Duck Confit and Watermelon Salad @MaddieDayAuthor

MADDIE DAY here. Here being Japan, as I am on the penultimate day of a two-week stay and a 13-day cruise around southern Japan. It's been a marvelous trip, and I'll have lots of recipes to share with you over the next month or two. 

Today I'll share this simple and delicious watermelon salad that includes all the tastes: salty, sweet, sour, bitter, and umami.

The friend I'm traveling with and I signed up for a Pan-Asian cooking class held on the cruise two days ago.

The chef and his helpers were fabulous, and we got copies of the recipes to bring home with us. 

Shown below is our chef Karlis, who was a great teacher, with all the dishes we prepared.

And yes, we also sipped a Rosé wine, sake, prosecco, beer, and an aperitif. My kind of cooking class!

But now for the watermelon salad, which includes duck confit, watermelon, toasted cashews, fresh herbs, and lime juice. I adapted the recipe from the one provided by the Oceania Cruises Culinary Center.

Duck Confit and Watermelon Salad

Ingredients

(Note: the ingredients shown in the photo were for a single serving, and the honey is not included.)

2 each confit duck legs and thighs (look for these at your grocer, Whole Foods, a specialty market, or online)

2 tablespoons hoisin sauce

4 mint leaves

4 basil leaves

8 cilantro leaves (or substitute parsley if you don't like cilantro)

4 cups small watermelon cubes

1/4 cup toasted cashews

1 lime, quartered

Chili-infused honey thinned with water in a 4:1 ratio

Directions

Pull the meat from the duck and shred into small bite-sized pieces. Combine the duck and hoisin sauce and marinate for at least an hour.

Crush the cashews by pressing with a flat bottomed bowl or a rolling pin. Chiffonade (slice into thin ribbons) the herbs.

Serving methods:

A: Add herbs and marinated duck to watermelon cubes and gently toss. Serve in four glass bowls, top with cashews, and drizzle with lime juice and honey.

B: In four parfait glasses, layer 1/3 each watermelon, marinated duck, herbs, and cashews. Squeeze on a little lime juice and drizzle with honey. 

Repeat twice more until all ingredients are used. Garnish with the lime wedge.

Either method yields a salad that surprised with me with how much more delicious these flavors are when combined.

I promise you will love this salad, especially if you make it in the summer when watermelons and herbs are ripe from your garden or local farms.

Readers: have you been surprised by a combination of flavors? What's your favorite watermelon salad recipe?

🍉🦆🥗

A Case for the Ladies is out and available wherever books are sold!

My most recent releases are Deep Fried Death, #12 in the Country Store Mysteries.

And Murder Uncorked, Cece Barton Mystery #1, which released in late October.

Check out all my writing:

We hope you'll visit Maddie and her Agatha Award-winning alter ego Edith Maxwell on our web site, sign up for our monthly newsletter, visit us on social media, and check our all our books and short stories.

Maddie Day (aka Edith Maxwell) is a talented amateur chef and holds a PhD in Linguistics from Indiana University. An Agatha Award-winning and bestselling author, she is a member of Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America and also writes award-winning short crime fiction. She lives with her beau and sweet cat Martin north of Boston, where she’s currently working on her next mystery when she isn’t cooking up something delectable in the kitchen.

GIRL VERSUS CRUISE FOOD BY AUTHOR DENISE SWANSON

From Denise:

Hi Everyone! I’m just back from my winter break and I had the opportunity to eat a lot of fabulous meals especially on Norwegian Cruise Line’s ship the Epic. It was a tough job, but someone had to do it. 😈

The Epic has six specialty restaurants—Chinese, French, Italian, Brazilian, Japanese, and American steakhouse—plus two main dining rooms and a special restaurant for Haven guests. We ate in all but the two main dining rooms and the food was amazing everywhere. Here are some pictures of the various dishes.

My husband's favorite the French onion soup at Le Bistro

My favorite cunard  à l'orange

Banana Cream Tartlet

Warm Espresso Chocolate Brownie

Macadamia Nut Ice Cream, Caramel Brittle

Marinated Berries and Mango

Crispy Almond Wafer

And I even persuaded the executive chef to share one of the recipes.

Mocha Mousse Coupe with Vanilla and Raspberry Cream and Hazelnut Butter Crunch

(I tried to order something different every evening, but I had this THREE times!)

Pastry Cream

Amount                                    Ingredients/Details

1 qt                                          Milk

232 gr                                       Granulated sugar

8 gr                                          Vanilla Extract

72 gr                                         Cornstarch

304 gr                                       Egg yolks Frozen

Procedure:

      1.  Combine 3/4 of the milk and 1/2 of the sugar in the saucepan and bring to a boil.

      2.  Meanwhile combine the cornstarch with the remaining sugar and the rest of the milk stirring with a wire whip

      3.  Add the egg yolks and the vanilla extract stir until the mixture is completely smooth.

      4.  Temper the egg mixture by adding about one third of the hot milk and return to the remaining milk in the saucepan continue cooking and whisk vigorously with the whip, until the pastry cream comes to a boil and the whip leaves a trail in it.

      5.  Pour the pastry cream into a large bowl and cover with a plastic wrap placed directly on the surface of the cream and cool over an ice bath.

 

Name:  Raspberry Jelly

Amount                                    Ingredients/Details

290 gr                                       Fresh Raspberry

116 gr                                       Sugar

174 gr                                       Water

1 ea                                          Gelatin Leaves

Procedure:

      1.  Place in sauce pan, raspberry, water and sugar.  Bloom the gelatin leaves and add to the warm raspberry

      2.  Blend it with mixer and strain it to avoid raspberry seed.  Mold it in petit four flexipan and place in freezer for complete set.

 

Name:  Hazelnut Crunchy (pailletée feuilletine)

Amount                                    Ingredients/Details

1590 gr                                     White Chocolate Couverture

928 gr                                       Praline Hazelnut Paste

638 gr                                       Pailletée Feuilletine

290 gr                                       Vegetable Oil

Procedure:

      1.  Melted the white chocolate in water bath, add the oil and the praline paste and mix by hand to dissolve,

      2.  Add the pailletée feuilletine and fold it until completely coated.

      3.  On sheet pan linen with parchment paper, spray the mixture to arrived a thickness of 1/4 inch; let it set in the cooler.

      4.  Cut in little cubes 1/8 inch by 1/8 inch and reserve for build up

 

Name:  Milk Chocolate Mousse

Amount                                    Ingredients/Details

1 Qt                                          Heavy cream

232 gr                                       Milk Chocolate

174 gr                                       Egg White Fresh

174 gr                                       Sugar granulated

87 gr                                         Mocha Paste

261 gr                                       Praline Crunch cut in small pieces

Procedure:

      1.  Melted in water Bath chocolate and mocha paste, set aside

      2.  On a mixer whip the egg white with sugar to a soft peak, set aside

      3.  On a mixer whip the heavy cream to a soft peak and set aside

      4.  In a bowl, mix the chocolate with half of the egg white then fold in the soft whipped cream

      5.  Finish with the rest of the soft whipped egg white

      6.  Add 174 gr of the Praline crunch cut in small pieces

Assembly: 

1.  In large Martini glass place a tsp of pastry cream in the bottom, pipe some dark chocolate mousse to one third of the glass, insert a frozen raspberry cream and with a squeeze bottle place around the glass a ring of coulis to make a ring of coulis.

2.  Pipe some more of chocolate mousse and sprinkle more hazelnut crunch on the top of it.  Finish with a spoon of soft whipped cream and a chocolate decor

 

     And speaking of chocolate delights, I’m giving away an advanced reading copy of my upcoming April book, Tart of Darkness. Just leave a comment for a chance to win. 

#Giveaway #AdvancedReadingCopy

Here's a bit about my upcoming book: Tart of Darkness.

Right when Dani thinks she's hit a dead-end in her career, she unexpectedly inherits an enormous old house in a quaint college town. This gives her the perfect opportunity to pursue her true passion—cooking! So Dani opens Chef-to-Go, preparing delicious, ready-made meals for hungry students attending the nearby university, as well as providing personal chef services and catering events for the local community. To help support her new business, she opens her home to a few students, renting them rooms and becoming almost like a big sister figure in their lives.

But just as Dani is relishing her sweet new life, the friend of one of her boarders is murdered, and Dani becomes one of the primary suspects! She'll have to scramble to clear her name and save her business before the killer reappears—perhaps to silence the new chef forever.

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Tart of Darkness Pre-order




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