Bami Haeng Bhet (Duck with Noodles)

Hello! It's been a long time since I've last posted anything on my blog. I guess I'd simply comes the point where I'd run out of of recipes to post, and was struggling for ideas. There has also been a distinct lack of travelling with life getting in the way and incredibly, a new baby shortly arriving in our household! So while I can still have the opportunity, I'm going to be doing a bit of posting for the time being. Interestingly for me, pregnancy hasn't diminished my love for Thai food (or any food!!) as I've had a great appetite, very little morning sickness and no odd cravings. I'm hoping that my baby girl will also eventually love these flavours as much as I do as she takes in and tastes tiny amounts of whatever I eat. Time will tell!

 To ease back into blogging, I've been bringing together collections of my old recipes on Tumblr and now have a few new ones to add as well.

This new recipe is called 'bami haeng bhet' which can simply be translated to duck with dry noodles. It's quite a simple dish, featuring a pan roasted duck breast, sliced over fresh egg noodles with a side of Asian green vegetables, or in this case, chard, with a rich sticky sauce drizzled over and crunchy bits of garlic and spring onion to top it off.

I really enjoy using fresh egg noodles, as they've a much better texture than the dried ones and are much less likely to clump together. By the way, don't be put off that the recipe suggests the noodles are dry, it just refers to the fact that they're not in a soup.

This recipe serves two

You'll Need:

• Two duck breasts, with skin, trimmed of excess flabby bits
• A pack of fresh egg noodles (ba- mi), loosened
• A large handful of your chosen Asian leafy green vegetables, roughly chopped- choi sum, pak choi etc. or in my case, rainbow chard as we grew it in our allotment
• 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
• two spring onions, chopped
• vegetable oil for frying

For the sauce:

• A big splash of light soy sauce
• a small splash of oyster sauce
• a small splash of water
• a level dessertspoon of palm sugar (or light brown sugar)

Begin by getting a pan of water on to boil and set a steamer over it. 

Let's start off by making some crispy garlic, this gets sprinkled over the finished dish. Heat a generous splash of vegetable oil in a frying pan until reaching a medium heat but definitely not smoking or the garlic will burn. Pop in the garlic, moving it from time to time, letting it slowly sizzle and gently crisp and turn golden brown over a few minutes. Drain out with a slotted spoon onto absorbent kitchen paper.

Retaining the garlic flavoured oil and a medium heat, place the duck breasts skin side down in the pan. Press firmly down to keep the meat flat and help the fat to render out and cook for around ten minutes until the skin is browned and crisp. Flip over and cook on the meaty side for a further two- three minutes, then set to one side and rest. If there is an excessive amount of oil in the pan, drain some off but leave any brown and crispy bits for now.

Hopefully your pan of water is now boiling. Set your green veggies off to steam- giving them a few minutes. Your fresh egg noodles can go in the water but will only take around one minute to cook. Drain both and set them ready in serving bowls.

Finally, to make the sauce that will go over the duck and noodles, heat up the frying pan with the garlic/duck flavoured oil and when hot, add in the soy and oyster sauces, sugar and if needed, a splash of water to bring everything together; scrape and mix in any crispy pan residue and stir, heating for a minute or two; however- don't over- reduce as you'll want some sauce to get down to the noodles below.

Slice the rested duck, place on top of the noodles and pour over the sauce, sprinkling with the crispy garlic, fresh spring onions and in Thai style, any other seasonings you fancy, such as chilli flakes, vinegar, peanuts or a little more sugar.