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by Kate Corrigan and Sebastian Miska
North Branch Farm, in the mountains of Ripton, is an unlikely place for ducks, but we’ve been raising them on a very small scale each summer for the last four years. Pekins are our favorite meat ducks to raise—they’re fast growing and white and beautiful. And they have lots of fat.
“Lots of fat?” you might ask. “Why would we want that?” Or maybe you already know. Local duck fat is a localvore’s dream. Any food lover’s dream, actually. It is delicious to cook with as a replacement for oil or butter, and it keeps beautifully in a glass jar in the fridge. Plus it really prevents food from sticking to pans, better than any other grease we’ve tried. You can get a lot of fat from just one Pekin duck.
Duck has a certain mystique, too. Quite a few people have never tried it, but almost everyone seems to be interested in it. Very few farms in Vermont raise it, probably because ducks are a lot of work to butcher. Removing pinfeathers can be a tedious chore. But they are worth it and not very hard to raise. A Pekin duck takes only eight weeks or so to reach five or six lbs. dressed! We move our Pekins onto fresh grass each day. We’ve also raised other duck breeds—blue and silver Swedish, mallards, and khaki Campbells, and we may try Muscovies next year—along with other poultry and pigs. All are outside, roaming and foraging, and supplemented with organic grain.
Roast duck is our favorite. One large duck can feed four people or more, and you can make a delicious stock with the bones afterward. Of course there are all kinds of French delicacies made from the organs, like pâté and malgret. We’d like to try making those one day, but since we’ve been running a farm, we haven’t had as much time to cook as we’d like!
Kate Corrigan and Sebastian Miska run North Branch Farm on Lincoln Road in Ripton. Their ducks have sold out this year, but to place poultry orders for 2010, or to order pork, contact them at
802-388-2059 or n.branchfarm@yahoo.com. Applecheeck Farm in Hyde Park may have French Muscovy ducks available:
802-888-4482 or applecheek@pshift.com.
Photo courtesy of North Branch Farm
Preheat oven to 425 °F.
Rinse a 5 to 6 lb. duck inside and out. Prick skin all over with a sharp fork. Place breast-side up on a rack in a 13” x 9” x 3” roasting pan and pour boiling water over the duck to tighten the skin. Cool, and empty any water that may have gone inside the duck. Pat duck dry inside and out then rub with salt and pepper.
Roast for 45 minutes, turn over, then roast 45 minutes more. Turn over again (breast-side up) and drain any liquid from the duck into the pan. Continue roasting about 45 minutes more or until the skin is brown and crisp (about 2 1/4 hours total). Let sit for about 15 minutes before carving.
Serve with a sauce or gravy, and roasted root vegetables or stuffing.
