PAPPARDELLE WITH DUCK RAGU

A delicious pasta dish from super chef Neil Perry

I remember when I first started in kitchens 4,000 years ago I keep I it keeps getting longer doesn’t it when I first started filming for YouTube I think it was a thousand years ago but it’s a bit a bit longer than that anyway there is a point to the story is it was

The times when the wonderful chefs like Michelle Gad and porus and people like that were putting out books was only one problem that books need bloody worked and I found out later that I think it was Michelle Gerard his wife was doing the book you know so they sort of didn’t

Actually quite make it you know you made the recipe and I I can make any recipe work I reckon I can anyway and you’d make it and you think there’s something missing here and then you’d go to their restaurant and you’d have the actual dish and it was nothing like it

Absolutely nothing like it those are the days when I used to go to France every year and rush around those three star michelan restaurants don’t do it any longer but anyway those were the days so this recipe is from an Neil Perry book well sort of you know I must admit I

Can’t help myself I do change things but his recipes always work always work and they’re good he’s got a good feel for food Neil Perry he’s run some wonderful restaurants it’s not just a restaurant so he really does have a good feel for it you know lovely flavors it’s spice

Temple oh what a restaurant and I also remember and I think I may have mention it before he started off in Sydney well I don’t know whether he started off in Sydney with this exact one but one of his very first was Blue Water Grill and

I love that restaurant the food was very simple as he said later on the reason it was simple was because he hardly had any equipment and the kitchen was Tiny so he had a big grill and not much else so he do lovely things things like wonderful

Butters and Salsas and all those kind of things and lovely salads and things to to make his plain grills appear fancy and taste good and they did I always remember he did a beautiful Swordfish with um Curry butter that’s what he still does Curry butter actually

I see it in his books anyway let’s just have a look here what I’ve got in there one medium onion one medium carrot one fairly large store of celery three cloves of garlic and a couple of good sized full rashes of bacon all diced all small and we’re just going to cook that

Until they’re reasonably tender now I know I’ve said this to you before but I do love talking about books that don’t work I love recipes that say cook it for until it’s tender for 3 minutes well it takes longer than that K now I don’t

Want it soft soft soft but I do want it you know to start the cooking process so I’d say about 5 seven minutes and what I’ve got over here about 500 G of duck now I’ve used the breast but Mr Perry did recommend using boned legs they

Didn’t have any at the polter so I’m using breast so there’s about 500 G of that and I’ve diced it pretty bloody small you can see that and fat and all but first of all let’s cook my vegetables for three I’m big silly at for 5 to 7 minutes and they’re very

Small so and neat and tighty that’s the whole thing about cooking is that you know if you’re making a nice dish with lots of veggies and make sure the vegies are nice and neat and tidy doesn’t matter if they’re big pieces that’s fine as long as they’re all the same all

Right guys this is looking quite good now and I’m going to throw the duck in and we’re just going to seal that off so that’ll take a few more minutes actually we’re not talking about the spice Temple before which I love and I always love rockpool the original Rock pool was was

Stunning when Neil was actually on the stoves himself in the very early days when I had the fish cap in Sydney he opened that and I think he did it with when I say did it with he was in conjunction with John susman who is the

Fish King and he was supplying him with all this wonderful Seafood so that was the original one but anyway the point see I digress that I go off on atten the point is that he doesn’t own those restaurants any longer he’s got a new place called Margaret which I haven’t

Made it to yet but I’m going to cuz I’m told it is a very fancy pants bistra and I’m also told it’s bloody marvelous so I’m looking forward to that and what we will next do add a cup of red wine now I’m going to use the red wine that I’m

Actually serving with this cuz it’s only for one or two so so I don’t need a whole bottle do I leftt over so one cup of red wine one one cup of stock any kind of stock this is a a ve broth 1/4 of a cup of cherry vinegar if you

Haven’t got Cherry vinegar a good red wines fine here we go and we’re going to reduce that by about a half and that will certainly take more than 3 minutes right now we’ve reduced that by half and I’ve got two cans of diced tomatoes so that’s 800 G all together

And we’ll throw that in and what we’re then going to do is we’re going to cook that oh 20 minutes 30 minutes until it’s thick and fragrant now I love saying thick and fragrant you know what I mean you can smell when it’s ready a bit like the

Italians who always say that when you cook a pasta sauce you cook it by the nose you can smell one the next step I’m not very good at that but the idea is great now my padelli is looking bloody good it’s actually a local version Australian familyowned and made made

GES I think that’s how you pronounce it I’m sorry Mr guzy if that’s not how you prounce it I got close now the sauce now that looks magnificent doesn’t it that’s a beautiful looking sauce now I’ll just taste it just for seasoning cuz I didn’t put any salt or pepper in

It need both need both quite a bit of paper give it a bit of a kick and it needs plenty of salt always be a bit careful you know with your bacon cuz sometimes bacon can be very very salty obviously that’s not cuz that does need a bit of salt the pep

Deli let’s drain it now I’m going to mix the sauce into this you can of course it’s up to you you can of course put the sauce on the top I sometimes like that but with this one I think I’m going to enjoy it oh mixed together now the other

Thing about it which I must mention is I must admit when I first saw the recipe and I saw that he was leaving the fat on the duck I thought oh that’s going to be tough and it doesn’t you cook it slowly in the sauce and it’s beautiful so don’t get paranoid about

That if like me you’re a bit greedy just a little bit more sauce on the top I’m a great believer in parmeson I love parmeson and to go with this a Pino Noir because it’s always hard to match tomato and red wine but it Pino Noir seems to work and

Mr Apprentice our wine expert said don’t you bloody dare buy anything from Central otago well I’m sorry Mr Apprentice I love this this is the remarkables which is a terrific wine so you can get nicked so pin Noir tomato and that beautiful duck Pasta guys to show you support for my channel and to keep in the loop subscribe it’s easy to do and don’t forget it’s free Okie cheers