This is the recipe that I won gold with at the Scot Hot competition 2005 in the Gressingham Duck Challenge. I really enjoy cooking this dish and it is an invigorating dish for the spring and summer months because all the ingredients are at their best at this time of year. The bright colours and fresh flavours make it an excellent summer dish. It is currently not on our menu at the Enverdale but it still remains one of my favourite recipes.
To start, take one duck crown and remove the wishbone and legs then trim off any excess fat. Roast the crown on the top of the stove until the skin is completely golden brown. Place in the oven at 200°C for 15 minutes, basting with oil and butter every five minutes. Remove from the oven and glaze with honey.
Meanwhile, to make the choux farcie ('wrapped in cabbage leaf') bone the duck legs and blitz the meat in a blender. Add 50ml double cream and season to taste. Pass through a fine drum sieve and check mousse for seasoning. Next, sauté 20g chopped shallots and one clove of chopped garlic with 50g chopped wild mushrooms. Add this to the mousse with 50g foie gras. Wrap the mousse in Chinese leaf and blanch for 10 minutes.
Next, make the sauce using the duck trimmings. Brown the bones and mire poix (stock vegetables - onions, carrots, celery, leeks and garlic), add 100ml white wine, 50ml chicken stock, and reduce by half. Finish with 50ml veal jus and a sprig each of rosemary and thyme, and season to taste.
For the fricassee of artichoke, take three large Jerusalem artichokes, peel and dice. Chop one shallot and one clove of garlic, and sweat with the artichoke and a sprig of spring thyme in 100g butter until the artichoke begins to soften. Add 250ml chicken stock and 50ml cream, reduce by half and check seasoning. Finish with some chopped marjoram. For the braised spring cabbage, heat a pan, add one shredded spring cabbage and wilt down. Add 50g butter and 100g emulsion (bring to the boil 500ml chicken stock, 250ml double cream and 125g butter and whisk together) and simmer slowly until tender. Season to taste.
Next, prepare the baby vegetables. Blanch six baby carrots, four baby leeks, four asparagus spears and some peas and broad beans in water until tender. Finish with emulsion, combine with some spinach leaves and serve with the carved duck, cabbage and artichokes.
Tristin Farmer is head chef at Enverdale House Hotel, Scotland, where he makes the most of Scotland's seasonal produce, creating a menu that encompasses the freshest local ingredients.
''Tristin began his career in the culinary world as a kitchen porter at the age of 13, then worked part time as a commis chef in a local pub. At 16, he left school to go to catering college in Perth. While at college he gained a work placement at The Peat Inn in Cupar, eventually moving there full time and starting his modern apprentice at Glenrothes College.
Tristin spent four and a half years at the Peat Inn, and was made sous chef. In 2004 he moved to Restaurant Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles and was promoted to chef de partie after a year. He moved to Coupar Angus in 2005 to set up a family run business at Enverdale House Hotel. Tristin has enjoyed success in several major culinary competitions and was the runner up in the Scottish Food Scholarship 2006, making him one of the best chefs in Scotland under the age of 26.''