Roast Duck with Gochujang Orange Glaze

This was my second time making this recipe after my trial in December of last year. What was a roast duck with gochujang orange glaze became a hearty spread this year - whole duck roasted, brushed with the same glaze, eaten in flour wrap and raw scallion along with rice cakes and vegetables cooked in duck fat. The dish felt like a hodge-podge of ingredients and methods. But at the end of the day, it was just a delicious amalgamation of everything I like to eat, the way I like to eat them. Although I wrote a more descriptive title for the post, I call this 'Duck & Dduk,' with dduk (떡) referring to rice cake. If you are expecting a quiet New Year's Eve/New Year's Day weekend, or if you find yourself bored at home at anytime in the next couple of cold months, give this a try - the whole spread or any part that strikes your mood. Hours of labor and a bit of messy work (duck fat splatter) are to be expected, but I hope you find this worthwhile at the end.

As for me, I'll come back to this next December, maybe the same or a step beyond from what I've made this year. I'll find out then.

INGREDIENTS:
5 lb Duck (enough for 3 as a main meal)

Spice Rub
1 t       Cinnamon powder
1 t         Ginger powder
1/2 t Nutmeg, ground
1/2 t Cloves, ground
1/2 t    Coriander, ground
1 T      Soy sauce
1 T      Mix of fresh juice and zest from 1 orange
          Reserve the rest for glaze (see below), and
          Reserve the orange flesh and peel to insert in the duck cavity.

Mixed rice cake and vegetables
Rice cake (떡 - tteok/dduk), preferably tubular kind used here
Potatoes, fingerling
Carrots, cut to bite size
Brussel sprouts
Onion, cut to large dice
Garlic cloves, peeled
Salt & pepper

Gochujang honey glaze
1/4 C Gochujang
Mix of freshly squeezed orange juice and zest, left from the spice rub (about 2 T)
2 T        Brown sugar
1 T      Honey
1 T       Soy sauce
* Feel free to double the glaze recipe based on the quantity of the vegetable-rice cake mix and if you want extra sauce for the wrap.

Flour wrap
1/2 C All-purpose flour
1/4 ts Salt
1 C Water
Neutral-tasting oil (such as sunflower seed oil or canola oil) to cook the wrap

5 stalks Scallion, rinsed, trimmed and cut to 2-inch length

DIRECTIONS:

For general information on cleaning and roasting a whole duck, I found these to be quite helpful. I'll skip the detailed cleaning and roasting process here and only mention when it's relevant to my recipe.

The Simplest Roast Duck by Melissa Clark on the New York Times Diner's Journal (3-minute video)
The Best Way to Roast a Duck by The Hungry Mouse (step-by-step pictures)

* Mix the spice rub ingredients and rub it all over the duck. Refrigerate overnight.

* Instead of a proper set of roasting pan and rack, I used a deep aluminum pan with a baking sheet for support and for easier cleaning later (toss the pan and wash the baking sheet). Spread the vegetable mix, excluding rice cake, on the bottom of the pan, place the duck on top and cover with an aluminum foil.

* Roast the duck in 300F degree pre-heated oven for an hour. Then flip to the other side, and roast for another hour.

* After about an hour, you should start seeing duck fat rendered to the pan, covering vegetables. Take a spoonful of duck fat and drizzle on a heated pan on stovetop. Roast rice cakes as in this recipe, only this time, using duck fat.

* After about 2 hours of the duck in the oven, the vegetable mix should be all immersed in duck fat bath. With a cake tester or a chopstick, check for doneness of a potato. The tester should go in with no resistence. Remove the duck from the pan. Carefully transfer all the vegetables to the pan with roasted rice cakes. Carefully pour the duck fat liquid to a separate container. Put the duck back in the aluminum pan.

* Brush the duck with gochujang orange glaze (all the ingredients combined), cover with aluminum foil and roast for another 30 minutes. Flip to the other side and brush with the glaze and cover. Roast for another 30 minutes.

* While the duck is back in the oven, pan-fry the vegetable and rice cake mix. You don't need any more duck fat because they've been bathing in it. Start with 2 tablespoons of the gochujang orange glaze to coat the vegetables and rice cakes generously over medium heat. Feel free to mix in more of the glaze. When the sauce starts bubbling up on the bottom of the pan, turn off heat and stir to combine all the ingredients well. Set aside.

* Make flour wraps by whisking the wrap ingredients together to get rid of lumps. Heat a pan, preferably a cast iron (which I use) or a nonstick pan, and drizzle 1/2 teaspoon of oil. Keep the heat at low to make the wrap. Pour 1 oz. of the flour batter on the pan and gently tilt the pan to make the wrapper thin and round. When the edges are cooked, gently flip to the other side. When both sides are cooked, remove from the pan. This process can be very delicate, so expect a couple of unfortunate disfigurations of the wrap. Repeat with the rest of the batter.

* Take the duck out of the oven and brush the glaze all over the duck one more time. Increase the oven temperature to 400F degrees and put the duck back in the oven. After about 5 minutes, keep an eye on the duck so that the skin gets crispy with the glaze bubbling up, but not burnt, which takes about another 5 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let it rest for 10 minutes before carving and serving with
1) flour wrap, scallion and extra sauce of gochujang and orange glaze, and
2) roasted rice cakes and vegetables mixed in the gochujang orange glaze.

By this time, your family and/or guests will be hungry from all the sizzling sound and the duck going in and out of the oven and they'll be ready for anything. And they certainly won't be disappointed by this duck spread.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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