Duck confit is a real treat. The meat is highly seasoned with salt, pepper, spices and garlic. Its texture is like that of the most tender stew and the skin on top shatters like glass when you put a knife to it. With crispy and soft textures and the rich savory meat, it is no wonder that this dish is a real classic of French cuisine.

Making duck confit involves using an old method of preserving from the time before refrigeration. The cooked duck is cooled and sealed under a layer of duck fat and could stay preserved on a cellar shelf for months. The duck fat layer would prevent bacteria from getting to the meat and the meat was highly salted which acted as a preservative. Both protecting food from oxygen and keeping food in a high salt environment limits the growth of bacteria and preserves the food. Today, we really do not need to preserve foods in this way. But, salt changes the flavor of foods and the resulting products are so desirable that we continue to preserve foods. To imagine how salt transforms food, think of fresh salmon vs gravlax, fresh lemons vs preserved lemons or fresh cucumbers vs pickled cucumbers.

When you have a meal of duck confit in a fine dining restaurant you may assume that the food being served is very labor intensive or they are using techniques that are very difficult. I mean, you are paying an arm and a leg for the meal, right? You imagine a whole brigade of chefs working to make this classic dish. And that there is no way you could ever do what these highly skilled chefs are doing. The truth is that they are using the exact same techniques that you would use to make a meal at home. They may of mastered those techniques but they are the same. The basic techniques of cooking are broiling, grilling, roasting, sauteing, pan-frying, deep-frying, poaching, boiling, steaming and braising. When you know what technique was used to make your dish you can make the same dish at home. You will save money and it will be more fun because you did it yourself.

When you look at the method to make duck confit you will see it is just a braise or stew. The only thing that is different between a beef stew and a confit is that the braising liquid for confit is fat. Now that you know that you are just making a stew, it seems a lot less daunting. You have made stew before. So, you can do this.

Step 1

You will see that this dish is so simple that there is no recipe needed. It is just three simple steps. The first step is to season the meat and let that seasoning work into the meat overnight. Traditionally the meat would be highly salted and cured. But for our purposes, we will just season each duck leg with a large pinch (three fingers) of kosher or sea salt. I add a small garlic clove to each leg as well that has been mashed to a paste. Just smear it over the exposed meat. Then I add a few sprinkles of ground cloves and a few cranks of pepper from the pepper mill. That is it. You can add whatever spices or herbs that you like.

Step 2

In step two, I put the duck legs into a cooking container. I added some fresh thyme, bay leaf and garlic. Then I cover the legs in melted duck fat. This gets covered with foil and stewed for around 2 hours at 225F. The stew is done when the meat is fork tender. You will also see the meat pull away from the bone. You can see that in the images below.

Step 3

After the stew has cooled, remove the duck legs from the fat with a spatula. Do not use tongs because the meat is really tender and will fall off the bone. Also, you can just toss the stew into the fridge for a few months at this point. As long as the fat covers the meat, it is preserved. You will want to broil the legs to crisp up the skin before serving. I use a method of putting the leg under the broiler and then moving it out of the heat when it gets too hot. This way the leg never gets burnt. Just put it under the fire and then back out several times until the skin is crispy. Strain and save the duck fat for cooking potatoes or just about anything else. It keeps in the freezer for a very long time.

I served my duck confit with braised red cabbage. But, it is just as good with roasted potatoes, ratatouille or stewed white beans.

Thanks for stopping by today. I hope that this post has inspired you to get into the kitchen.
Do you think that you could make this dish after reading the post?
I look forward to engaging with you about this dish in the comments section below.

Best,
Steve