This was a regular supper when I was growing up.  My Mam used to call it ‘free food’.  We had plenty of mallard on the river and lots of apples and red cabbages on the farm.  These days, I like to serve it with game chips – they add a lovely crunch to the proceedings.

Ingredients

2 mallard gutted and dressed for roasting (ask your butcher or game dealer to do this).
Salt and pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil

For the red cabbage
50 ml olive oil
1 onion, peeled and sliced
2 apples, peeled, cored and sliced
Sprig of thyme
1 small cabbage finely shredded
50 grams caster sugar
150 ml port
150 ml red wine
4 tablespoon red current jelly

For the game chips
2 large potatoes

Method

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C/350⁰F/gas mark 4.

Season the mallard inside and out with salt and pepper.  On the hob, heat a heavy-based frying pan that can go in the oven or a heavy-based roasting tin.  When it is hot, add 1 tablespoon of the olive oil and then the mallard.  Brown them, turning occasionally, until golden all over.

Place the ducks in the oven for 15 minutes, or until they are ready – they should remain pink in the middle.  Remove from the oven, cover with foil and set aside in a warm place to rest. 

For the red cabbage, heat the olive oil in a heavy-based saucepan.  Add the onion, apple and thyme and cook until just soft.  Add the cabbage and cook until very tender.

Add the sugar, port and red wine and let it bubble until it reduces to a lovely sticky glaze.  Check the seasoning, and then finish off by stirring in the redcurrant jelly.  Set aside and keep warm.

To make the game chips, peel the potatoes and slice as thinly as possible – a mandolin is a great way of doing this.  Dry the potato slices thoroughly and, if you have a deep-fat fryer, set the temperature to 140⁰C/284⁰F.  Deep-fry the slices individually until golden.  If you don’t have a deep-fat fryer, heat a good amount of oil in a heavy-based frying pan until very hot.  Please be careful.  Then fry the chips as above.  Drain well on kitchen paper and season with salt. 

To serve, remove the breasts and legs from the birds.  Serve on breast and one leg per person, placing the meat on a warm plate on top of the cabbage.  Garnish it with a pile of game chips.

By courtesy of Bryn Williams