Hello, dearest readers.

I recently decided to start working through, and reviewing, the many cookbooks I have.
The first book I’m going with is Market Chronicles: Stories and Recipes from Montréal’s Marché Jean Talon, by Susan Semenak. I bought it in the market’s bookstore– yep, they have a bookstore– when I visited Montréal, Canada, in 2018.

To give you an idea of how remarkable this open-air marketplace is, here is how Semenak describes it:

“Ever since the market’s beginnings in the early 1930’s, waves of immigrants to Montréal from Italy, Ireland, Poland and Ukraine, then Portugal and Greece, Morocco and Tunisia, El Salvador, Vietnam, Mexico, Lebanon, and Haiti — and countless points in between– have come here to find inexpensive fruits and vegetables. This is where the city’s Italians come for their carloads of of plum tomatoes when it’s time to ‘make the sauce’ and where Muslims from Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco gravitate on Ramadan evening in search of sweet, sticky chebakia to break the fast. Mexicans hankering for authentic barbacoa follow their noses to Javier Muñoz taqueria on Saturday mornings, when the smell of spiced lamb barbecued in clay-lined pits fills the air. Around the market’s perimeter, Italian bakers and grocers, Latino butchers, and hole-in-the-wall tonkinoise soup and shish taouk joints lend their world beat to the vibe.”

The cookbook is organized by seasons, and for each season there are highlighted produce and recipes. Oh, how I love it!

I dived straight in, not realizing that it starts with Spring (so not aligned with the current season). But that’s okay! I will skip to Summer next post and get back on track. In the meantime, let’s roll with what we have.
The first ingredient of Spring is *drumroll* — Maple Syrup.

One of the uses suggested for this ingredient was Maple Soy Duck Breast (on a bed of sautéed ginger and scallions). Very fancy.
Now, the reason why I got so excited is my fiancé, Alex, loves duck and usually only gets it when we eat out. I wanted to surprise him.

Duck breast tends to be hard to find and quite expensive honestly. Luckily, I found some at Wegman’s for about sixteen dollars for a pound-and-a-half. Needless to say, I opted for only one breast.

These are the major ingredients I used for this dish:

The maple syrup is used alongside soy sauce and ginger to create a marinade for the duck breast, which is scored (fat side only) and coated with a peppercorn rub beforehand. Once placed in the marinade, it is refrigerated for at least 4 hours. Easy day.

After 4 hours or so, you want to remove the duck breast from the marinade and pan-fry it. The outside becomes brown and crispy.

Once this was achieved, I removed the duck breast from the stovetop and placed into the oven for about half an hour, or until the internal temperature hit 170 degrees.

Luckily, I didn’t throw out the frying oil! Some of it is set aside and used to make a finishing glaze. I did this by adding it to the remaining marinade liquid, along with a touch of vinegar, and white wine. No need for additional salt as there is a lot of soy sauce.

The glaze then needs to be reduced for approximately 15 minutes, or until it becomes thick and syrupy.

While the duck was in the oven, I sautéed the ginger and scallions and built our side salad.

And voilà, after about half an hour, the duck was looking pretty great.

I sliced the duck and laid it atop a bed of scallions and ginger. Then, I added the glaze. The sides were rice and salad. Here is the final result!

The salad is not represented as it didn’t fit on the plate. We were also too hungry to patiently and thoughtfully build a montage of dishes.

Now for the review.

Turns out, I don’t like duck. Womp, womp.
That’s not the recipe’s fault, though! I just don’t like the taste of duck meat. That being said, the meal was a solid win– Alex loved it! The slightly crispy scallions and ginger paired beautifully with the glaze, and emphasized the main flavor notes of the dish. The soy sauce and maple syrup danced together in making a sweet, delicious umami, which slowly ran through the rice. It was very tasty.

Now, here is what I have to say about the recipe itself.
I think the flavors highlighted are pretty amazing, and objectively pair well with duck. The quantities listed are accurate and go well together. One could also say, they “pan” out — badum tss.

It’s okay. I’ll let myself out.

Jokes aside, the recipe works well flavor-wise and quantity-wise.
The only criticism I have is in regards to times and temperatures. The recommended time and temperature for the duck to stay in the oven was 8-10 minutes at 325 degrees. Wrong.

I would replace that with at least 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees. The ducks internal temperature needs to be at 170 degrees, and breast meat tends to be pretty thick and isolated with a layer of fat.

That being said, I thoroughly enjoyed making this. I enjoyed the process of going grocery shopping and preparing the meat, and learning that duck meat wasn’t for me. This really surprised me, by the way!

Well, dear readers, I hope you enjoyed reading this. I’ll see you next time with an appropriately themed summer dish! Much love, Evelyne.