Duck with kumquats and spätzle

A Namibian German recipe for duck with kumquats dripping in rich and tangy flavours that makes it perfect for all seasons, depending on your choice of side dishes. It's incredibly easy to cook. All it takes are good quality ingredients and a little patience to end up with a restaurant-quality dish.

Die Enten schnattern

Eons ago, I met two German Namibian sisters studying in South Africa and we clicked; became friends. A decade later, when I was working in Germany, I met up with one of the sisters again. She was an artist who had been commissioned to create (then) new murals for Windhoek's Hosea Kutako International Airport. For some reason—even she wasn't sure why—Lufthansa had paid for her to join the tourism board on a press trip promoting Namibia as a destination to the German market.

We immediately reconnected and over the course of a suitably Hanseatic meal in Hamburg, she invited me to visit her in Windhoek. I wasted no time making it happen: I had been desperately wanting to visit Fish River Canyon for years and this provided the perfect opportunity to get my ducks in a row.

Before heading for Africa's largest canyon, I hung out with her and her sister in Windhoek, getting to meet lots of local artists and musicians. On the weekend before I headed off into the wilds, their mother organised a big family meal to which I was invited. It was a chaotic affair with the extended family and friends all chattering enthusiastically.

The hostess's own mother had recently moved in with her and her husband. The matriarch thought it something that was about them "worrying to much" rather than her no longer coping with independent living. A formidable lady from Lüderitz, she insisted on taking charge of the kitchen. Clearly everyone knew better than to refuse Oma Lotte...

Luckily for me, she didn't refuse my help, probably because she liked that I had spoken with her in German when everyone else had automatically been speaking in English to accommodate her Australian son-in-law. As she bossed me around in the kitchen, it also gave me a chance to learn her recipe.

It was absolutely great listening to her stories as she guided me through the recipe and it has become one of my all-time favourites. She explained that when she was a little girl, her mother cooked a version with oranges that was quite traditional in Baden-Baden, not that far from Alsace with its Franco-German cuisine. But, later her family moved to Lüderitz. After her father died tragically young in a road accident, her mother, a doctor, became disillusioned with Germany. Without him, also a doctor, to advocate her expertise as a physician, she felt that the glass ceiling was pushing down on her. Oma Lotte told me her mother would say: "They were happy enough to have women doctors during the war when they needed them, but now... Pft!"

So, Oma Lotte's mother got a job as the medical officer for a mining company and moved her daughters to Namibia. Oma Lotte told me that it was terrifying for her, barely a teenager, to be in this strange new land without friends and where no one spoke about the loss of her father because "it was different times".

But, as grief faded and her love of the unique landscape of this part of the African Atlantic coast grew, she became fascinated by local plants and ingredients. Over time she incorporated them into the dish, creating a new Namibian family tradition. For example, the kumquats she was using grew abundantly in the garden...

You can start the dish in the same oven-oven proof dish with a lid (Dutch oven), but it really comes down to the design of your pot has and your stove. A metal (e.g. cast iron) Dutch oven with a flat base (e.g. Staub) works very well but if, like me, you're using an enamelled oven dish with a ridge around the base (Le Creuset) where the base won't make direct contact with a ceramic hob (and won't even operate with an induction hob), you need to use a another pot to start the dish (though the Le Creuset will work fine with a gas hob).

Putting differences to the side

In this recipe, the main evolution I've contributed over the years is the side dishes with which I serve it, though there still remains a nod to Oma Lotte's wonderful farewell lunch for me all those years ago.

I'm serving it here with spätzle with a combination of beetroot, horseradish and other flavours. In Oma Lotte's lunch for me, she served it in the more traditional rendition of spätzle dressed in a little butter with sautéed onions and parsley. She also told me that she often served it with bratkartoffeln (roast potatoes cooked in a slightly different manner to the dominant UK styles) and a Feldsalat (Lamb's lettuce) salad with thinly sliced beetroot and raw onions in a mustard dressing.

I've tried all of these and they are all utterly delicious. But, if you live somewhere where spätzle aren't that easy to source, they are great alternatives. Yes, of course you can make spätzle from scratch, but I've long given up on that. The sad truth is that, like bread or fresh pasta, making your own is theoretically great fun, but ultimately, unless you're really going to put the hours in perfecting the skill, it's never going to be as good as what you can buy from a good deli or bakery.

I'm shameless when I confess that my current strategy for spätzle is to get my brother-in-law Karel in Frankfurt (yes, the important Frankfurt; not getting into the regional debate here...) to take them to Antwerp, whence Luc brings them to me. Even post-Brexit, at least spätzle seem to have "freedom of movement" in Europe...

In this version, I prefer to keep the salad extremely pared back, mainly because I've gone frou-frou with the spätzle, moving ingredients over from one side dish to another.

This recipe is for two diners, but it can be scaled up. However, when doing so with the duck dish, it's not simple arithmetic. Apart from the duck legs themselves, only increase the other ingredients by 25% for each two additional diners.

With the spätzle, however, simply increase everything proportional to the number of diners.

3 top tips to get this recipe right:

• I am using duck legs for this recipe, exactly as Oma Lotte taught me all those years ago. As she explained, duck legs with the skin on provide the right amount of fat for the dish. You can cook it with a whole duck, but it makes it very heavy and a little fatty, which is good in a German winter, but not in the Namibian heat. She was totally accurate: I've tested it.

• When cooking the bacon cubes, it seems almost pedantic to first cook them in a separate pan from the one you're using to start the duck and other base ingredients. But, having tried 'n tested it over the years, I concur with Oma Lotte: adding the bacon juices into the pan before the duck juices have been absorbed into the base of the dish can give your final sauce a kind of "greasy" flavour. Following the recipe below results in a much fresher tang to your final sauce.

• The use of vegetable stock (versus chicken stock that often gets used in duck dishes) is important. Oma Lotte instinctively understood in Lüderitz what the famed chefs of the Medici passed on to Italian cuisine. The basic rule: use duck stock (not chicken stock) for winter dishes and vegetable stock for summer duck dishes. But, in an age in which practically no one is going to make duck stock from scratch, chicken stock seems like the nearest alternative, right?. Nope. Chicken stock "flattens" the flavour of duck replacing that beautiful, quintessential taste of duck with something that "tastes like chicken". Vegetable stock does not do that.

Shopping list

for the duck with kumquats

• 1 duck leg per diner; skin on

• Approx. 100g thick-cut unsmoked bacon; diced into cubes (or bacon lardons)

• 3 large echalion shallots (or equivalent other shallots); peeled

• 2 or 3 handfuls of ripe kumquats; washed and drained

• 3 sticks of celery, finely sliced (and keep any young leaf shoots)

• Approx. 5 tbspns unsalted butter

• 500ml vegetable stock

• 400ml dry white wine

• 1 tspn caraway seeds

• 1 tspn white pepper

• Approx. 2 tbspns plain white flour

• 1 tspn cornflour

• salt to taste

for the side dishes

• Spätzle

  • 1 handful of spätzle (dried or fresh) per diner

  • 2 medium beetroot, cooked, cooled and diced

  • 4 tbspns crème fraîche (or cream)

  • 2 tbspns, creamed horseradish

  • A generous clutch of fresh parsley, finely chopped

  • salt and pepper taste

• Green salad

  • Lamb's lettuce

  • Wild rocket (arugula)

  • Vinaigrette dressing

Cooking method

for the duck with kumquats

1. Cook your bacon cubes in a shallow frying pan in 1 tbspn butter until they start to crisp, then place to one side. NB: with this dish you can't do this days before because you will use all the juices in this dish and fridge storage will make them "grungy"

2. Sift a little flour onto a plate and season your duck legs with a little salt and white pepper. Press your duck legs onto the flour, coating in a thin layer all over. Shake off the excess and allow to rest

3. In a large pot or deep frying pan with a lid, heat approx. 2 tbspns of butter on a medium heat. As soon as it begins to bubble, add the floured duck legs and brown gently on all sides. Once it has a nice colour on it, remove and place to one side

4. To the same pan, add 2 tbspns of butter and slightly increase the heat. As soon as it begins to bubble, add your celery and stir in and sauté for about 2mins. Then, add the shallots, turning to ensure they are coated on all sides. Add the caraway seeds and stir in. Sauté all of these together, stirring occasionally. Allow the shallots to catch (i.e. blacken) a little in certain places (but not burn too much). This is important for the caramelisation that adds to the dish.

5. When the pot is almost dry (and shows signs of sticking), pour in half of the wine and stir with a wooden spoon, deglazing by scraping any "sticky bits" from the bottom of the pan with the wooden spoon so that their caramelised flavours mingle with the "juice". If you have any of the young stalks and leaves of the celery, add these too. Cover and allow to simmer for about 5mins, reducing the heat slightly

6. Add the kumquats and an additional quarter of the wine and the vegetable stock. Stir, re-cover, and simmer for 6 or 7mins; until the shallots and celery have notably softened

7. Arrange your duck legs, skin side up, in the oven-proof dish. Add the bacon cubes and their juices, leaving the bacon on top of the duck, which will protect the skin from burning. Gently transfer the solid contents of the pot into the dish, also leaving the celery on top of the bacon to build up the "protective layer". Gently pour the liquid around the edges of the duck legs. Cover and place at the centre of an oven preheated to 200°C. Cook for 40mins without disturbing

8. Remove from the oven and uncover. Gently turn the shallots and kumquats so that the browned surfaces are submerged beneath the liquid. Re-cover and return to the oven for a further 20mins

9. Remove from the oven and uncover. Gently nudge the roasted bacon into the liquid, exposing the skin of the duck legs so that it can crisp up. Re-cover and return to the oven, cook for a further 20mins

10. Remove and uncover. Very gently (the pot will be very hot) pour almost all of the liquid into a small saucepan (i.e. a small pan meant for making sauce). Re-cover your oven dish and return to the oven and turn off the heat

11. Bring the liquid in the saucepan to a vigorous simmer, pouring in the remaining wine. After about 2mins or so, add the cornflour, whisking constantly to prevent lumps. As soon as it has reached the consistency of a gravy, remove from the heat and strain into a gravy boat or sauce dish. You need to time the cooking so that everything is ready and your sauce does not stand too long

12. Plate the duck legs, kumquats and other contents of the oven dish and take to table with the sauce and other side dishes

for the spätzle with beetroot and horseradish

1. Time you cooking so that this coincides with the duck and sauce being ready. Cook the spätzle in salted boiling water (check the packaging for directions because fresh cooks far quicker than dried). Once cooked, remove from the heat and drain

2. Return the drained spätzle to the hot pot. Add the diced beetroot and creamed horseradish. Season with salt and pepper. Stir in and cover, keeping warm in the hot pot

3. Just before plating, add the parsley and crème fraîche (or cream) and stir in. Re-cover for about a minute so that the heat of the pot warms them gently, then plate and take to table together with the salad

Alternatives

This dish is very much about the duck, and therefore not easy to adapt for vegans and vegetarians. That said, I have done fantastic plant-based versions, but even then I would say that they are essentially a different dish and require different sides. The versions that have worked best have been those with butternut squash or dense pumpkin (e.g. grey pumpkin or flat white Boer pumpkin). The orange "round" pumpkins more prevalent in Europe and parts of the USA contain a far higher water ratio and tend to become too soggy.

Naturally, these versions don't include the bacon (add two tablespoons of mushroom ketchup when it goes into the oven as a flavour substitute) and for the first 40mins in the oven, do not include the pumpkin or butternut squash. Once these baseline ingredients have reduced, add thick slices of pumpkin or butternut squash with the skin on, and the remaining wine, and cook for a further 40mins. NB: it may take a little longer to reduce the sauce you take to table.

I have never tried a pescatarian version, mainly because the long, slow cooking thing really isn't suited to fish and seafood. So, no suggestions. Jammer!

However, for carnivores, if you don't like duck, this dish is fantastic with pork loin treated very much like the duck; sealed and cooked as a large piece (or pieces) and then carved before taking to table.

Pairings

I almost always default to a Riesling with this dish, perhaps nostalgically, subconsciously remembering that fantastic Sunday afternoon in Windhoek .On this occasion, we decided to try a workaday Riesling 2023 Qualitätswein Rheinhessen produced by a UK supermarket chain's own winemakers, mainly because it seemed very good value. We knew we were risking it with a medium-dry wine. But, while on the sweeter side of dry, it actually turned out a more interesting option than the safer choice of drier Rieslings: the hint of sweetness actually balanced the slightly bitter notes of caraway and horseradish perfectly.

However, if you prefer to play it safe, I'd say that my all-time recommendation for quality-for-money would be this Rheingau number that has become a kind of "old faithful" when not interested in splurging on the really good stuff: Leitz The Boar Riesling. I've come back to this one, tried numerous vintages, and it always delivers.

I cannot remember exactly what the Riesling was the first time I had this dish in Namibia, all I remember is that it came from the Cape. But, in my little experiments to see whether I would actually recognise it after all those years, this is one I chanced upon from Elgin that I thoroughly recommend if you want to be on the drier side of the road, Saurwein Chi Riesling 2022.