February 2008 Archives

Elizabeth Falkner, of Citizen Cake renown, has launched her new venture: Orson. Located in a two-story building on 4th Street near Bryant the undertaking is audacious, both for its considerable size and for the edginess of the menu. The space uses the full height of the building with the ground floor featuring a large horseshoe shaped bar at the center of a large open lounge area, with dining areas at the edges. The décor features dark soundstage-like grays, with glass and chrome. The upstairs areas, open to the lounge area below, are currently devoted to private dining rooms. Background music (depending on how you define background) is techno-pop.

The menu is divided into five sections, with three of them leading up to dessert: “teasers,” “shorts,” “premiere,” and two of them being dessert: “naughty” and “nice.”

Weekends afford the time to experiment in the kitchen. After looking long and hard at the bags of sodium alginate and calcium chloride in the cabinet (more anon), I decided to experiment with something that I was more certain I would be able to eat. Accordingly my attention was drawn to one of the smoked duck breasts I had bought during the last expedition to Village Imports / Made In France in Brisbane. The following recipe isn't entirely original, but at this point I'm not certain where I first read it, and there are some changes. This recipe serves two moderately hungry gourmets.

Ingredients

One smoked duck breast
Four eggs
Three tablespoons sour cream
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
One tablespoon minced fresh chives
Three tablespoons chopped shallots
Salad greens
Vinaigrette dressing

Method

1. Peel the skin and fat from the duck breast. Place the skin and fat into a skillet over medium-low heat and render the duck fat until the skin turns into crispy crackling (about 10 minutes). Cut skin crackling into small pieces and set aside. Retain the duck fat.
   
2. Beat eggs with the sour cream, chives, salt and pepper until well mixed and fluffy
   
3. Heat some of the rendered duck fat in a skillet until hot. Add one-half of the shallots and cook for a minute or two, until softened. Add half of the egg mixture and half of the cracklings to the pan and make an omelet. Repeat for the remainder of the shallots, eggs and cracklings.
   
4. Dress the salad greens with the vinaigrette. Split the salad between two plates; thinly slice the duck breast and split between the two plates, arranging on the top of the salad greens. Place an omelet on each plate next to the salad and serve immediately.