As
most of my readers know, I am Canadian by birth and mighty proud of it. I am also mighty proud that Canada racked up
a total of 10 Gold Medals at the Sochi Olympics. This would be quite a feat no matter what
country achieved it. But to put it in
context, Canada, a country of 35,000,000 people came in third in the medal
count after Russia with 143,000,000 and these United States with a population
of 317,000,000. It was something I
wanted to celebrate. So as Andrew headed off the morning the Canadian Women’s
Hockey team won Gold, I told him to prepare for a Canadian dinner.
Montreal, Beautiful anytime but
especially in snow. To
break my ethnicity down even further, I am a Quebecois from a family with roots in the province of Quebec going
back five generations. We were Scottish
immigrants, Anglos to be sure, and I hate to admit that I was the first
generation of the five who actually learned French. My mother was hopeless in the language. Once,
answering the salutation “Comment allez-vous, Madame” (How are you Madam) she
answered “Combien” (How much?) instead of “Tres Bien” (Very well). My father was a quiet man which concealed his
complete lack of any French language skills whatsoever. He, at least, had an excuse: He was born in Winnipeg. The French-speaking Quebecers put up with
this language barrier for years and years.
Then came the “Quiet Revolution” which was not so quiet and all about
Frenchifying Quebec for future generations.
This had great success in sending legions of all-English-speaking
Quebecers out of the province in one enormous wave. The Bank of Montreal moved its headquarters
to Toronto. My parents moved to Atlanta. In truth, I didn’t go back to Montreal
for years and years. But when I did, I
could not get enough of the place. Or its food.
The food in Quebec is as hearty as
its winters are cold. It’s
French-inflected of course, and the best of it has distinctly peasant
roots. It’s more of what you would find
in Brittany and Normandy than in Paris or Lyons. That makes sense because the first settlers
were from those two northern provinces.
In Quebec, people hunted and fished and the fur trade flourished, as did
dishes with high fat counts—almost a necessity in the cold of winter. Today, Quebec has re-discovered its roots and
its culinary stars seem intent on keeping this wonderfully comforting food on
their restaurant tables. “Au Pied du Cochon” helmed by Martin Picard and “Joe
Beef” the culinary home of David
McMillan and Frederic Morin, are must stops on any serious gourmand’s trip to
Montreal. And then there’s Chuck
Hughes. Now 37, Hughes is likely the
best-known Canadian chef ever. His
presence on the Food Network and his series “Chuck’s Day Off” sent his
reputation rocketing. This followed
appearances on “Iron Chef” where he became the youngest Canadian Chef to win
(Chef Rob Feenie of Vancouver was the first Canadian to win). Chuck is also the only Canadian chef to beat
the legendary Bobby Flay. The ‘Secret
Ingredient’? Canadian Lobster.
Garde Manger, Warm and welcoming.It
seemed only logical to take out the four Quebec chefs’ cookbooks to prepare our
Canadian dinner. So I dutifully perused
“The Art of Living according to Joe Beef, a cookbook of sorts” (Ten Speed Press
2011) and Martin Picard’s “Au Pied de Cochon” (Douglas and McIntyre 2006) and
finally, Chuck Hughe’s own “Garde-Manger” (La Presse 2010).
Garde Manger is the name of Chuck’s first restaurant in Old Montreal. Andrew and I had met the man himself at his
second, “Le Bremner” and we have a lot of affection for him. Never mind that the edition of Garde Manger
was in French, if I was going to cook Quebecois,
I might as well cook in the language too.
I got a huge charge out of doing so.
And while there were plenty of things I really did want to sink my teeth
into, I chose “Magret de Canard, Foie Gras, Sauce au Vin Rouge” You’ll note that there’s no Foie Gras in the
finished dish. That would have really
put it over the top. So out went the Foie Gras but on to the table went this
amazingly rich dish with its crisp duck, its bed of duck-fat fried potatoes and
mushrooms and its somewhat incongruous but nonetheless delicious slice of
triple
crème cheese. I looked everywhere
for the Riopelle de l’ile cheese never
finding it. The cheese is named after a renowned Quebecois artist, Jean-Paul
Riopelle, said to be all of Canada’s most important modern artist. For each 3
lbs of cheese sold, one dollar goes to a foundation that helps the children of
Isle-au-Grues get a higher education. It
is where the cheese is made and where Riopelle died in 2002 at the age of 79. I substituted the much more easily found Saint
Andre which melts into the dish giving it a rich creaminess and flash of
flavor.
The
Red Wine Sauce in the original recipe was enough to stock Garde Manger, the
restaurant, for weeks so I cut it back drastically and the amount here would
have been quite enough for the four servings this dish serves. I cut the rest of the recipe in half too for the
two of us. And because Chef Hughes gives
you all kinds of permission to do so, I substituted Fava Beans for the Corn
kernels in the original which Chuck uses in season. My only question would be: who would eat this
rich and warming a dinner in corn season?
If this looks complicated, it is
not. There’s about 30 minutes of prep
and an hour of cooking time. You get the
wine sauce going, parboil the potatoes then using the duck fat from the
breasts, you make a sauté of fingerlings, mushrooms and fava beans. These form the bed for the cheese and the
duck breasts which you liberally lap with the sauce. It’s true comfort food and
a perfect salute to Canada and the cold. Here is the recipe. A votre Sante!
1.
First
make the red wine sauce:
Heat
the oil in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the mustard seeds and the
shallots and cook until the shallots are translucent.
Add
the wine, orange juice, vinegar and honey and bring to a boil. Lower the heat
and simmer gently until reduced to about 1 cup…about 30 minutes.
Meanwhile,
in another saucepan, bring
the veal stock to a boil, then let it reduce to about 1/2 cup over low heat, about 30 minutes.
Strain the wine mixture through a fine sieve set over the pan of reduced
stock, pressing down on the vegetables to extract maximum flavor; discard the
solids. Stir the sauce, then continue to cook over low heat until slightly
thick, about 15 minutes. Add the butter, whisking constantly. Season with salt
and pepper. Keep warm.
While
the stock and wine are reducing, in a heavily salted saucepan of boiling water,
cook the potatoes for 20 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside
Preheat
the oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
For
the duck breasts: Score the duck on the skin side. Remove the excess fat around the
breast, and remove the tip, if desired. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Place
the duck breast, skin-side down, in a room-temperature skillet with no oil. Set
the skillet over medium-high heat and cook for 5 minutes. Pour off the duck fat
and reserve. Transfer the skillet to the oven and cook until medium-rare, 8 to
10 minutes. Again, pour off the duck fat and reserve.
Let the duck breasts rest on a cutting board
for about 5 minutes.
While
the duck is cooking, heat the duck fat in a cast iron skillet and add the
potatoes, cooking until they are golden brown.
Add the mushrooms and the Fava Beans and cook for 5 minutes. Season the
mixture with Salt and Freshly Ground Pepper. Sprinkle half the parsley and
chives over the mixture and set aside.
Divide
the Duck Fat Potato mixture into four portions. Ladle some of the Red Wine Sauce over the dish, reserving the rest to use once the duck tops the potato mushroom mixture.
Lay
a slice of cheese on top.
Slice the duck
breast and lay one atop each portion of potatoes and cheese. Nap with the Red Wine Sauce. Scatter the
remaining chives and parsley over the top of the dish. Serve at once.
