Sometimes I feel pretty stupid. I cooked this gorgeous stir-fry last night, which came out just as I wanted, and forgot to take a photo. Duh! As it happens, it’s a very simple dish – and fast.
Ingredients
- Two duck breasts
- Half bunch shallots
- Handful of snow peas or sweet peas
- Small clove garlic
- Sesame seeds
- Seasoning
- Sesame oil
- Aussie bush honey (natural)
- Soy sauce
Preparation
Trim the excess fat off the duck breasts
Cut each half into about 5 slices
Cut about four decent size shallots into inch long segments
Trim the ends off the snow or sweet peas
Add 3-4 teaspoons of honey and some soy sauce into a cup and mix them.
IMPORTANT: the mix must be evenly balanced, so that neither soy nor honey dominates the flavour. If you get the balance right, the honey will blend in completely without much effort.
I borrowed this photo just to give you an idea – it’s close to what my dish looks like.
Cooking
You need heat for this, using either a frypan or wok.
- Turn up the heat, add some oil, toss in the garlic and sliced onion to gauge the heat of the oil. Chop up the garlic now and add it
- When the onion starts frying vigorously, toss in the shallots and the pieces of duck.
- Spoon a little of the honey/soy mix over each piece of duck, keeping the heat fairly high. Add sesame seeds and seasoning, turn over after 90 secs
- Do the same with the other side: add honey/soy, sesame seeds and seasoning and turn over 90 seconds later
- Add snow peas
Turn over the duck pieces twice more. If you like it very pink inside, fry 60 secs on each side twice instead of 90. You want the outside nice and brown. The trick is to add just enough soy/honey sauce so it keeps turning into a thin glaze. Just keep adding more as needed – you can always add more but you can’t take any away. Stir the lot well when done to make sure it hangs together, and serve.
Use rice or noodles or veggies on the side.
Options
- You can use chicken instead of duck breast, but chicken breast does not have much flavour and tends to be very dry
- Maryland will have more flavour and moisture but you’ll have to pre-roast it on a tray in the oven, get it nearly cooked, then finish off in the pan or wok
- You can try adding more ingredients, such as shitake or oyster mushrooms, a touch of chilli if you like, but I’d suggest to keep it fairly simple.
We had this with a bottle of Delatite 2009 Gewuerztraminer. Brilliant together.
Enjoy
Kim