by Tom Stobart
Choosing domestic ducks – or ducklings – is not difficult, as it is fairly obvious from the look of a duck if it is old and in any case, commercially-produced birds are killed when quite young. It may be less easy in some remote market or with wild ducks, and the following rules will help. Ducks should be fresh, without smell, and plump, particularly on the breast, which is the important part. The bottom half of the beak should be flexible, and you should be able to bend it back easily. The webs of the feet should be soft – in old ducks they are hard – and the wing pinions should also be flexible. To carve a duck, remove the legs and carve the breast in long, thin slices fore and aft, more or less vertically, down to the bone.
In Europe, the US and Asia, wild ducks of various species come in from further north to winter, settling in large numbers in estuaries and lakes, or feeding inland in fields according to their habit. Thousands of birds were netted or shot by wildfowlers with great punt guns which were fired into the massed birds. In Britain, the mallard is the commonest wild duck (it is the canard sauvage of France) and the one most eaten everywhere, since it is abundant and of excellent table quality. It is at its best in November and December. In southern France, it is preserved in brine.
Other ducks commonly eaten in Britain are the pintail (Anas acuta), the teal (Anas crecca), which is small, the scaup (Aythya marila), the shoveler (Spatula clypeata), the widgeon (Anas penelope) and the pochard (Aythya ferina). Others, like the shelduck (Tadorna tadorna), and the Tufted duck (Aythya fuligula), are protected or avoided. Nature-lovers get more pleasure from flights of ducks over the water than from wild duck on the table.
In North America, the most prized wild duck is the Canvasback (Aythya valisineria), so-called for its light canvas-coloured back; it is said to take its delicious flavour from the ‘wild celery’ it gets by diving. In addition to the pintail, teal, scaup, shoveler and widgeon, other ducks which are highly-prized in North America are the Redhead (Nyroca americana),the Black duck (Anas rubripes),of which the Cayuga is a domesticated version, the colourful Carolina or Wood duck (Aix sponsa),the Ring-neck (Aythya colloris), and, further south, the Dominican Masked duck (Nomonyx dominicus), as well as many others of less quality. There are also favourite wild ducks in Asia, Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and some gastronomic oddities like the dried Fray duck (Anas zonorhyncha) of China. Opinions vary as to the respective merits of ducks; some are good when young, but horrid when old. Old ducks of edible species make good game stock, though.
Wild ducks should not be hung, though some recipes call for them to be marinated to tenderize them and rid them of any fishy flavour. Plucking out the down is tedious; one solution is dunking the bird in scalding water for a couple of minutes and then rubbing it with finely-powdered resin, which brings off the down by sticking to it. After plucking, the duck needs singeing. Cut off the head and draw and wipe out the ducks in the normal manner. In the old days, wild duck were usually trussed with the feet left on, and the feet were scalded and skinned, but people today are more squeamish and don’t like to be reminded of what they are eating. Wild duck is usually served rare – the old saying was that a mallard should walk through the kitchen, a widgeon should run slowly through and a teal should rush through. Most experts recommend about 20 minutes in a hot oven, but such short cooking might be inadvisable with frozen game or with any that might be infected with Salmonella. See eggs.
[Duck – French: canard German: Ente Italian: anatra Spanish: pato]
DURIAN or durion (Durio zibethinus) is a well-known tropical fruit, a native of Malaysia which looks something like a *jack fruit but is not related. The fruits, which are green, rugby ball shaped and have a hard shell with pointed warts or spines, weigh about 2 kg (4½ lb).When they are ripe, they go yellowish and may fall, making it inadvisable to walk underneath the trees, which may reach 30 m (100 ft). Many people find the fruit delicious, although it has a dreadful stench of stale vomit. Optimists say that this can be removed if the pieces of fruit are soaked in coconut milk for a day. The flesh has the consistency of custard; the taste is rich, aromatic and sweet, with a strange balsamic background.
DULSE. See seaweed.
DURRA. See millet.
DWARF CAPE GOOSEBERRY. See physalis fruit.
DYERS’ ALKANET. See alkanna.
DYES. Nearly 90% of food colourings sold are synthetic dyes and have to be certified as safe by the responsible authorities. The first coal-tar dye, aniline purple, was discovered by the British chemist, Sir William H. Perkin, in 1856, and by the beginning of this century, dye chemists had developed dozens of these synthetic colourings, any one of which could be added to food, provided there was no obvious and immediate harmful effect. At that time, nobody had registered that dyes could also have long-term ill effects. Gradually, over the years, the more obviously harmful dyes have been weeded out and banned, but it has recently become clear that the control and selection has not been done well enough. Even more alarming is the situation when authorities such as the World Health Organization, the Federal Drug Administration and the responsible agencies of the various European governments do not agree on the dyes which should be considered safe, in spite of the pressure they are under to standardize, because differences upset international trade. Such a situation arose, for example over the colour amaranth. When this was provisionally banned on suspicion in the US, the authorities in Britain (where it is most commonly used for colouring jams and other foods that tend to be eaten by children) did nothing about it, on the grounds that the tests were inconclusive. Most parents would consider it more sensible to take the attitude that any chemical is guilty until proved innocent, rather than waiting for cast-iron proof of harmfulness before taking action. Children, who eat most of these dyes, are also most vulnerable. Dyes, amongst other things, can cause cancer, allergies, and damage to unborn babies.
However, in fairness, it is a mistake to think that every natural substance is harmless and every synthetic one harmful. All cooking, all life, is chemical. Naturally charred substances used to colour gravies could be carcinogenic. One concludes it is best to use food colours only on special occasions and to keep the children’s soft drinks and sweets to a minimum. Making them at home is not only more wholesome but also cheaper. Flowers, fresh or crystallized, nuts and fruits can be used for colour and decoration.
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EAR SHELL. See abalone.
EARTHENWARE. This is the simplest and most primitive form of pottery. It is soft, porous and fragile. Although easily broken by a knock, it is comparatively resistant to thermal shock; that is, it is not so easily cracked by sudden changes of temperature. Pouring cold liquid into a hot, dry earthenware pot is, however, likely to crack it. Earthenware does not heat evenly like a metal, but good quality earthenware cooking pots can often be put straight on the open fire or gas flame without harm, especially when the bottom of the pot is rounded.
Unglazed earthenware is the classic material for water pots. The water soaks through, evaporates and so cools the contents. For wine, it was more usual to use skins, gourds or other less permeable containers, with good reason. Nobody wants to lose wine by evaporation, and glazed earthenware in the past was dangerous if used for storing acid substances (see ceramic glazes).
Earthenware pots, such as the Spanish ollas or graxioneras and Italian padellas are splendid to cook in, if you understand their characteristics. Some dishes, like the pot-roasted rabbit with herbs and black olives of Liguria (coniglio alla sanremese), even taste better when cooked in earthenware, although I have not been able to work out the reason. However, if food is allowed to burn in earthenware, it burns badly. The glaze of an earthenware pot which has been used regularly on a fierce fire or on naked gas for some months may crack or craze. The exposed earthenware can then give an unpleasant taste to the food and the pot must be replaced with a new one.
Earthenware has a high specific heat, which means that it needs to absorb a lot of heat to raise the temperature. Earthenware pots warm and cool slow
ly. Food brought to table in the pot in which it was cooked will stay hot – and may even go on cooking. Should the instability of pots with a rounded bottom be an embarrassment, then a mat of straw or wood, shaped like a ring, is the traditional rustic solution for the table; a metal flan-ring will solve the problem on the stove.
[Earthenware – French: terre cuite German: Töpferware, Steingut Italian: terraglie, stoviglie Spanish: loza de barro]
EAU-DE-VIE. See fruit brandy.
EAU-DE-VIE DE MARC. See marc.
EDDO. See yam (dasheen).
EELS are fish which show a resemblance to snakes in shape. This makes them repugnant to some people, but they are all good eating, and the common eel has become an expensive delicacy. The large marine eels, the *conger and *moray belong to different but related families.
The Common eel of Europe and North Africa (Anguilla anguilla) used to be a most mysterious creature. Every spring, about March, baby eels (or elvers), tiny worm-like animals only 6-8 cm (2¼-3¼ in) long and 2-3 mm (1½-1⅛ in) thick came wriggling up rivers in a massive migration known as an eel fare. The elvers pushed on into every tiny stream and even crossed fields to reach ponds and ditches. Every autumn, large silvery eels left those ponds and ditches, reached the streams and headed down river to the sea. Old books carry descriptions of silver and yellow eels, of sharp and broad-nosed eels which were thought to be of different species. In the days when even mice were thought to arise from fermenting grain, there were bizarre notions about the origin of eels. In 1905, the International Council for the Study of the Sea assigned to Denmark the task of unravelling the life history of the eel, and Dr Johannes Schmidt of the Carlsberg Laboratory in Copenhagen was chosen to head the team. It took almost twenty years and the co-operation of countless ship’s captains before the mystery was unravelled. Eels were found to breed 275 m (900 ft) down in the depths of the Atlantic to the south-west of Bermuda, not far from the Sargasso Sea. The eel larvae – very small, almost transparent leaf-like objects – drift about 5000 km (3000 miles) in the Gulf Stream until they reach the shores of Europe – a journey which takes three years. They then change their shape and turn into elvers, which swim up the rivers (a large proportion of males stay in the estuaries).They live in fresh water for eight to ten years, feeding voraciously and growing. These eels are yellow. Then they change: their eyes get larger, their lips thinner, their noses more pointed, and their colour goes from yellow to silvery before they start to migrate in autumn, crawling like snakes through the grass on wet nights, knowing where to go by some incredible instinct. Once back in the sea, they swim for their breeding ground, a journey which takes them six months to complete. The following spring, they are ready to lay their eggs in the place they left as minute larvae. After breeding, they die or so it is presumed – because they never return to their rivers. The American eel (Anguilla rostrata), which is closely related, breeds not far away from its European cousin and so has a shorter distance to travel. Eels in Japan (A.japonica), Australasia (A. australis) and elsewhere have similar habits and closer breeding grounds, so they do not travel the same vast distances as the European species.
In the past, elvers were a common seasonal delicacy. In Britain, they were boiled and pressed into eel-cakes. Today, the high price of eels means that most of the elvers caught go to stock eel farms, but they can still sometimes be obtained locally, for instance, at the mouth of the Severn. Elvers are usually bought ready for cooking. As soon as they have been brought home, they should be well washed in salted water.
In Spain, elvers (angulas) are a popular and expensive spring treat. They are usually cooked a Ia bilbaina, quickly boiled in oil with chilli and garlic. For 300 g (11 oz) of elvers, fry 8 cloves of garlic and a red chilli in oil until the garlic begins to colour. Then put in the elvers and continue to fry for a couple of minutes. The elvers are still soft and white (they look unfortunately like parasitic worms).They are usually cooked in individual earthenware dishes, to be fished out of bubbling hot oil and eaten with a wooden spoon.
Fully grown eels are another sort of delicacy. They need to be mature; when yellow they are poor eating. The best size is under 1 kg (2 lb), although females sometimes grow to a monstrous 1½ m (5 ft) and 6 to 7 kg (about a stone). Mature silver eels are caught in nets as they migrate towards the sea in autumn. They are also fattened on eel farms. Near Venice, eels from the valli, as the salt-water lagoons in that part of the Adriatic are called, are kept in huge, half-sunken baskets called bolaghe and left to fatten until they are ready for eating.
It is a shame that pollution and modern drainage have led to drastic reduction in the numbers of eels. At one time, canals were full of eels, and barge men carried a trident-like eel-spear for jabbing at the muddy banks as they went past – eels disclose their presence by tell-tale bubbles. Even in those days, there was a pollution problem: the Dutch eel boats (there were so many that they had even their own mission in the East End of London) would not come above Gravesend for fear that the live eels, carried in perforated ‘wells’ open to the sea, would be poisoned.
Eels should be bought live. lt is best to get the fishmonger to kill and skin your eel for you (but cook it immediately). However, it is quite easy to kill eels by banging the heads against a hard object; the trouble is they go on wriggling after they are dead. To skin an eel, cut a ring in the skin round the neck with a sharp knife. Get someone to hold the head (a skewer passed through it helps the grip) and pull the skin back, inside out, like peeling off a glove. A pair of pliers helps in gripping the skin; so also do wood ashes or coarse salt. Eels may be grilled, baked or cooked in dozens of ways. In Germany, it may be eels in dill sauce; in Britain, jellied eel is famous. Shops selling this speciality were once common in the East End of London, and there were jellied eel stalls on the streets. Eels were popular, too, in most seaside resorts. But now, alas, price has turned eels from poor man’s food into a rich man’s delicacy (like salmon and oysters). Eels are popular in almost every other European country from Norway, through Holland, to France, Spain and Italy. Frozen eel is imported from as far away as Japan and New Zealand (but is not as good as the freshly-killed article).
Smoked eel is also a great delicacy and an excellent, if expensive, start to a meal. The skin, dried by smoke, is easily peeled off and the fillets are removed from the backbone. Smoked eel is usually served with brown bread and butter, and lemon wedges. The finest smoked eel comes from Holland.
[Eel – French: anguille German: Aal Italian: Anguilla Spanish: anguila]
EGGPLANT. See aubergine.
EGGS. It is generally stated that all fresh eggs are edible, though possibly not nice. I do not know if this bold statement is intended to cover reptile eggs – although turtle and alligator eggs are certainly good to eat; what about snake eggs? With birds’ eggs, though, I feel inclined to accept the generalization. (Having climbed several times to vultures’ nests, I will leave the trial of their smelly offerings to someone else.)
However, the eating of wild birds’ eggs, once prevalent, has now become a matter of conscience because of our dwindling wildlife. It is also often a matter of what is allowed by law, even though, with some species, taking eggs expertly might do no harm. The nests must be found before the bird has finished laying her clutch. If only one or two eggs are now quietly taken when the bird is away feeding, she will usually go on laying to make good the loss. With management – an egg being taken every day – a continuous supply can be arranged over a period of a week or more, and yet the bird in the end can be left to hatch out a full clutch. This benefits the robber. He is following the pattern of the good parasite which does not exterminate its host. It is quite immoral to grab a whole nest of eggs or through ignorance to cause birds to desert the nest.
Eggs have superlative food value (containing about 12% fat and 12% protein). While hens’ eggs in particular are excellent value for money, they are also a promoter of good health, although in recent years some medical opinion has denigrated them. Eggs cont
ain cholesterol, the stuff that they say clogs up the arteries. But eggs also contain lecithin – which unclogs arteries – and the sulphur-rich amino acid, methionine, which also helps in this.
As eggs are also rich in iron, in vitamin B, and in vitamin A, it is not surprising that there are doctors who greatly approve of them and advise eating up to four a day; they say that excluding eggs is a disaster, especially for people with defective circulation and heart, for whom an egg-free diet is often prescribed. One day, no doubt, the truth will be known. When people are allergic to eggs, the trouble is almost always due to the white, especially if it is raw or lightly cooked. Raw white, in fact, is said to contain traces of a harmful substance, but in practice this can be ignored. For most people, who are outside the controversy, eggs for breakfast, or with oil in mayonnaise, are probably a passport to good health.
Hen eggs. ‘Egg’, without qualification, always means the egg of the domestic fowl. It is an article of food produced yearly by the billion. There is scarcely a village in the whole world, outside the high Arctic, perhaps, where hens cannot be found. Indeed, eggs are probably the most universally known food of man. The domestic hen is descended from a species of jungle fowl and was domesticated in India or Indonesia, where wild jungle fowl are still common in places. Domestication took place quite early in history; and the practice of keeping hens soon spread from the East over the Old World. The Romans noted them in Britain when they arrived, but they did not reach America until they were taken there by Columbus on his second voyage.