Duck á l’Orange Photo: Ilise Goldberg
The Supper Club is a group of friends who love to cook, eat, drink, and laugh together – plenty of each occur at our periodic themed dinner parties. Friends and family like to live vicariously around our feasts so we’ll share the stories, pictures and recipes here from time to time. Click here for previous Supper Club posts, and here for the group’s origin story.
Did you miss Part 1? Find it here.
In the previous post we began telling the tale of our latest Supper Club dining adventure – the theme was Citrus. Everyone did a fabulous job with their assigned courses, covering a great many types of citrus. Even when the same fruit appeared more than once the treatment was so different each time that it became a happy surprise rather than “Oh no, not grapefruit again.”
In hindsight I wish I’d been brave enough to try one of the more exotic citrus options, such as Buddha’s Hand or Citrangequat. Click the links and look them up, I’ll wait. (Whistles quietly to self, examines fingernails.) Oh hello, welcome back. Weird, right?!
Did you miss Part 1? Find it here.
In the previous post we began telling the tale of our latest Supper Club dining adventure – the theme was Citrus. Everyone did a fabulous job with their assigned courses, covering a great many types of citrus. Even when the same fruit appeared more than once the treatment was so different each time that it became a happy surprise rather than “Oh no, not grapefruit again.”
In hindsight I wish I’d been brave enough to try one of the more exotic citrus options, such as Buddha’s Hand or Citrangequat. Click the links and look them up, I’ll wait. (Whistles quietly to self, examines fingernails.) Oh hello, welcome back. Weird, right?!
Citrus Fun Facts: Citrus has been farmed commercially in Florida since the mid-1800s. The first citrus was brought to the New World in 1493 by Christopher Columbus. In the mid-1500s one of the early Spanish explorers, most likely Ponce de Leon, planted the first orange trees around St. Augustine, Florida.
Florida's unique sandy soil and subtropical climate proved to be ideal for growing the seeds that the early settlers planted and have flourished ever since. Today it is a $9 billion industry, employing nearly 76,000 Floridians.
-- Visit Florida and Florida Dept. of Citrus
To refresh your memory from Part 1 of the story, here’s the evening's menu. Today’s post will explore the details of the Main Course and Desserts.
Ellyn – Cocktails: Clementine Negroni; Paloma; Assorted wines
Karen & Kathleen – Appetizers: Fennel and Citrus Salad with Tuna Patties; Brie and Kumquat Chutney Toasts; Lemon-Marinated Olives with Artichokes
Ilise & Ann – Main Course: Smoked Barley, Beet & Grapefruit Salad; Duck á l’Orange; Wild Rice Pilaf; Fennel with Blood Oranges
Greg – Desserts: Lemon Meringue Tartlets; Lime-Basil Macaroons; Blood Orange Polenta Cake; Assorted liqueurs
Ellyn – Cocktails: Clementine Negroni; Paloma; Assorted wines
Karen & Kathleen – Appetizers: Fennel and Citrus Salad with Tuna Patties; Brie and Kumquat Chutney Toasts; Lemon-Marinated Olives with Artichokes
Ilise & Ann – Main Course: Smoked Barley, Beet & Grapefruit Salad; Duck á l’Orange; Wild Rice Pilaf; Fennel with Blood Oranges
Greg – Desserts: Lemon Meringue Tartlets; Lime-Basil Macaroons; Blood Orange Polenta Cake; Assorted liqueurs
Continue reading for the rest of the story -- recipe links, photos, and music too.
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Just as juicy as biting into a delicious orange and twice as fresh – please enjoy the Lemons to Lemonade Playlist – Part 2.
Citrus Fun Facts: |
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The Main Course:
We did not select the most exotic fruits to work with, but felt that we challenged ourselves with the entrée nevertheless. Duck á l’Orange had always seemed, to me at least, fancy, imposing, quite serious, and a bit intimidating. But it’s also a culinary classic that perfectly fit the theme and Ilise really wanted to give it a try. So that was that.
We experimented ahead of time as we usually do. (Some of our supper club cronies don’t test their dishes in advance, just going for broke in the moment. I admire that spirit, but prefer to try the recipe as written the first time and then adjust as needed for future meals.) We made one duck for the test run and two for the dinner party. Just sayin’ so you don’t get confused looking at the photos below, which were taken at both marathon cooking sessions. Yes, this dish takes a lot of work. And your house is going to get smoky while the duck is roasting. Plan ahead with the exhaust fan on high and open windows. But it’s not especially difficult and one key step can be done the day before, which is a big help.
The diners began the meal with a composed salad of smoked barley, beets and grapefruit. That was special in its own right because you’re smoking the barley with wood chips right on the stovetop. Another reason to open the windows and crank up the fan! Read about this tasty salad in detail and get the recipe here.
Then we took one of the ducks on a victory lap around the dining room, showing off its crispy-skinned, golden-roasted glory before carving it up for serving. Oohs and Ahs ensued and were very much appreciated.
A side dish worth noting is the Fennel Salad with Blood Oranges – really, really good and so pretty! Find the recipe (plus pix) here.
Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.
We did not select the most exotic fruits to work with, but felt that we challenged ourselves with the entrée nevertheless. Duck á l’Orange had always seemed, to me at least, fancy, imposing, quite serious, and a bit intimidating. But it’s also a culinary classic that perfectly fit the theme and Ilise really wanted to give it a try. So that was that.
We experimented ahead of time as we usually do. (Some of our supper club cronies don’t test their dishes in advance, just going for broke in the moment. I admire that spirit, but prefer to try the recipe as written the first time and then adjust as needed for future meals.) We made one duck for the test run and two for the dinner party. Just sayin’ so you don’t get confused looking at the photos below, which were taken at both marathon cooking sessions. Yes, this dish takes a lot of work. And your house is going to get smoky while the duck is roasting. Plan ahead with the exhaust fan on high and open windows. But it’s not especially difficult and one key step can be done the day before, which is a big help.
The diners began the meal with a composed salad of smoked barley, beets and grapefruit. That was special in its own right because you’re smoking the barley with wood chips right on the stovetop. Another reason to open the windows and crank up the fan! Read about this tasty salad in detail and get the recipe here.
Then we took one of the ducks on a victory lap around the dining room, showing off its crispy-skinned, golden-roasted glory before carving it up for serving. Oohs and Ahs ensued and were very much appreciated.
A side dish worth noting is the Fennel Salad with Blood Oranges – really, really good and so pretty! Find the recipe (plus pix) here.
Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.
The recipe is really lengthy – lots of ingredients, many steps – so I won’t add it to the text here, you’ve probably got the gist from the photo captions above. You can find the recipe source online – Jacques Pepin via Food & Wine – and you may download a printable version of the recipe here:
| Printable Recipe- Duck á l'Orange |
Citrus Fun Facts: Citrus has a positive impact on Florida's environment. A modern grove design allows for large areas of undeveloped land, providing an excellent wildlife habitat and a natural buffer between farmlands and urban development. University of Florida researchers recently observed more than 159 native species of wildlife within grove ecosystems. Research shows that for every acre of mature trees, 16.7 tons of oxygen is produced per year.
-- Visit Florida and Florida Dept. of Citrus
The Desserts:
It was a 1st Century Roman foodie – Apicius – who purportedly coined the phrase “We eat first with our eyes,” a concept which Greg embraced fully that evening. He constructed a lovely presentation for the desserts which included multiple tiers, a big ol’ Fiestaware platter, and a multitude of whole citrus fruits.
And the desserts themselves? Perfection. That’s the only appropriate word for these sweet treats. The Lemon Meringue Tartlets and Lime-Basil Macaroons were so beautifully executed you’d expect to find them in a fancy patisserie. And as miniatures, they’re even cuter (and harder to make).
The Blood Orange Polenta Cake was more rustic than elegant but no less delicious. The puckery-sweet syrup from the caramelized blood orange perched on top of the dense, moist cake is addictive – and perfect with a cup of coffee. (Yes, I ate leftover cake for breakfast. Sue me.)
Greg mentioned that he’d been in the kitchen since 9am preparing all three desserts. That’s a lot of work in one day, for one dinner, but he is a stickler for quality and attention to detail. It paid off big time. As I said, perfection!
Greg also offered a sampling of citrus-flavored dessert liqueurs: Cointreau, Limoncello and Pamplemousse Rose (pink grapefruit). He froze some of the liqueurs in shot glass molds. They started disintegrating almost immediately, but what a fun idea!
Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.
All dessert recipes come from Ottolenghi: The Cookbook (Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi, ©2008 and 2013, Ten Speed Press). You can find partial recipes on the Ottolenghi website and probably a few other internet locales.
That’s a wrap for another chapter in the ongoing Supper Club saga. I hope you enjoyed your meal vicariously. We certainly did, live and in person, and look forward to our next adventure in eating which will come in April. Theme TBD. Stay tuned!
If you’d like to read about past Supper Club adventures in home cooking and dining, you’ll find them here.
Unless otherwise indicated, all photos by Ilise Goldberg and Ann Johnson.
If you’d like to read about past Supper Club adventures in home cooking and dining, you’ll find them here.
Unless otherwise indicated, all photos by Ilise Goldberg and Ann Johnson.
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