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Roast Ducklings

Roast ducklings stuffed with mashed potato, almond, and onion mixture, baked and served with a currant jelly gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Roast Ducklings

Oven, in the book's wordsA very quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Whip the mashed potatoes with butter and cream until creamy.

  2. Season the mixture with celery salt and white pepper.

  3. Mix in the chopped almonds.

  4. Stuff the cleaned ducklings with the mixture without packing them tightly.

  5. Truss the legs and wings with cotton twine.

Roast

  1. Rub the duck breasts with the split onion.

  2. Dust the duck breasts with pepper, salt, and flour.

  3. Place the ducklings on a roasting rack.

  4. Add boiling water to the pan and cover.

  5. Roast in a preheated oven at 400°F (200°C) for the first 15 minutes.

  6. Lower the temperature to 350°F (175°C) and cook for 10 minutes per pound, still covered.

  7. Uncover the ducklings.

  8. Baste the ducklings with gravy and butter.

  9. Dredge the ducklings with flour and brown.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Skim the fat from the gravy.

  2. Thicken the gravy with browned flour and currant jelly.

  3. Serve the ducklings in a 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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Potato + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Mashed potatoes
Bind the stuffing and keep the cavity filling moist and soft.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and helps the skin brown.
Almonds
Add texture and a nutty flavour to the stuffing.
Browned flour
Darkens the gravy and thickens it for a richer body.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a touch of acidity to the gravy.

The step that matters

Covered roasting, then uncovering to brown. Covering with boiling water first steams the birds so they cook through without drying. Uncovering later lets surface moisture evaporate so the skin can brown and crisp, which needs the fat and dry heat of the oven.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, butter, cream, celery, almond, onion, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, cream, celery, almond, onion, pepper. 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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