Tipo 00 - Duck Ragu w/Parmesan Gnocchi

Prep - 1 hour before cooking

1. Salt skin side of duck (stand for 1hr)

2. place porcini into 250ml of warm water (stand for 1hr)

3. Peal, Scrub & Chop potatoes if necessary - boil potatoes until tender (20-50 minutes) before mashing\ricing

Ragu

Starting the Ragu

1. Remove Porcini from the soaking water, and dice (reserve water to be added to ragu later).

2. Preheat oven to 150c

3. Oil a roasting tray\casserole dish and heat over medium-high heat - Brown the duck, skin-side down - allow to fry until fat renders (5-6 mins), then flip and brown other side (2-3 mins) - remove duck and set aside

4. Add carrot, onion, garlic, sage, thyme, bay leaf and saute until tender (5-8 mins), add porcini and saute until softened (3-4 mins)

5. Add tomato paste and cook until colour deepens (2-3 mins)

6. Deglaze with wine and stir until thickened (4-5 mins)

7. Add stock and porcini soaking water (through strainer to avoid settled grit, add 3/4 if strainer not available) -

8. Return duck to pan and bring pan to boil.

9. Cover the pan in foil, and transfer to oven to braise until meat falls from bone (1.75 to 2.25 hours)

Finishing Ragu

1. Remove pan from oven, use tongs to shred the duck;

2. If the ragu is still watery, return the pan to the hob and simmer to reduce.

Gnocchi

1. Mix riced potato with egg yolk, flour, nutmeg, cheese and salt

2. Knead gently until a dough forms (overkneading may cause gnocchi to become dense)

3. divide dough into 4 pieces, for each piece form a snake (1cm diameter) and cut into 1.5 cm chunks; finish on a gnochi paddle if desired.

4. Cook in salted boiling water until they rise to the surface (1-2 mins) - (note can be refershed in iced-water, lightly coated in oil and fridged for up to a day.

Ingredients - Ragu

• 6x Chicken Marylands (250gm - 300gm each) - skin seasoned with salt for 1 hour before cooking ; can be substituted with 2x marylands & 2x breasts.

• 1x diced carrot

• 1x diced onion

• 3-4 garlic cloves crushed

• 2x sage sprigs

• 1x thyme sprig

• 1x bay leaf

• 10gm dried porcini, soaked in 250ml warm water for 1 hour prior to cooking

• 100gm tomato paste

• 125ml dry white wine

• 750ml (3cups) chicken stock

Ingredients - Gnocchi

• 660gm riced potato (Floury varieties generally best for lighter, waxy varieties like kipfler may give more body, density) - expect to get ~70% of potatoes out from what goes in. Eg: 1kg of raw potato in will get you about 700gm out once peeled, cooked and riced)

• 200gm tippo 00 flour (additional flour of any type for dusting)

• 30gm parmesan\pecorino

• light dusting of nutmeg

• 1 small egg yolk

• 1/4tsp salt

Adapted from Original Source: Andreas Pappadakis, Gourmet Traveler