I celebrated the new year with stuffed duck and hen from Khuu's Catering Kitchen! Heard about this caterer from a Facebook group and I can't believe there's so many amazing low key chefs in the bay area.
Duck ($60) was stuffed with sticky rice, Chinese sausage, shiitake mushrooms, pine nuts, dried shrimps, and scallions. Hen ($20) was stuffed with sticky rice, Chinese sausage, shiitake mushrooms, and scallions. They sold out pretty fast, and request payment via Venmo, although I was able to pay via Paypal.
Khuu was very responsive and informative throughout our communication, and flexible with the time window that our family preferred to have our food delivered.
The stuffed duck and hen came ready to eat, though there were reheating instructions which we utilized. The tray fit right in our small conventional oven! Of course, remember to remove the wooden stick and put foil over the wing tips, drumsticks, and maybe loosely over the top so the exterior doesn't burn!
First of all, I have to say that right out of the tray the duck was breathtaking. It looked like a perfectly cooked duck, all laid out on its back with an amazingly even golden brown skin. The small bit of sticky rice peeking out was such a tease, yet we knew it was completely packed from how bloated the thing looked. Same with the hen... It was a fat hen with some cute thick legs!
After we finished reheating, we split the fowls down the middle which revealed SO MUCH STICKY RICE GOODNESS. No mai fan is one of our family favorites during the holidays (since it takes a lot of prep time, it gets the "only made for celebrations" treatment), and this came very close to tasting as good as how mom makes it! Perfectly sticky, chewy, moist, rice with extra chopped meat and mushroom goodies. Not only was the sticky rice great, but the duck was cooked sooo well with a five-spice glaze. The breast was still pink! Usually in Asian cooking, it's blasphemous to have pink in any type of meat, so I was just gobsmacked at how perfectly this was cooked. Loved the thin layer of fat running underneath the skin. One of these can definitely feed a big family.
The hen tasted essentially the same as the duck, but more lean. I enjoyed trying it, but obviously duck is superior. The hen was surprisingly bigger than I thought it'd be, and could easily feed two or three.
Such amazing work is put into stuffing ducks and hens, and these were excellently stuffed and almost entirely deboned. Would order again and again for a luxurious comfort meal! read more