This simple but elegant classic French duck à l’orange recipe is one to make for impressing a crowd! Crispy, succulent duck, smothered in a velvety, sweet, tart, buttery orange sauce. Utterly delicious and deceptively easy! Try it for your next dinner party, Christmas, or any holiday. It’s also perfect for a date night, or to treat yourself to a gorgeous and delicious meal!
One of the most common mistakes with duck à l’orange is having an orange sauce (bigarade sauce) that’s way too sweet and sugary. But this duck à l’orange recipe does not make this mistake! You’ll have a beautifully crispy duck, with a complex, slightly sweet, slightly bitter, tangy, buttery orange sauce that’s perfectly balanced. Trust me, once you give it a go, you’ll see why duck à l’orange is a timeless French classic.
Duck à l’orange is a dish that gained a lot of popularity in the 1960’s and 1970’s. This was largely because of Julia Child’s book ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking’. French home-cooking became all the rage! Now I know, you might be thinking duck à l’orange is a bit ‘retro’ or outdated. But this duck à l’orange recipe is utterly delicious, and beautifully elegant – especially with the luxurious, flavourful sauce!
Ingredients in this Duck à l’orange Recipe
Of course, we will need duck! It’s readily available at poultry shops, or even supermarkets like Coles and Woolies. You can also just use duck breasts for this recipe, for a quick and smaller version. But I’m going with a whole duck! The bay leaves, shallots, and oranges are stuffed into the cavity of the duck. They help give a beautiful aroma to the duck as it roasts. And once they are roasted and caramelised, they will give unbelievable depth of flavour to the orange (bigarade) sauce.
For the orange sauce, or bigarade sauce, we will need oranges (juice and zest). You’ll also need butter, honey, red wine vinegar, beef bone broth, salt and pepper – it is incredibly simple. The reason it’s called a bigarade sauce is because traditionally, the sauce was made with bigarade oranges. Bigarade oranges are characteristically bitter and sour. They’re great for marmalade or essential oils, but I’m just using standard oranges here picked from my garden! The number of oranges you’ll need will depend on how much juice you get out of them. But you’ll need 150ml of fresh orange juice for this duck à l’orange recipe. This could be anywhere from 1-3 oranges. You’ll need some extra for some orange segments too, for a burst of freshness, and to make this dish extra elegant and gorgeous!
How to Make this Duck à l’orange Recipe
There are really two parts to making duck à l’orange. The first part is roasting the duck to crispy-skin perfection! The second part is making the luxurious, velvety orange sauce to drizzle over the duck. Ideally, you want to pat the skin of the duck dry, sprinkle it with salt, and let it sit uncovered in the fridge overnight. This helps draw out the moisture out of the skin, and makes it crispier! This is the same principle as salting pork belly and letting it sit overnight to achieve perfect crackling! But this duck à l’orange recipe still works fine if you skip the overnight salting.
After patting the duck dry, I like to score the skin and the fat underneath. Be careful not to score the flesh! This helps the fat render out, and this is what promotes that crispy, golden, crunchy skin! Sprinkle with salt and pepper – oil isn’t necessary! The duck has so much natural fat that will render out and crisp up the skin, especially since we have scored the skin and fat! Then, roast the duck at 150°C for about 60 minutes. Then turn the temperature up to 220°C for 20-25 minutes to get that perfect crispy skin! This should give you a slightly pink blushing centre in the duck breast. If you like your duck more rare, or more well-done, adjust your cooking time accordingly. If in doubt, use a meat thermometer!
Once the duck is roasted, let it rest, loosely covered with foil. This helps it stay juicy and succulent by allowing the muscle fibres to relax. While it’s resting, making your orange sauce! Remove the shallots, orange, and bay leaves from the duck cavity and roughly chop. Brown some butter in a pan, then add the honey and stir until you have a foamy, thick caramel-like consistency (be careful to not let it burn). This is our gastrique (but instead of sugar, we use honey).
Then throw in the caramelised shallots, orange, and bay leaves, and the red wine vinegar to deglaze the pan. Add your beef bone broth, orange juice and zest. Then simmer and reduce until the sauce has thickened. Season with salt and pepper after it’s reduced. Whisk in a final knob of butter to make the sauce rich and glossy. Pass through a sieve, slice up the duck, and pour this delicious orange sauce over your perfectly roasted duck!
How to Serve
To make this duck à l’orange recipe fancier, I like to cut some fresh orange segments to serve with the dish. It gives a bright burst of freshness and cuts through the rich velvety sauce, and fatty duck perfectly. You can also finely slice some orange peel (not the white pith!) to scatter over the top. A classic pairing for duck à l’orange is French green beans (haricots verts), which have some toasted almonds through them. They are the perfect accompaniment for this duck à l’orange recipe and guaranteed to impress your guests, and yourself – classic French cooking at its most elegant!
I truly hope you love this recipe xxx
Classic French Duck à l’orange Recipe
Ingredients
Method
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Preheat your oven to 150°C fan.
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Pat the duck dry, and with a sharp knife, score the skin and fat, being careful not to cut into the flesh. Sprinkle the duck with salt and pepper.
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Cut the shallots and 1 of the oranges into quarters, and place them inside the duck cavity along with the bay leaves, and a pinch of salt and pepper. Place on a wire rack into the oven for 90 minutes. Then turn up the temperature to 220°C for a further 20-25 minutes, or until the skin of the duck is crispy and golden brown.
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Remove from the oven and allow to rest, loosely covered with foil. Meanwhile make the orange sauce.
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Melt 3 tablespoons of butter in a pan on medium heat. Add the honey and stir until you have a bubbly, caramel-like consistency. Remove and roughly chop the roasted oranges and shallots from the duck cavity and throw them into your pan, along with the bay leaves. Sauté for a minute or two.
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Deglaze your pan with the red wine vinegar. Add in the beef bone broth, along with the juice and zest of 3 oranges. Simmer and reduce for around 10 minutes, or until the sauce has thickened.
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Adjust for salt and pepper, and then stir in your last tablespoon of butter to make the sauce glossy and shiny. Pass the sauce through a fine-meshed strainer.
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Carve the duck, and spoon on the orange sauce. Garnish with fresh orange segments and finely sliced orange peel, and serve with some French green beans. Enjoy!
