Duck Sauce - Traditional Danish Sauce for Christmas Eve
Duck Sauce © kvalifood.com
Video Recipe - For me, the hardest thing to do for christmas eve was always the duck sauce. If you make it like a restaurant sauce, it will not have the correct consistency and taste the we danes know from christmas eve. So the trick is to find a balance both in the time it takes, and the ingredients you have to use. This recipe has a few variations both the traditional “everyday Christmas Eve” and the “fine dining Christmas Eve.”
Ingredients
Yields ½-1 liter (2-4 cups) of sauce (for 10-20 people)
roux for half a litre of sauce
- 3 tablespoons flour
- 2-3 tablespoons duck fat (enough to cover the flour)
If you want 1 litre (1 quart) of sauce, just use twice the amount of roux.
Stock
- ½-1 liter (2 cups) dark duck stock - or drippings from the duck and the roast pork. Porc drippings makes the sauce much better.
Directions
Put the flour and the fat into the pot and roast at MEDIUM heat until the flour does not taste raw anymore. Less than 5 minutes typically. The flour should not brown too much. It is usually done when it starts smelling like popcorn.
Pour the roux into the stock while stirring, to prevent lumps. Than add:
- A stock cube or two (If you are good homemade stock it is usually strong enough without cubes.)
- A small dash of red wine (optional, but is good. Eg ½ dl (1/4 cup))
- A small dash of heavy cream (optional, but is good. Eg ½ dl (1/4 cup))
- Extra duck fat to taste. Up to 1 dl (½ cup) is usually a good amount.
- Sauce browning (only if you don’t use a dark stock and a light roux.)
- Salt to taste
- Pepper
It has to simmer until it tastes good. It might taste a little bit of flour if the flour is not roasted enough initially. Then it just needs to simmer a little longer.
If you roast the flour to a more golden color, it should also simmer longer, and the more red wine you add, the longer it should simmer. Otherwise the flavours will not even out and it will taste off. Often it needs to simmer for an hour before it collects. It can taste fairly bad to begin with, but it will come around eventually.
You should flavour it with a nice amount of duck fat. It helps for both texture and flavour. Just add as much as it will take without separating.
Notes
The sauce can easily be made some days days in advance and then reheated. It will be just as good.
You should preferably use a good duck stock instead of cubes. It makes a big difference.
This sauce is is one of the reasons why I’m doing the breasts and the thighs separately, so that I can use the carcass to make a good sauce the day before.
If you use duck stock cooked on duck carcass you should reduce it to 1/2 - 1/3 for a stock that is strong enough for a sauce.
You can substitute the flour with fine sweet rice flour for a gluten free version.