The first of two recipes from Husband. This is a little amuse bouche involving one of my favorite things: duck cracklins. At work, it is always enviable to be around anytime duck is being confited, because duck cracklins are just around the corner: thrown in the fryer or toasted in the oven, there is nothing like fried duck skin - fat cooked in fat cooked in fat.
I bought a duck leg confit* at Whole Foods last week, and Husband warmed it up yesterday for these crostinis. If you double or quadruple this recipe to make for friends, I recommend eating the skin yourself while hiding in the kitchen, and offering the meat on the crostini instead. There will easily be enough meat on one leg quarter for 10 crostinis.
Crostini with Duck Cracklins - 4 crostinis
1 Duck leg quarter confit (if you have a butcher that sells duck confit in bulk, buy about 8 ounces with fat)
4 small marinated fresh mozzarella balls, cut into quarters (antipasta bar)
4 marinated cherry bomb peppers, cut in half (these are sweet-hot peppers in the antipasta bar at the supermarket, or in the Italian section)
1/4 loaf baguette, sliced into 1" rounds
Place the confited leg skin side down in a warm pan and render, slowly, until some of the fat melts out; place the baguette rounds in the fat and cook until they are lightly toasted, then flip and repeat; set aside. Continue to cook the duck, turning the heat up slowly to medium high, until the skin becomes crispy (this takes about 10-15 minutes). Remove the skin (carefully, it's hot) and slice. Place on crostini along with the peppers and mozzarella. If desired, you can pull the meat from the bone and use it as well, or reserve for another purpose.
*What is confit (pronounced cohn-fee)? Basically a method of preservation. Originally, it referred to fruits preserved in sugar, and then grew to include meat preserved in fat. Meat is cooked slowly in fat, its own or otherwise (these days, usually duck fat or olive oil), and then is stored submerged in the fat. This method of preserving meat yields meltingly tender, succulent meat that lasts almost indefinitely (okay fine, 6 months just to safe) when refrigerated. Duck and rabbit are particularly well-suited to confiture.
