[Photographs: Vicky Wasik]
Making a glossy, spoon-coating, restaurant-worthy jus at home isn’t hard. It just requires time, patience, and some high-quality, homemade stock.
For our Big Duck Project, we wanted to pull out all the stops for a duck jus worthy of the occasion. To make this sauce, we start by reducing our brown duck stock and red wine separately on the stovetop, until the wine has cooked off most of its alcohol and concentrated to a syrup. The reduced wine is then added to the simmering stock, along with some bloomed gelatin that gives the jus body without the need for purchasing a bunch of collagen-rich bones to cook down with the stock.
As the stock simmers and reduces, fat and impurities are skimmed off, to produce a smooth, silky sauce. For the best results, we recommend straining the jus into a smaller saucepan as it cooks down, to get rid of any sediment particles from the stock. This optional step may seem fastidious, but it leads to a shiny sauce, free of any grit.
Once the jus has reduced to the perfect spoon-coating consistency, it’s ready to be seasoned. Season a sauce that is still reducing is always a risk, since it’s possible the salt will grow overly concentrated as the water content evaporates. Holding off on seasoning until the very end therefore ensures that we aren’t left with an inedibly salty sauce.
The duck jus can be simply seasoned with salt, or you can stir in a spoonful of blended-smooth shio koji, which lends the sauce not just salt but also savory depth as well as a little background sweetness. Either way, you will be left with a rich, meaty jus, perfect for spooning over roast duck and vegetables alike.
Published at Fri, 31 Jan 2020 10:30:30 +0000
