise my husband for dinner so I thought, I will keep everything ready and cook the duck just before he ate, so that its nice, hot and moist. I was still contemplating how I was going to plate up, so I decided finally to make them into wraps. I think the duck turned out quite well, I couldn't get a moment to take a picture of the wraps they were gone in no time :)
If you are suitably excited and hungry, here is what you need. Frankly I just went to pantry and went mad with spices and sauces I had, this is a bit of an Asian and Middle Eastern fusion.

Serves - 2 hungry people
Prep time - 10 mins
Cook time 26 mins.

Ingredients:
2 fresh duck breasts with skin on and scored criss-cross
Soft corn tortilla.

Ingredients for the dry rub:
1/2 teaspoon sweet smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon Szechuan pepper / black pepper
1/2 teaspoon roasted fennel seeds
a big pinch of rock salt
a pinch of dried mint
Crush everything down in a pestal and mortar into a fine powder.

Ingredients for the sauce / glaze:
juice of 3 tangerines
1 tablespoon on pomegranate molasses
1/2 tablespoon golden syrup
1 teaspoon dark soy sauce
a good squeeze of lingam chili sauce - This sweet with a kick, adjust the taste as per your heat tolerance.

Condiments:
Thinly sliced cucumber
Thinly sliced yellow pepper
Thinly sliced spring onion
Thinly  sliced lettuce heart

Roasting the duck breast:

1. Make sure that the duck breast is scored criss-cross through the skin, be careful not to cut through the meat.
2. Rub the dry rub on the duck liberally on both sides.
3. Heat up a non stick pan on a very low heat and put the duck skin side down without any oil.
4. Gradually increase the heat to medium heat and cook the duck skin side down for about 6-7 minutes or until the duck turned golden brown.
5. Turn the duck over and cook the other side for a minute and keep turning until you sear all sides.
6. Transfer the duck, skin side up, in a preheated pan for 18 mins on 200 degrees Celsius fan. I put a stand in the pan so that all the fat drains off in the pan. Don't worry this will not dry out the meat.
7. Take the duck out pour the glaze over and then roast again for 4 mins. save some of the glaze to drizzle over wrap later.
8. This will cook the duck to well done. Cook it for lesser time if you like it rare or medium rare.
9. Let the duck rest for 2-3 mins before you slice it.
10. Slice it into reasonably thick slices.

Put it all together:

1. Warm up the tortilla in the oven on the rack.
2. Stuff the tortilla with sliced duck, cucumber, spring onion, yellow pepper and lettuce ribbons.
3. Drizzle over the left over glaze.
4. Roll the wrap and voilà.. its ready to be savoured :)

You could do several things with this, I chose to make wraps. This will taste equally nice in a stir fry or just by itself on a bed of nice salad. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Bon Apetit!!