Welcome back to The Weedeater, Racket’s column exploring the exciting world of cooking with cannabis. Each month, I walk you through a tasty new cannabis-based recipe with foolproof instructions to make it yourself. Some are fast and easy. Others, elaborate and oh so very dumb. But all are delicious and leave you feeling real nice. With that, let’s get cooked!
Duck Conqui’d With THC-Infused Duck Fat Potatoes
Can you believe it’s already been an entire year of us eating weed together? It truly brings a tear to my bloodshot eye.
When I initially started thinking up recipes for The Weedeater around this time last year, one of the first that came to mind was duck confit. Confit is a classic French cooking method originally used for food preservation. It involves cooking something in fat at a low temp for a long time until it’s more tender than even the littlest forehead kiss. Cooking something in fat at a low temp for a long time? We’d be crazy not to infuse it with weed.
Confit is usually used to cook meat, although garlic confit and tomato confit both also kick major ass. But today, we’re making the crème de la crème of confitable foods: duck.
Duck confit starts with plump, fatty duck leg quarters that are cured overnight before being submerged in the best tasting fat on the planet: duck fat. They’re then cooked low and slow at 240 degrees for several hours all while infusing the duck fat with herbs like rosemary, thyme, and bay leaves. Now, the THC compounds in cannabis burn up entirely at 250 degrees, so any THC infusion must take place below that. They also take several hours to fully bond to fat molecules. All this science means cannabis-infused duck confit is a no-brainer. It’s so easy I honestly questioned whether it would actually work.
To test it out, I hosted a feast and invited only my highest friends. Everything we ate was made with the infused duck fat: the duck confit itself, air fried potatoes, Deviled’s Lettuce Duck Eggs, duck fat Waedsar Salad, and orange bars with a duck fat shortbread crust (which you'll see a recipe for in a coming Weedeater installment). The only thing that didn’t have duck fat in it was the late-night Cheba Hut we ordered once we all became the highest we’ve ever been from eating all of said infused duck fat food.
So obviously, it worked. To be honest, it worked even better than I thought or hoped it would. And the real beauty is that it only requires two additional steps from making a traditional non-weed duck confit: decarbing the weed and tossing it in the pot. That’s it! Otherwise, this is just a normal duck confit recipe which, while it may seem daunting because it’s French food, is actually incredibly easy.
Here’s what you’re gonna need.
For the duck:
- 4 large duck leg quarters
- 1–2 cups duck fat (the larger your duck legs are, the more duck fat you’ll need)
- 4–7 grams decarbed weed (same method as the deviled egg recipe)
- 1 sprig rosemary
- 2–3 sprigs thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 bulb of garlic
- 1 knob of ginger
- Salt
- Black pepper
- Recommended: cheese cloth and butcher’s twine
For the potatoes:
- 1 pound new or fingerling potatoes
- 2 tablespoons infused duck fat
- Salt to taste
- Optional: 1–2 packets of any Dr. Dabs seasoning
Here’s what you’re gonna do.
- Prepare the duck legs and decarb your weed. Preheat your oven to 240 degrees. Lay your duck leg quarters out on a quarter sheet pan. Using a paring knife, gently poke or score each duck legs’ skin. Piercing the skin and underlying fat layer helps the fat render more consistently. Liberally season the legs on both sides with salt, pepper, and any other spices you’re using. I kept mine pretty simple and opted for just salt and black pepper. Place the legs in a ziptop bag and chill in the fridge overnight.
- By now, that oven should be preheated, and you can get on with decarbing your weed following the same process found in our Deviled Egg recipe. I used 7 grams of the good stuff and wound up with a very potent three cups of infused duck fat. If you’re looking for something a little lighter, use less weed.
- Conqui’d the duck. Preheat the oven to 240 degrees again. Pull your duck legs out of their fridge prison and walk them right into a Dutch oven skin side down. Don’t worry about trying to fit them all in a single layer as they’ll soon be mostly submerged in delicious duck fat anyways. Wrap your decarbed weed in cheesecloth and tie each end with butcher’s twine. Do the same with the other herbs. You can forgo this step and instead just throw all the herbs (and herb) directly into the pot with the duck but putting them into sachets keeps the fat cleaner with less material to strain out at the end. Nestle both herb sachets under the duck legs to ensure they’ll be fully submerged in the duck fat we’re about to rain down on everything. Cut a full bulb of garlic in half and add it to the pot, skins and all. Cut an unpeeled knob of ginger in half the long way and give the inside a couple good whacks with a knife to score it before adding it to the pot.
- Over on the stove, melt two cups of duck fat until it just reaches its liquid state. You’re just trying melt it, not heat it up. Pour the duck fat onto the duck legs. They should be pretty well surrounded, but not fully submerged or floating. Slap the lid on that Dutch oven and put it in the oven to cook low and slow for four to five hours. Check on the legs every hour and flip them after two hours. By the fourth hour, the legs should be fully submerged in infused duck fat. Most legs will be done at this point but if your legs are on the larger side, you may need to let them go the full five hours. If you’re serving the duck right away, move on to step 4. If you’re making this ahead of time, remove the duck from the fat and set aside. Strain the fat through a fine mesh sieve into a clean container. Return the duck legs back the fat and pop the whole container in the fridge until you're ready to serve. Since the confit process was originally used as a long-term preservation technique, the fully cooked duck will stay good in your fridge for months, as long as it remains fully encased in duck fat.
- Make the potatoes. Preheat your air fryer to 400 degrees. Thoroughly rinse the potatoes. Keep smaller potatoes whole and cut larger ones in half. Put all potatoes in a bowl. In the microwave or in a small pan on the stove, melt two tablespoons of your infused duck fat. Again, we’re melting it, not actually heating it. Pour the duck fat over the potatoes and toss well to coat. Let them sit in the bowl for a couple minutes so the fat has a chance to cool slightly and harden onto the potatoes. Season liberally with salt and Dr. Dabs if using. Dump the potatoes into your air fryer basket and arrange in a single layer. Cook them in batches if you need to. Air fry for 20 minutes, giving them a shake halfway through.
- Crisp up the duck. Put all your duck legs onto a quarter sheet pan skin side up. Crank the oven up to 450 degrees. If you’re starting with cold duck confit from the fridge, put the pan in the oven while it’s preheating to more gently bring the duck legs up to temp. If you’re going right from the Dutch oven to the sheet pan, wait until the oven is fully to temp before putting the duck in. Let the duck cook for 15–20 minutes or until the skin is nice and crispy.
- Feast! While the duck confit and duck fat potatoes are a full feast in themselves, I served them alongside an equally infused appetizer, salad, and dessert. For the appetizer, I went with a duckified version of Deviled’s Lettuce Eggs. I followed the recipe exactly except anywhere it called for a regular chicken egg, I used a duck egg. I also used infused duck fat in place of oil for the mayo. If you’ve never made duckonnaise, I can’t recommend it enough. My friend Jim, a noted deviled egg enthusiast, declared them to be the best deviled eggs he’s ever had, which was high praise from a very high man. For our salad, I went with a duck fat Waedsar and it was equally as tasty—and potent! While I have no real idea just how infused this duck fat really is, all evidence from this feast and all the things I’ve made with it since point to it being very fucking potent. For dessert, I made orange bars with a duck fat shortbread crust. They absolutely ripped and Jim said he’d easily pay $16 for one in a nice restaurant but has yet to send me a Venmo. We’ll cover that recipe in next month’s Weedeater! I also paired the whole affair with a fruity and precocious Beaujolais!
Or you can take the easy way out.
I gotta be honest, there isn’t really a way to make this one any easier than it already is. I know that something that takes two days to make may not sound easy, but I promise you it is. In those two days, only about 20 minutes was actively spent on the duck confit or potatoes. The rest of the time is just waiting, which is actually a pretty easy part if you ask me. I guess if you really want to take the easy way out on this one you could just eat like 100 mg and go eat some duck at a restaurant, but your mileage may vary on that endeavor.
Well, that’s all for this one. See you next time when we’ll learn how to make those infused duck orange bars!
But wait! There’s more!
As I mentioned earlier, I ended up with about three cups of infused duck fat from this recipe. Now, obviously I used some for the potatoes, deviled eggs, salad, and orange bars but even after all of that, I still had a little more than a cup leftover. In the days since this feast, I’ve made everything from duck fat queso to duck confit mac and cheese with some leftover duck meat. I even made duck fat scrambled eggs and they kicked a ton of ass. Duck fat popcorn, duck fat fries, duck fat cookies—the possibilities are truly endless. I’ve basically just started replacing oil and fat in other recipes with infused duck fat and my life seems to be better because of it.
Ok, now that’s really all for this one. Happy Honda Days and Merry Toyotathon! See you next year!
