A duck. What to cook with a duck. Side dishes for duck.

 The backstory is I got a frozen duck from Gideon for my birthday in December. It is too luxurious to eat by myself, so I stuck it in the freezer. Now it's April and the Omnicron wave around my the end of the year has subsided, the weather is nicer, and it is time to cook a duck.

The first problem with my meal plan is the flip side of it being too lonely to eat a fancy duck by myself. I started by inviting Yasmin. Then I invited Matt and Emily because they also gave me lot of fancy ingredients for my birthday (most of which I still have, and may incorporate into the meal). And I had to invite Gideon of course, but he hasn't told me if he will come. Also, roommates. So I am dealing with not a lot of duck per person and also a lot of uncertainty about how many people I even need.

Two people have suggested I make Peking duck. I do not know how to make this. I am not really sure how to make any duck (that is the point of Gideon's gift.. he gets me weird things I have to figure out). But I especially don't know how to make Peking duck.

I currently think I will make a large amount of some sort of risotto (that was a gift from Matt & Emily) as a first course, then a small serving of duck with a side of some vegetables as a second course. This is basically the Italian meal style. Which means I could flesh it out with an antipasto course. My main risotto ideas are either mushroom (risotto ai funghi), saffron (risotta alla milanese) or to be very weird, strawberry (risotto alle fragole). This one for orange risotto sounds good too. (risotto all'arancia)

The point of this blog post is to take notes while I look through all the grocery circulars to see what is on sale this week and maybe come up with ideas. The title of the blog post was accidentally SEO bait and then I thought it was funny so I made it more baity.

Bravo: Asparagus $2/lb. Mozzarella $3. They don't list them on sale, but they sell bulk white mushrooms for $3/lb which is a pretty good price and I could use a ton of those with a few porcini (gift from Matt & Emily).

Brooklyn Harvest Market: Asparagus. Mozzarella.

C-Town: Asparagus. Mozzarella. All the sales are the same this week. Escarole $2/lb.

Food Bazaar: Lemons 5/$2, but I'm not dealing with that whole store for that.

Ozzie's: Asparagus. Mozzarella is 2/$4 (must buy 2) so at least that is a little different. And ricotta is only $3.

Green Corner: Strawberries $2/lb. Lemons 5/$2 (I will go here just for that).

My Planned Menu

Antipasti: various olives, some cheeses, giardiniera, roasted red peppers, and maybe some sort of crackers

Primo: Risotto ai funghi

Secondo: Orange duck (anatra all'anatra)

Contorno: Escarole or arugula salad with strawberries, gorgonzola

Whole Foods Update

 I previously wrote a guide to shopping at Whole Foods because it's cheap for some things. Later, I bought a big basil plant. Here is an updated guide.

I went to Whole Foods today because Chase Freedom's 5% back on groceries quarter ends next week and I wanted to buy 3 liters of olive oil. I got both extra firm and silken tofu because it's $1.79 for organic (they don't have non-organic). Tofu is at minimum $2.50 everywhere else. I got frozen spinach for $1.79 because it's usually $2 elsewhere. Food Bazaar was supposed to have 2 lbs for $2.50 this week but they were out of everything. I also got arborio rice for $3. I don't know if that is a good price.

The other stuff is from Mr. Piña, which I should write about more often. The pineapple was $1.49, the zucchini was $0.50, the peppers were 2/$1 and the bag of lemons, which contains 3, was $1.

My Whole Foods cashier said "wow"

Because I only paid $0.53. Because I had a $10 off coupon for spending $10 3 times last month (which is when I got a frozen pizza).

Today I got dried shiitake mushrooms ($19.99/lb), dried woodland mix mushrooms (?), 3 cans of pumpkin ($1 each),  and a bag of arborio rice that I think is 16 oz and cost $3. That came to $10.53.

I haven't used my other dried mushrooms yet, but I'm getting ready. I will probably use some sort of mushrooms in risotto.

Let Me Tell You About Associated

I meant to tell you about C-Town, but I'm telling you about Associated first because that's where the story starts. I've been shopping there more lately. I mostly liked it, except when I walk out without buying something and they question me about that. Sometimes I just don't want to buy something! Sometimes I'm just perusing prices before I make my big purchases. Sometimes your tomatoes are ugly.

Today I went in to get some stuff and saw their ATM was still broken. When I went to check out, they told me the credit card system was on and off. The cashier tried. It was off. I left. If you want me to buy groceries, give me a way to pay. I just left all my groceries there for them to put back because they should pay me to work there if they want me to do that. But I don't know how they'd get money to pay me if they won't even take my money.

So maybe I have to go shop at C-Town more, even if it is gentrifying faster than I am, if only because it will take my money. (Except I didn't shop at C-Town after this. I went to Bravo. But Bravo has a $10 credit card minimum and I can only commit to about $7 so it will never be my regular store.)

P.S. I am 30 years old and I am bad at cooking rice, so my new rice store is the Chinese restaurant next door. It was $2.95 for a "large" of brown, but it is already cooked and I cook rice so infrequently and so poorly that this makes sense for me. I'm stuffing some peppers.