A Duck Liver Salad with Calvados, Glazed Apple & Grapes

Name: A Duck Liver Salad with Calvados, Glazed Apple & Grapes
Yield: Serves 6
Cuisine: Australian
Ingredients: 1-2 tablespoons white sugar; a small slosh best quality cider vinegar; 400 g cleaned duck livers, carefully checked and any greenish marks, fat and tubes removed; sea salt and freshly ground black pepper; 3 tablespoons rendered duck fat or extra virgin olive oil; 3 Golden Delicious or 2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and cut into eighths; 250 ml verjuice; 24 seedless green grapes, on the stem; 3 handfuls mixed salad leaves [including wild rocket sprigs, small pieces of dandelion or radicchio, crisp baby cos hearts and spicy Asian greens such as tatsoi or mizuna], washed and spin-dried; 40 ml Calvados; 1 heaped teaspoon Dijon mustard; 1 small clove garlic, any green shoot removed, smashed; 20-40 ml best quality cider vinegar; 4-6 red radishes, tops removed, thinly sliced; 20 ml grapeseed oil; 40 ml extra virgin olive oil; 40 ml walnut oil; 1 small eschalot, very finely diced; 1 tablespoon rendered duck fat

Preparation info

Serves
6

Difficulty
Complex

Appears in

Salades

By Damien Pignolet

Published 2010

About

Duck livers and apple are a delicious combination, particularly if the apple is slightly caramelised and spiked with a touch of cider vinegar. Calvados, the apple brandy from Normandy, has a complex fruit flavour that softens the richness of the duck livers in this salad. The apple may be cooked a little in advance but should not be cold, so transfer it to a warmed, covered plate and wrap in a heavy towel for up to one hour before serving.