French Feast

Inspired by the cuisine at Chez Olivier in Prahran, my boy – let’s call him Snapper Radish – and I embarked on cooking a three-course French extravaganza. Not an easy feat for a couple who have resorted to Deb, beans and rice for dinner on more than one occasion.

After perusing the Food Safari website and Googling for a while we settled on quiche for entree, duck with cherries for main and chocolate pudding for dessert.

The first stop at food Mecca, otherwise known as the South Melbourne Market, was the poultry shop. Yes, they had two duck breasts and they only cost about $13. Sourcing the cherries (we cheated and used the tinned variety), potatoes (Kipfler for us) and the other ingredients was easy (including the ready-made shortcrust pastry from Coles).

But veal glaze? What the hell, we thought, is veal glaze and why would you pour it over duck? After asking around for a while we found it in a deli at the market. Turns out, it is a reduction of veal stock. I’m not sure why you use veal glaze on duck but I do know it makes a cracking sauce when you simmer it with orange juice and Spanish red wine (ours was about $10).

The recipes were fairly straight forward. But we needed to cook the duck for about 10 to 15 minutes longer than the specified time and the sauce took longer than expected to get to the right, syrupy consistency. We also cooked the puddings for an extra five to 10 minutes and they were, if I do say say myself, perfect little bundles of chocolate joy.

Snapper Radish and I didn’t manage to time the meal like pros – we had to cook the dessert after finishing eating our main. But I was truly amazed we didn’t have any major stuff ups. It has inspired us to have our own food safari in Snapper’s apartment kitchen. Next stop is Italy and homemade pasta. I’ll let you know how it goes.

PS I can’t believe I admitted to eating Deb. I’m glad this website is anonymous. It was Snapper’s fault and I promise never to consume Deb again.