[Lucusd88]

Hi chefs,
Went to a restaurant last night and had duck and my partner had lamb. I had half a breast and she had one cutlet from a rack. My question is, how do they cook half portions of meat with the pink, cut side presented without wasting half a breast/rack?
Thanks

 

[kuan]

It's possible they cooked the whole portion and then sliced off a portion.

 

[Pat Pat]

It's most definitely that they cook the whole thing and portion it afterward.

 

[C. Cortez]

You got ripped off. How much did you pay for the duck?

 

[someday]

I'm going to guess they use sous vide. I use a 1 lb average duck breast that I cut in half, sous vide, and pickup individually for each order. It's nice and cost effective for me since I get 2 portions from each breast.

I've also done chickens dishes where I got 2 portions out of a chicken breast. I'll do something like a half a chicken breast and a piece of boneless thigh roulade. Sous vide is my friend for this as well.

It also allows you to do nice clean presentations...the smaller pieces of meat (say your lamb) are cooked to a consistent temp, all you have to do is slice in half, slice or just trim the end to get the nice "cut" presentation appearance.

 

[Lucusd88]

Sous vide makes sense. It just doesn’t seem very cost effective to waste half a breast. It came with confit leg, so the price was fairly reasonable.

 

[Lucusd88]

With sous vide, do you cook to a certain temperature and then ice bath and reheat to order? Tempted to get one for work but I’m unsure on the paperwork and technicalities here in the uk.

 

[someday]

With sous vide, do you cook to a certain temperature and then ice bath and reheat to order? Tempted to get one for work but I'm unsure on the paperwork and technicalities here in the uk.

Yes, exactly. Re-therm at a lower temp than the initial cooking temperature. Most things are then finished with a secondary cooking method, commonly pan seared for a brown crust or grilled (I use the term grilled in the American sense, hopefully over coals or wood)

Most of the items are first sealed in a vacuum bag with aromatics.

I can't help you with the "paperwork" in the UK but if you need food safety advice about it I can help with that.