The Dirty Duck of Ubud #4 – And Licked Our Fingers.

We had to go for a cocktail party by the beach this evening. As food will be served, we have to leave some space in our stomach for the anticipated sumptuous meal. It is already late afternoon so we only cautiously ordered half a duck to be shared by the three of us.

To me duck are better stewed, braised or roasted to retain a bit of moisture and should come with a strong sauce or it will be over-powered by the strong taste. I was concerned that deep fried duck may be too dry, tough or fibrously.

It didn’t look that great but appetizing and smells good. It came with three small side plates of salad, sambal sauce and spicy pickled onions. The main dish itself came with sautéed potatoes. We tear into it with bare hands. And what a taste! Crispy, crunchy, with a mouth-watering spicy (not hot) flavor. It had been well marinated (we later learned for 36 hours) so that the spices had time to leisurely seeped into and blended with the meat so that the rich taste in every part of the duck.

It is unlike any duck I’ve ever tasted. Thus, it is no wonder to receive testimonial from guests such as Chow Yun Fat. There was also a magazine cutting of a famous French chef who said he still dream of “Dirty Duck.” That is a great compliment considering the pride the French had in their skill in preparing duck dishes.

Want proof of how much we loved it? Looked at the before and after pictures. Only the big bones were left. We chewed all the small bones. We looked at each other and said we just had to have another go. We decided to give the chicken a try.

I had a friend with a genius IQ traveling with me. So we let him order. In his affable manner he told the waitress “Can we have half a Bebek Ayam?” The waitress looked at him first in puzzlement, then with an amused smile said “Bebek is duck, Ayam is chicken’. So we should be ordering Ayam Bengil instead. I told the genius I liked him a lot better now for he just proved himself human. The chicken was good but no where as great as the duck. We left the restaurant more than satisfied and secretly wished we did not have another dinner that night.