Zhangcha Tea Smoked Duck (Goose) Recipe with Homemade Plum Sauce ala Dentist Chef

Homemade Tea Smoked Duck Recipe. Eversince i’ve made my homemade Smoked beef, i was tempting to try smoking any kind of food. I ever heard about tea smoked salmon before but none for duck or a goose. Zhangcha duck, tea-smoked duck, or simply smoked duck, (literally: 樟茶鸭 zhāngchá yā, camphor-tea duck), is a quintessential dish of Szechuan cuisine. It is prepared by hot smoking a marinated duck over tea leaves and twigs of the camphor plant. Due to its complicated preparation, zhangcha duck is eaten more often in banquets or festive events than as a daily household item.

Making tea smoked duck or tea smoked goose is quite simple. The duck or goose is first marinated for several hours with a rub containing a typical combination of whole or crushed Sichuan pepper, huangjiu or baijiu (fermented or distilled Chinese wine), ginger, garlic, and salt, with much of it rubbed inside the cavity of the duck. For intensity of taste, sometimes the marinade rub is augmented with choujiu, black pepper, tea leaves, and camphor leaves. Following the marination, the duck is quickly blanched in hot water to tighten the skin, and then towel and air dried. This step ensures that the skin of the duck has a crisp texture upon completion. A wok is then prepared for smoking the duck with black tea leaves and camphor twigs and leaves. Following a smoke treatment of approximately 10-15 minutes, the duck is then steamed for another 10 minutes before being deep fried in vegetable oil until its skin is crisp. The duck is consumed wrapped in clam-shaped buns called gebao.

Tea Smoked Duck Recipe:

Ingredient:

• 1 duck/ goose breast (about 500 gr), deboned
• heavy duty alumunium foil( the thick ones)

Homemade Smoked Goose/ Duck Curing Recipe:

• 1/4 tsp *sendawa/ salt peter/ curing salt
• 1/2 tbsp salt
• 1 tsp brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp szechuan peppercorn
• 1/4 tsp chinese five spice/ ngo hiang
• 1/2 tsp honey
• 1 tbsp Shaoxing rice wing/angciu
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black peppercorn
• 1 star anise
• process into a fine paste

How to Tea Smoking Duck Mixture :

• 1/3 cup chinese tea leaves
• 1/3 cup rice
• 3 tbsp brown sugar
• 1 cinnamon stick, crushed
• 12 star anise, crushed

Homemade plum sauce recipe:

• 1/2 cup plum jam or plum preserves ( you can use 5-6 pitted, processed fresh plums instead)
• 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
• 1 tsp honey
• 3 strawberries, pureed( the plum jam is too sweet for my licking, so i use some  pureed srawberries to balanced the taste)
• 1 garlic clove, pureed
• Pinch of cayenne pepper
• Pinch of salt

Instruction:

How to make smoked duck recipe:

• Mix the duck/ goose breast with the curing ingredient, let it rest in fridge overnight
• Remove the curing ingredient by washing in running water, drained well, the meat should be firmer.
• Add more freshly ground black peppercorn
• Put into freezer and let it rest to half frozen
• For the step by step ilustration of tea smoked duck, you can see the photograph in my Homemade Smoked Beef Recipe
• Put a layer or two of aluminum foil on the bottom of your sauce pot, large pot or rectangular baking pan.
• Scatter smoking mixture.
• Take a wire rack and put it at least 2 inches above the sawdust. If the wire rack does not sit high enough above the sawdust when resting on the edges of the pan or wok, you can raise it by placing wadded up aluminum foil under the legs of the wire rack.
• Set the stove to the highest setting until the smoke begin to release
• Put the half frozen curing duck/ goose in the center of the wire rack.
• Cover the wire rack, meat and pan snuggly with either a lid or more aluminum foil.
• If you are using a lid, you can line it with aluminum foil as well to make the clean up easier. I use the bottom side of heavy bottom wokpan with some water to make the temperature lower
• Turn the heat  low . Cook until meat is done.

How to make homemade Plum Sauce :

• Combine all of the ingredients in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat.
• Reduce the heat to simmer, stir well to melt the jam, and simmer 5 minutes.
• Let cool to room temperature before serving.

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