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Duck, Braised, with Chestnuts

A braised duck stuffed with chestnuts, onions, and vegetables, simmered in stock and sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Duck, Braised, with Chestnuts

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Boil the chestnuts and remove the skins.

  2. Cook the Spanish onion in stock or water until tender, then chop finely.

  3. Season the chopped onion and chestnuts with salt and pepper, add the egg, and use this mixture to stuff the duck.

  4. Truss the duck and lard it neatly.

Braise the duck

  1. In a large stewpan, heat the butter or fat and add sliced vegetables.

  2. Place the duck on top of the vegetables, cover, and fry gently for about 20 minutes.

  3. Add enough stock to cover the vegetables three-quarters, adding more as it boils away.

  4. Cover the duck with greased paper, put on the lid, and cook gently for about 2 hours, or until tender.

Finish and serve

  1. Heat the Espagnole sauce, add the wine (if using) and jelly, and season to taste.

  2. Remove the trussing strings and place the duck in a hot oven for a few minutes to crisp the bacon.

  3. Serve with some sauce poured over and the remainder in a sauce-boat.

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. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  2. Chestnut + carrottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together186 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Port wine + curranttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together356 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Onion + chestnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together696 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Port wine + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Duck
Forms the main body of the dish, providing rich meat that becomes tender through slow braising.
Chestnuts
Add starchy body and a mild, nutty flavour to the stuffing.
Egg
Binds the chopped onion and chestnut stuffing so it holds together in the bird.
Espagnole sauce
Gives the finished dish a rich, glossy brown sauce built on a roux-based stock.
Red-currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a touch of acidity to balance the rich sauce.
Butter or good fat
Carries heat into the vegetables and browns the base before braising.

The step that matters

Gentle cooking of the duck. Keeping the heat low during the long braise lets the connective tissue soften slowly, so the meat becomes tender rather than tough or dry. Boiling vigorously toughens the meat and reduces the stock too quickly.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sauce, port wine, onion, chestnut, butter, egg, carrot):

  1. Figfits better
  2. Cherryfits better
  3. Plumfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sauce, port wine, onion, chestnut, butter, egg, carrot. 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.

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