Future projects
under construction
for 2010...
 
In our inexperience as chefs
in the past year...
 
We've done a duck,
fizzled a fish,
so I'm thinking
our next one should be
a RATATOUILLE dish.
 
 
 

I have confirmed reports that we don't need to travel all the way west to catch a duck and make it into a halal meal.

Fahd and I found some near a small little reserve or lake thing near "the place".

For security reasons, I cannot reveal where LOL because in New Zealand we can't catch ducks in certain places. Shhhh. ;)

It's a taster of projects we have to come... one of them, as you can tell by now, is a Catch-A-Duck educational and taste sensational project. Heheheheh... XD

Plan of Attack:

1. Ninja Night ActioN.
2. Net-It Ninja Style.
3. Nice 'N' Painless.
4. Pluck 'N' Clean.
5. Roast 'N' Enjoy.

NB: Not final arrangement.

See you soon! Adios.

Xin

Just wanted to clarify with our readers that from time to time we will add extra bits and pieces to an entry. It's what you get when you have four FANTASTIC minds that remember different parts to an event. It's how our friendship functions. For example, on a daily basis there are a range of things we need to do or need to remember, it's difficult or near impossible remember them all, all the time. So what happens? there is always at least ONE of us who does! How cool is that lol. Anyway point is, if say I forgot something, either Marg, Pija or Wani will be sure to rememeber it and remind me. Sometimes they're so efficient that I get more than one person to remind me. Even stories we update each other with become extra emphasized because if I hear it once from one of them, I'm likely to hear it twice more in different versions lol. That's a little side swipe for our readers to get nice and personalised with your writers. On with the main event.....

Wani and I had a great time sewing the duck together. Even though it took us more than 1.5 hours to complete it lol. After reading, I want you to think about this. I accidentally made a hole in the duck near the wing when I tried to cut it off. Not helpful when I stuff it later cos stuffing keeps oozing out.

We tried so many different techniques to sew that duck with the best substitute for a trussing needle (official name of meat sewing needle) which happens to be (at that time) a BBQ skewer lol. We jab a hole in the skin - not too close to the edge or we'd make another hole in the skin and have to sew that up too. While Wani held the skin taut and all spread out, I would drill the skewer and make the hole bigger, then push the baking string through. About this time, Wani and I whispered teamwork commands like "ok ok, hold that" and "you almost got the string through" and "good good good". After some intense concentration duck sewing action and starting out at normal speaking levels, I realised we dropped to WHISPERING sewing commands.We looked sideways at each other, paused, and at the same time...

Wani/Xin - "Why are we whispering?" 

then...

Wani/Xin - "...We don't want the duck to hear" ..what we're doing to it

-.-II

LOL

I swear, once you pass the 40 min duck sewing time - you start going nuts. I fnally get why they call doctors a quack and why they use to say "go see your quack" when you crazy in the head hahaha.

Anyway the first pic is what the duck is supposed to look like or at least kinda look like. The second is our actual duck lol.

...I figured this duck was one of those special near-extinct species we found in the Amazonian rainforest. If you can't find any then blame the butcher, he probably ate them all. =P

GOOOO DINO-DUCK!!! BE FREEeeeeee hahahaha!!!

With Love,

XiN~NiX

Have you guys watched Julie and Julia movie yet?? If you havent...well...too bad...because you might not have that much clue of what im about to spill here. MWAHAHAHAH ! If you did...well...good on yah because here's the story of how we were in the making of cleaning slash boning slash baking this duck which took us quite a considerable amout of patience and effort for sure. Yes ! Exciting isnt it?!! Thinking back again..we are pretty ambitious and crazy to have done that. LOL.

Despite watching that movie which makes you drool over the food and your stomach could not stop making noises and you kept swallowing over nothing...we were inspired to actually follow the movie's recipe on cooking the duck.

Pate de canard en croute?

I cant really remember the actual name in french. Sorry my readers. But yes thats the uhm....boned stuffed duck covered with pastry we're talking about yaw !! Hehe =D. It all started with me and Xin going to a halal butchery store and we came across this note ----> DUCK for $16.99 i think. So that was cool. At that point in time, we were actually considering of getting a live duck as well...so we went to ask one of the butcher guy...."where can we get a live duck?"and he said while laughing" You could try Western Springs Park." And we started having a runs of imagination on how to trick a live duck. Here's what we came up with :-

1. Xin's - fish it, we improvise the fishing rod. haaa but bread as the bait, you feel me?

2. Xin's & Wani's - use a really huge net , ninja style we'll each throw one.

3. Wani's (note, imagination is a lil out of place) - "Are we plucking out the feathers while its still alive" *very sad face*  

Crazy huh?? But... in the end we just took our baby-smoochy-poochie-little frozen duck with us. =p

So the journey began. We started the mission at 7 pm or so. Xin was in charged of boning the duck. Wani was in charge of doing the stuffing for the duck. Margaret was in charge of the pastry. And I was basically in charge for washing the dishes while being an assistance for them. Team work babe !! ;D The funny/scary thing about it is the fact that the duck...when it was already defrost...the head is still there which makes the duck look like it is staring at us. So Xin covered the head and slowly slit it through the neck part before chopping the head off. LoL. Surgery on its way. All good. We'll skip that part. By then, you've already imagined that in your head. Hahaha ! Im evil. I know. Anyway, im telling yah..boning the duck was the trickiest part of all but Xin managed to do it just damn nice! Although there was one part that actually got cut off while Xin was cutting the flesh from the carcass bones down one side of the bird. See i told you..its very tricky !

Now...the stuffing part...measurement of this and that..bits and bobs...we decided to do the stuffing with chicken and the leftover meat from the duck.The stuffing was pretty easy as she marinades it with eggs, salt, pepper, allspice, thyme, and garlic and the onions. The onions....Ahahaha. Im sorry. Wani was crying when she was chopping the onions in this part here. lol. She needs to cooked the onions thoroughly with the butter first though before putting the whole nyummy-wholesome-goodness-marination. ;p The only thing that never came across our mind was the butter was a salted one !! So the stuffing was somehow a bit salty. So I reckon if you do want to try this..make sure you pick unsalted butter or reduce the salt measurement to suit taste.

Moving on to pastry...Margaret actually pampered the dough so nice that it tasted goooooood, Umph umph umph ! With her hands, she kept smudging it till it breaks in pieces..and i mean small tiny pieces like the oatmeal flakes. Patience sure is on Margaret at that time. In Margaret's case..the tricky part is to make sure that the dough was not sticky or damp. After seeking advice from Xin and confirmation from Wani...the dough was not sticky or damp. Phew~ What a relief ! So Margaret put the dough in the freezer for half an hour. It was supposed to be one hour but taking into consideration of the time we've been starting this mission...its already 9.45pm by that time...And we soon realized that we dont have an actual roller to roll out the pastry later on. All we had was a roller that was taken out from a kitchen towel and it was stuffed with more papers underneath it. Since New World supermarket was just close by, and its closing at 10pm, I went out and run like nobody's problem just to get the roller. Hahaha !

After all the processing of boning the duck, Wani and Xin stuffed in the meat and start sewing the duck. Funny it is because they couldnt find a tool to actually sew the duck so they used a stick instead to make a whole on the duck skin. Another operation. Wahahaha. By then, me and Margaret are bored and lazy already. So we took some time off to play FIFA 10. The next thing I know, Wani and Xin fried the duck to get them brown a little bit and I heard " Pija....(pause) pija....(pause).. Pijaaa !!! " Thats when I knew Wani is asking me to help her to hold the duck for her to lift it up. Another operation. After that, I continued playing FIFA 10 with Margaret again while they were decorating the pastry for the duck before chucking it in the oven. They come in funny shapes too i.e: theres a dinosour shape! Haha. 

I know .. I know it looks gooey and  slimy, but hey we artistically brushed lots of egg yolks on top of it and plus I'm not joking it does look like a dinosaur right?  

All in all, we finished battling with the duck at 2.30 am in the morning. But it was worth the shot and the experience. And duck was all goooood to go with pastry and stuffing. Nyuuuuuuuuuum !!  P/s: That was Wani's and Pija's first time of eating duck meat. 

Oh and on a later note...when me and Wani went to the halal butchery shop again just a few days ago..we saw the sign..."we now sell live ducks." .

Girls you thinking of what I'm thinking? And NO Wani don't worry, we're not plucking its' feathers out while its still alive darling. 

With love,

Pija

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Recipe for boned stuffed duck baked in pastry

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/food/articles/2009/08/05/recipe_for_boned_stu...

Recipe for stuffing (obviously we substitute with duck and chicken)

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/food/articles/2009/08/05/pork_and_veal_stuffi...

The Halal Butcher Store

http://www.mohammeds.co.nz/home.htm