Wild Duck

[Dakota Slim 1,087]

My favorite way to cook wild ducks is to stuff them with apples and celery and slow roast them in the oven for a couple hours while basting them with beer, wine & whiskey. Then, about 1/2 hour before they are finished cooking I dump out the apples and celery and rinse the cavity with beer before basting them again and putting them back in the oven. 
Wild rice is a great side dish -- especially If you can get some real wild rice from Minnesota. Add a can of chicken broth to the wild rice when you cook it and add a stick of butter when it's done.

If you don't want to go through all that trouble - or maybe want to eat some in camp and bring your max possession limit home -- you can breast them and fry them in a pan while sautéing them with beer, wine and whiskey. Serve the breasts with plain old white rice and sweet & sour sauce.  

[nugget108 1,747]

We smoke the whole duck then eat it with a homemade wild berry sauce. Or we will breast them out and smoke them with bacon wrapped around the breast chunks. Or take a whole mallard breast, butterfly it, then fill it with jalapeno cream cheese and wrap with bacon. That was dinner 3 nights ago. Mmmm...

[pondmn 265]

We breast our ducks and geese and take them to the butcher and have them made into pepper sticks..  yummy

[nugget108 1,747]

10 minutes ago, pondmn said:

We breast our ducks and geese and take them to the butcher and have them made into pepper sticks..  yummy

We make pounds and pounds of goose jerky. We cut it thin on the meat slicer, let it cure in High Mountain jerky seasoning and then throw it in the dehydrator. If we cut it thin, its easier to find the pellets which leads up to less broken teeth haha. And the ol GoldBug2 is awesome for finding the steel shot too.

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

I tried smoking duck. It made me cough and ruined a good pipe. 

I don't hunt or eat duck often. But I like duck (and quail) roasted in the oven with butter and bacon fat. I roll them around in the fat while they cook. A few minutes before I figure they are done (which is either long before or long after they are actually done) I'll snuggle them down into a baking dish of stuffing and bake a while longer. How much longer depends on how hungry I am at the time.

If you can get your stuffing at a Wal Mart in northern Wisconsin it is best. They have a special brand up there called "Stove Top". It's exquisite 

The duck tastes a lot like oysters to me. I like the shellfish seasoning it has naturally. With enough butter and bacon fat it is really good. I think keeping it slathered in fat and not overclocking it is the secret to any bird.

A bird like a duck is probably better cooked with the skin on isn't it? Do you experienced Duck hunters pluck your ducks?

[Stillweaver hillbelli 325]

4 hours ago, Bedrock Bob said:

They have a special brand up there called "Stove Top". It's exquisite 

 

Ahem. The secret to stuffing isn't the brand, but the sauteed celery  Onion, garlic and generous loading of minced sausage added to whatever breadcrumbs and seasonings you prefer.

After incorporating all ingredients,  and baking, stuff the steaming goodness into your bird(andbake).

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

4 minutes ago, Stillweaver hillbelli said:

Ahem. The secret to stuffing isn't the brand, but the sauteed celery  Onion, garlic and generous loading of minced sausage added to whatever breadcrumbs and seasonings you prefer.

After incorporating all ingredients,  and baking, stuff the steaming goodness into your bird(andbake).

So do you pluck your duck or skin your bird?

[Stillweaver hillbelli 325]

43 minutes ago, Bedrock Bob said:

So do you pluck your duck or skin your bird?

At the most, spatchcock it for the smoker. The feathers provide fiber

[nugget108 1,747]

Picking the whole duck really sucks!! But when we smoke them whole, we do it. Thats the only time we leave the skin on. The rest of our recipes we use, we just cut the meat from the bone.

[BMc 1,044]

Hard to beat a lightly brined rotisserie roasted duck basted with green peppercorn sauce and glaze of choice with wild rice on the side . . .

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

Brined. Yep. I just learned that trick. 

It sure makes a difference in how moist things are.

So do you pluck your duck Mac? I bet you are a duck plucker. A bird brining duck plucker.

Edited January 17 by Bedrock Bob
I see skin in your photo. Don't try to deny it.

[Stillweaver hillbelli 325]

There's always the Yardbird Chicken Plucker(after scalding the bird real good to clean and soften up things).

It looks lik a small washing machine ,built for spin cycle only, and full of rubber fingers that do the plucking.

Looks like it's  takes all of 5 seconds  to do the job( for a chicken). Could be there are designs for duck with their many more feathers.

Cabela's has a vid "How to  pluck a duck" involving wax to get the feathers and down.

"Can't make the "Tee" time, today, gotta wax my duck."

Edited January 17 by Stillweaver hillbelli

[Stillweaver hillbelli 325]

3 hours ago, BMc said:

Hard to beat a lightly brined rotisserie roasted duck basted with green peppercorn sauce and glaze of choice with wild rice on the side . . .

Yumm! Dry brine?

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

14 hours ago, Stillweaver hillbelli said:

 

It looks lik a small washing machine ,built for spin cycle only, and full of rubber fingers that do the plucking.

 

Sounds like a great birthday gift for Slim. 

We should take up a collection to get him a duck plucker so he isn't sitting in his RV skinning his bird all day.

[Morlock 1,730]

22 hours ago, BMc said:

Hard to beat a lightly brined rotisserie roasted duck basted with green peppercorn sauce and glaze of choice with wild rice on the side . . .

I've tried many types of meat..some pretty exotic. Does duck taste like chicken?

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

To me it tastes more like quail or turkey. And it often has a shellfish taste from the stuff they eat. 

I have eaten it at an oriental restaraunt and it was fantastic. It was probably a domestic duck. It was completely different than any wild duck I have ever eaten. So I guess the taste depends on the duck as well as the cook.

 

[Dakota Slim 1,087]

23 hours ago, nugget108 said:

Picking the whole duck really sucks!! But when we smoke them whole, we do it. Thats the only time we leave the skin on. The rest of our recipes we use, we just cut the meat from the bone.

This is what is called the North Dakota Jerk....

 

[Stillweaver hillbelli 325]

56 minutes ago, Bedrock Bob said:

 

I have eaten it at an oriental restaraunt and it was fantastic. It was probably a domestic duck. 

 

It was a Peking duck

[nugget108 1,747]

45 minutes ago, Dakota Slim said:

This is what is called the North Dakota Jerk....

 

I have been hunting ducks and geese for 32 years and have been a waterfowl guide for a big chunk of that. I have NEVER seen that!!!! Wow!! I just showed my 2 boys and they thought the same...WOW! To just the common duck hunter who goes out a few times a season, they might not see a genius here. But to those of us who clean ALOT every year, dang. New technique for sure.

Thanks Slim!

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

2 minutes ago, Stillweaver hillbelli said:

It was a Peking duck

No, I don't think so. It was a Thai dish that used the one duck for about 6 different dishes. It took all night to eat it. They cooked it and served the skin in one dish (musta been duck pluckers), the breast in a few ways and the legs and the rest in a soup. They even used some of the innards and a duck egg to make a sauce.

It was some traditional Thai holiday feast. It had a name about a mile long.

[nugget108 1,747]

1 hour ago, Morlock said:

I've tried many types of meat..some pretty exotic. Does duck taste like chicken?

Every duck species has a different taste. Some are stronger tasting than others, just like any other wild game. Personally my favorites are Teal, Sprig and Wood ducks. They mainly eat seeds and grains so they dont get a fishy taste like the diver ducks sometimes get.

[Bedrock Bob 4,061]

4 minutes ago, nugget108 said:

I have been hunting ducks and geese for 32 years and have been a waterfowl guide for a big chunk of that. I have NEVER seen that!!!! Wow!! I just showed my 2 boys and they thought the same...WOW! To just the common duck hunter who goes out a few times a season, they might not see a genius here. But to those of us who clean ALOT every year, dang. New technique for sure.

Thanks Slim!

That is exactly how I was taught to do dove and quail. I just clip the wings at the joint. 

I don't start the pull in the center of the breast though. I pull from the bottom of the breast up. Like pulling off a tee shirt.

I do turkey just like that too. They never peel as easy though. The next time I'm going to try to do it from the center of the breast just like the video. I bet a turkey will almost jump out of his skin if you did it that way.

[nugget108 1,747]

22 minutes ago, Bedrock Bob said:

That is exactly how I was taught to do dove and quail. I just clip the wings at the joint. 

I don't start the pull in the center of the breast though. I pull from the bottom of the breast up. Like pulling off a tee shirt.

I do turkey just like that too. They never peel as easy though. The next time I'm going to try to do it from the center of the breast just like the video. I bet a turkey will almost jump out of his skin if you did it that way.

Oh heck yeah, dove and quail we clean that way. Just his whole process is sweet. Redhead ducks are some of the hardest the clean too.

[Dakota Slim 1,087]

40 minutes ago, nugget108 said:

Every duck species has a different taste. Some are stronger tasting than others, just like any other wild game. Personally my favorites are Teal, Sprig and Wood ducks. They mainly eat seeds and grains so they dont get a fishy taste like the diver ducks sometimes get.

I like teal and woodies but a big old greenhead is my favorite. In the midwest, many ducks (especially mallards) and geese feed in picked corn fields. That fattens them up and makes for a great taste. Same thing with the deer, but they don't wait for the corn to be picked. They are in there as soon as the cobs are ripe.

[nugget108 1,747]

Slim there is nothing better than a flock of big fat greenheads dropping into the decoys. I love eating mallards too, but when all the grain fields and corn fields are all ate off i have shot lots of mallards that have resorted to eating minnows. I will never pass up a big fat greenhead!!