- 8 minutes ago
Bon Appétit meets chef Lucas Sin at NYC’s largest Chinatown in Flushing to eat the city’s most traditional Peking Duck. At JUQI inside Tangram Mall, chefs prepare Beijing-style roast duck by air-pumping the skin and roasting in a traditional Míng huǒlú oven to achieve the glassy, crispy duck skin that defines authentic Peking duck.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:05Welcome! We are here in Flushing, New York, the biggest Chinatown in New York City.
00:09We're here because, I've been told, the most traditional Peking duck in New York
00:13City is made at Juxi here in Tangren Mall. This is a regular mall.
00:21Welcome to the prep kitchen. This is where all of the Peking duck prep begins. The whole day
00:27is about building up to a perfect, glassy, crispy, crunchy skin and nothing in the
00:33preparation process will compromise that texture. The air gets pumped underneath the
00:38skin of the duck to release the skin from the flesh itself. This gives it ample
00:42space for that fat to render out during the cooking process. Making the slit
00:46underneath the armpit of the roast duck to remove all of the organs. The reason why
00:50the slit is right there is to preserve the integrity of the skin so it doesn't
00:54split. Chef is taking off the duck feet, making a little bit of slit in the neck to
00:59release any of that remaining blood. It also is going to be the entrance for his
01:03air pump. Traditionally, this is probably the most iconic step in making Peking duck.
01:08These ducks come in from Long Island every single day. They're a very special duck
01:14that has its roots in Chinese-style Peking duck but was introduced, cross-bred and
01:19become really its own breed of duck today. Chef from the US has noticed some
01:23differences. One of them is that during the butchery process, American Peking duck
01:27isn't bled thoroughly after it's killed and so it will retain some of its
01:32unpleasant gaminess. The leeks and the ginger and the Sichuan peppercorn and the
01:35lemon in the blanching process help get rid of all of that nasty blood flavor.
01:40They're like balloons. They are quite cartoonish. You can see all the nasty pink
01:45liquid coming out. All of that is gaminess and you can smell it in the air too. He's also
01:49trying to get a lot of water inside of the balloon of the carcass to flush out
01:53the inside of the duck. You can imagine cleaning a balloon inside out. It's a
01:58tedious process. It takes a lot of work but it also is quite delicate because you
02:02don't want to damage the skin. The minute that you have any excessive holes in the
02:07skin of a duck, you'll lose the integrity of the entire structure of that skin.
02:12Chef is blanching the ducks to tighten that skin. As it comes in contact just for a
02:17couple of seconds with boiling hot water, the surface proteins are going to
02:21tighten up, exposing the pores, so that later it'll dry more consistently and more
02:26thoroughly. The duck before it goes in hot water is a little wrinkly, it's bubbly, but
02:31as he dunks into that hot water, even for just a couple of seconds, three, four, five,
02:36it'll come out nice, white, glossy, like an inflated balloon. Without this blanching
02:42process, the duck is not going to dry consistently and that duck skin is not
02:47going to be as crispy and as consistent as it could be. The next step is to start
02:52glazing them and drying them. The drying room is next door, come with me. And
02:56Chef is glazing them with a little bit of a warm glazing liquid. Now every single
03:02place does it a little bit differently.
03:18Jeff is glazing the ducks with his pale yellow liquid. We're calling it a glazier, but it's
03:23not as thick as a barbecue glaze. It's more like a syrup. There isn't a huge amount of flavor here,
03:28so most of the spices, the lemon, the onions, it's for getting rid of gaminess. It's not so much for
03:33a
03:33really seasoning that duck. The glaze does two things. The first is the sugar that clings to the skin. As
03:39it meets heat, it's going to help encourage that caramelization, that Maillard reaction. It's going to give it that nice
03:44color and a little bit of that sugar shatter crust shell.
03:48The second thing is sugar is actually going to pull out a little bit of moisture from that skin to
03:52help the dehydration process.
03:54One of the things I've noticed is that throughout this entire preparation process, there actually isn't a huge amount of
03:59salt or seasoning or spices involved.
04:02The duck in the original Beijing Peking style is supposed to be flavorful enough that you won't need a huge
04:07amount of seasoning.
04:09This room is cool, close to about 40 degrees. It feels like a walk-in, but there's a gigantic fan
04:14on the side and two gigantic DeWalt fans, industrial fans, mounted to the top.
04:19They're going to encourage a huge amount of air flow to make sure that water evaporates despite being at that
04:25low temperature.
04:26Between this drying room and the fridge on the outside, it will probably dry between one and two days before
04:32it gets roasted.
04:33It's a little less than I expected, to be honest. It's not a dry aging process. It's just a dehydration
04:39process.
04:39The ducks at the back are the ones that have been there for a day, and you'll see that they've
04:43picked up a little bit of color just from moisture evaporating.
04:47When you see that tight skin, that gloss, you'll know that the duck is almost ready to be roasted.
04:54Take a look at this fridge outside. This is the one that's on display.
04:58All of these ducks have been sufficiently dried, and you'll see that the color is a little bit different.
05:02It's lighter brown, it's a little bit yellow, and you can see how tight the skin is going to be.
05:08There used to be a tradition in Beijing, when people ordered Peking duck, they would pick their specific raw duck
05:14carcasses that they would want,
05:15and then they would write their names onto the front of the breast. This did two things.
05:21Number one, if the skin was still wet, the ink wouldn't set, and they would know that the duck wouldn't
05:26come out right.
05:26The second is that after the roasting process, if they could still see their name written in black ink on
05:33the top of the duck,
05:34then you would know that the duck was roasted properly, it wasn't burned, and it was made just for you.
05:40This is the famed roast duck oven.
05:45Wow! So hot!
05:46This oven is really quite special. It came from China, they had it built purposefully for this.
05:51It is a Ming Huo Lu. The flames are exposed.
05:54Traditionally, Beijing roast duck, Peking duck, would have been done with something like fruit wood or charcoal.
05:59That's really hard to get permitting here in New York City, but this is the next best thing.
06:04This open flame means that chef has more control over the cooking of the duck.
06:08He can bring it out to the front, rotate it, use the flame to get it to lick certain parts
06:12of that duck that aren't fully cooked yet,
06:14to get that nice, consistent shell.
06:17The number one arbiter of weather Peking duck is proper Peking duck.
06:21It's the texture and the quality of that skin.
06:24They're looking for glassy, crispy, crunchy in the center of the breast and on the legs.
06:28It's a little bit more fattiness.
06:30The gold standard is,
06:33in Chinese means fatty, but not greasy.
06:35When you're cooking, do you have any way to make the meat that's not so dry or so?
06:44We'll put it in the back.
06:46Okay.
06:47Is it hot or hot?
06:48The temperature is a bit均衡.
06:50The temperature is a bit均衡.
06:52If we want to make it out and make it more脆, we'll put it in front.
06:56Chef was explaining that there are three steps to roasting duck.
07:02First is to warm it up.
07:04That starts at the back, slightly lower temperature at the back of the oven.
07:07Slowly bring that temperature up.
07:09The first thing that's going to happen, the remaining water in that skin is going to evaporate.
07:14As that water evaporates, it's going to punch out and eventually set into this basically foamy type of structure.
07:22You need all of those proteins to set with the air bubbles in the middle as the water continues to
07:27punch out,
07:28and that becomes the shell.
07:29That solid fat needs to become liquid and drip off down the body out.
07:33You need just enough fat to render out so it doesn't feel greasy,
07:37but you need that fat to basically fry the duck skin inside out
07:41so you have a nice crispy, almost chicharron thickness level of skin throughout the entire duck carcass.
07:47The second step is kao, which is roast.
07:50When the duck comes further forward towards the heat source,
07:53Chef will begin spinning it to be even and they'll let that shell really harden
07:56and pick up that dark, sort of burnished red color.
08:01So Chef is now going to the liao process of singeing off certain parts of the duck,
08:06hitting it with just a little bit of heat from that exposed flame in the front.
08:10He's rotating it, he's checking for doneness of the meat,
08:13he's checking for any pale spots on the skin from a color perspective.
08:17You'll see that even sometimes when the skin or the moisture has punched out of the skin
08:21and it runs down the side of the duck.
08:24It has these imperfections, these little like trails of moisture.
08:28Chef is trying to get rid of as much as possible to keep it nice and aesthetic.
08:32Their standards at the end of the day are very high,
08:34and it's standards that Chef has maintained for about 30 years.
08:37It's about to cook up between 60 minutes and 80, 90 minutes.
08:41It really depends on the size and the temperature of the oven.
08:43Dinner service is about to begin, I need to order mine, let's go sit down.
08:47Peking duck is the national dish of China,
08:49which is to say that it is the dish that represents the entire culture
08:52and centuries of culinary development the best.
08:54Here we are, on the other side of the world, in Flushing, New York,
08:57inside of a mall, eating this duck that has evolved for hundreds of years.
09:02That's kind of special.
09:03So, let's take a piece of the whole thing.
09:07The whole thing is?
09:07Yes, let's take a piece of the whole thing.
09:09Let's take a piece of the whole thing.
09:10Let's take a piece of the whole thing.
09:10Then, I'll add a piece of the whole thing.
09:12No problem, it's good.
09:14Here, look at this thing.
09:17Consistent colour, puffed up.
09:19And when you look kind of closely,
09:21you can see the fat rendering out in between the layers of skin.
09:24A little bit of translucence means that that fat is rendering out
09:27and it's starting to fry itself inside out.
09:29If you don't eat it hot, the fat's going to start to congeal
09:31and it's going to lose a lot of the texture.
09:33So, time is obviously the essence.
09:35Whenever you order here, it's roasted to order
09:37and then you get a cut table side.
09:38First cut, down the centre, along the breast,
09:42just a little strip in the middle.
09:44This is the prize cut.
09:46Look at that strip in the middle.
09:47Sewing it out.
09:48He's going to let it aerate on the side.
09:50Just let it get crispy, get it like hardened.
09:52Let the rest of the steam steam off.
09:53And you can hear it.
09:54It's a very gentle crunch.
09:56Really nice and consistent.
09:58Wow.
10:00Oh my goodness.
10:01Why is there caviar in it?
10:03Do you have any particular ideas?
10:05Do you want to use the fish?
10:07Because many people don't like to eat the food.
10:09They usually use the fish.
10:10Oh, yes.
10:11But for people to eat more healthy,
10:13they use the fish.
10:15Oh, I understand.
10:16So the taste is more different.
10:19And it's more different.
10:22Wow.
10:23Chef is now going through the side of the leg.
10:26Dark meat, you can see, is a consistent color.
10:29It's not red at all.
10:30It's fully cooked.
10:31That's one of the interesting things about Peking duck
10:33because actually, because you're roasting it for so long,
10:36it's well done.
10:37But still, it is really quite juicy.
10:39I mean, you can see the liquid coming out of it itself.
10:41Of course, the duck breast is the most prized part.
10:45The way that they slice it is also traditional.
10:48Some people will call it a willow cut.
10:50Some people will call it a fish scale cut.
10:52But the idea is that every single slice
10:54will have a thin sliver of skin
10:56and then a thin sliver of flesh.
11:00The balance between the fattiness of the skin
11:03and the leanness and the flavorfulness of the breast
11:06is better expressed from these cuts.
11:10One of the more interesting things to me
11:12about the Peking duck experience
11:13is the variance in texture.
11:15On the sides of the breast,
11:16you'll see a little bit of this crescent shape.
11:18On the back, what sometimes people will call the brisket,
11:20as we learned in Hong Kong,
11:21will be something of a more tender flesh
11:24with a thinner layer of skin.
11:26Usually, it is served with some sort of bean
11:30or pancake, I suppose.
11:33In this case, they're called lotus leaf pancakes,
11:35basically a flour tortilla.
11:37The other things on the table.
11:39Tianmian Jiang, sometimes called sweet bean sauce,
11:41sometimes called sweet flour sauce.
11:43It's a fermented soybean paste
11:45that is cooked down with a little bit of sesame,
11:47sesame oil and sugar.
11:49In traditional Peking duck,
11:51Peking duck is not seasoned thoroughly.
11:52That's what the sauce is there for.
11:54The main flavor of the duck is going to be
11:56a delicious aromatic fattiness.
11:59And so, in order to cut through any taste of grease
12:02or any unpleasant fattiness,
12:04you have things like onion,
12:06you have a little bit of acidity
12:07from something like a pickle or a hawthorn
12:08to cut through that grease.
12:10The idea is that in one bite,
12:11it all works together.
12:13All of the flavor profiles are balanced.
12:15This is time to address the fact
12:16that this is ridiculous.
12:19This is the first episode of Street Eats
12:21we filmed outside of Asia,
12:23back in New York.
12:25And we've sold ourselves out.
12:27We're eating a dynastic,
12:30thousand-year-old dish
12:31with caviar in a mall.
12:34Fatty piece of skin,
12:37the center cut,
12:37one bite crisp,
12:39caviar over the top.
12:41This is the recommended serve.
12:49I gotta say,
12:52I don't want any of the other stuff with it.
12:54Because,
12:56this piece of skin alone is magical.
13:01You hardly ever get to see duck skin
13:04of this thickness in New York City.
13:06This is what all that preparation was for,
13:10was to see this elevation of the skin
13:12away from the flesh
13:13and the top layer punching out
13:15with the moisture
13:16until it becomes,
13:17not just crispy,
13:19but crunchy.
13:22This half right here
13:23to show you how it's done properly.
13:25With the duck breast as a paintbrush,
13:27you're painting the sides of the bing.
13:31Couple of pieces,
13:33laid vertically.
13:35Cucumbers,
13:36not too much.
13:37For texture,
13:38a little bit of
13:39washed onions.
13:43The bottom comes up.
13:46Oh, I understand.
13:52Oh, I see.
13:53So tight.
13:54Oh, wow.
13:56Now there's chun bing, right?
13:58Yes.
13:58Yes.
14:04Duck bone soup.
14:05Duck bone soup?
14:06And fried duck bone.
14:07Oh, amazing.
14:08Can I have a...
14:09Oh, thank you.
14:12That was phase one of the meal.
14:13The second phase
14:14is the rest of the duck carcass
14:15gets repurposed into another dish.
14:17Soup.
14:18I mean, this is a classic appropriation
14:19of the leftovers, right?
14:23Good, salty.
14:24A little bit of the spine,
14:26a little bit of rib,
14:27some cartilage,
14:28and then the parts of the wings,
14:31part of the leg bones,
14:32become this fried crispy salt and pepper dish.
14:36You can also order this spicy
14:38with a little bit of chili.
14:42Nice.
14:46Good if you're drinking beer.
14:48There are probably some minor differences
14:50between the way the duck tastes here
14:52and the way the duck tastes in Beijing.
14:54But that's not to say that Jushi
14:56isn't still dedicated to traditional craftsmanship.
14:59And I think that this is probably
15:01the closest experience that I've ever had
15:03to Peking duck in Beijing,
15:04but here in New York City.
15:06It's a delight.
Comments