Sweet duck legs cooked with plums and star anise

Name: Sweet duck legs cooked with plums and star anise
Cook time: 155 min
Total time: 155 min
Yield: 4
Ingredients: 4 fat legs of duck; 4 tablespoons soy sauce; 3 teaspoons five-spice; a handful of star anise; ½ a stick of cinnamon; 1 tablespoon olive oil; 1–2 fresh chillies, deseeded and sliced; 16 plums, halved and destoned; 2 tablespoons Demerara sugar

With easy soy sauce marinade

Dairy-free Gluten-free

2 hrs 35 mins plus marinating time

Super easy

serves 4

About the recipe

Cooked slowly to give you thin, crispy skin and beautiful, melt-in-your-mouth meat.

nutrition per serving

Calories

25%

Fat

52%

Saturates

52%

Sugars

29%

Salt

26%

Protein

38%

Carbs

10%

Fibre

of an adult’s reference intake

Recipe From

Jamie's Dinners

By Jamie Oliver

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Ingredients

4 fat legs of duck

4 tablespoons soy sauce

3 teaspoons five-spice

a handful of star anise

½ a stick of cinnamon

1 tablespoon olive oil

1–2 fresh chillies, deseeded and sliced

16 plums, halved and destoned

2 tablespoons Demerara sugar

Top Tip

Support your local duck farmers – look for free-range farms in your area and help the British farming industry. Free-range ducks have freedom to roam outdoors and the provision of open water, allowing them to display their natural instincts of splashing and swimming. Living a good life generally means they have better flavour and texture.

Method

Place the duck legs in a sandwich bag with the soy sauce, five-spice, star anise, cinnamon stick and olive oil and let them marinate for a minimum of 2 hours. To really get the flavours going, you could keep this in your fridge to marinate for up to 2 days. Then get yourself a pan, casserole or high-sided roasting tray that snugly fits the duck legs. Place the chillies, plums and sugar in the bottom of the tray and then pour the marinade from the bag over the top. Mix it all up using your fingers, and place the duck legs on top.
Place the tray in a preheated oven at 170°C/325°F/gas 3 for 2 to 2½ hours until the meat falls away from the bone. Remove the star anise and cinnamon stick, then taste the sauce to see if it needs to be seasoned with a little more soy sauce. It’s now down to you how you would like to serve it. You could have it as a starter with some of the little Chinese pancakes that you can buy, or served simply with rice or noodles and the chunky, jammy plum sauce that the duck has cooked in.

If you are the type of person who goes into a supermarket and buys pre-packed chicken or duck breasts, thighs or drumsticks, then I really want to start you thinking along the lines of buying a whole chicken or duck. It’s far better to buy the whole bird and then remove the breasts or legs.

I’ve also noticed that duck legs aren’t as popular, because the packs of duck legs never seem to shift from the supermarket shelves like the chicken ones do – which is strange, because all they need is some slow cooking and you’ll get thin crispy skin and beautiful melt-in-your-mouth meat.