Skip to main content
Main

Duck Stew

A stew of a whole duck with carrots, green onions, parsley, eschalots, and stock, roasted then simmered.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Duck Stew

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Truss the duck firmly and roast it half-cooked over a quick fire.

Make the stew

  1. Melt butter in a stewpan and fry the minced eschalots until delicate.

  2. Add the chopped carrots, green onions, and parsley to the stewpan.

  3. Once the duck is half-roasted, place it in the stewpan.

  4. Cover the duck partially with boiling gravy or beef stock.

  5. Stew for 1 to 1.25 hours, turning the duck occasionally.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Carrot + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Duck
Provides the main protein and rich fat that flavours the stewing liquid.
Eschalots
Soften in butter to build a sweet, aromatic base for the stew.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and body to the stewing liquid as they soften.
Boiling gravy or beef stock
Supplies the moist cooking liquid that tenderises the duck during stewing.

The step that matters

Roasting the duck half-cooked before stewing. Roasting first renders some of the duck's fat and sets its skin, so the bird does not turn greasy or pale in the liquid. Stopping at half-cooked lets the slow stew finish the meat gently without drying it out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, parsley, butter, beef):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Parsnipfits about as well
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, parsley, butter, beef. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More duck stew recipes

Wild 21with Green Peas 8with Red Cabbage 4with Peas 3 See all 58 →

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipes