It is a great tasting duck, and a good tasting duck only needs salt and pepper, leave the skin/fat on... I cook it primarily fat side down to render that fat. I normally cook on higher heat to get better caramelization, but I been experimenting on lower heat to see if that fat renders better... 3 BWT I cooked last night.



Cook fat side down.




Cooked med to med rare, how I like it, like my steak...That layer of duck fat bursts with flavor!!!

That looks great I’ve only ever had teal fried

Those look Delicious. I like to marinate and grill rare to med rare too when you breast them out and don’t pluck. One of my favorite recipes for Mallards and Teal below.

https://honest-food.net/how-to-cook-duck-breasts/

Marinate is good for ducks you pull out of the freezer or divers. Don’t miss out on that natural flavor of a good tasting duck, like a teal.

Someday I'll rent me a guide and try them. They look good like Sandhill Crane.

Fantastic

Best teal meal I ever had was the Teal and Oyster Gumbo I made...
Started with Roux from scratch and then the trinity (onions/bell pepper/celery)...
added some stewed tomatoes, okra, bay leaves and then the breasted teal...
simmered with Tony's cajun seasoning for a while as that wonderful smell went through the entire house...
final add was two pints of shucked oysters (oh yeah) and as soon as the oysters were cooked through...
it was time to ladle all that goodness over some cooked white rice...
final touch was some gumbo file' on top of that steaming bowl...
It was so good, that momma was scraping the bottom of the pot at the end of the meal...!

That looks great Guy. Try some scrambled eggs and teal after the hunt. Cook Teal medium rare, take out. Scramble eggs, cut Teal into strips and throw in at end to mix in but you don't want the teal to cook more. MMMM....I'll try to make some tomorrow AM.

This is the exact way I cook my Teal, the birds are so good they make an ordinary cook look like an executive chef, boy are they wonderful !!!

Is it just me or does it rub anyone else wrong when you see pics of guides/outfitters shoot a 5 or 6 man limit of teal and then that night at the lodge all they cook is steak. Or atleast all they post pictures of is the grill full of steaks.

Good job Guy for eating your harvest

Try Redleg for north Texas, Bryan Glass seems like a good guy, we did a forum hunt with him years ago. https://www.redlegoutfitters.com/

A better idea is go south, I would look for a guide in the Eagle Lake/El Campo area and hunt over rice fields. Maybe someone can post up a good guide in that area.

I do not have a problem with it. Customers pay the outfitters upfront for those steaks, that is what I would want to eat. Clean the ducks for me, put them on ice, I'll eat them later.

Yes sir! Little filet mignonettes. My favorite duck and cooked just like that!
That looks good.

Thanks Smokey. I only cook them like that if fresh, when I pull them out of the freezer and try to cook like that, it’s not as good. Last few years, I been pretty much eating all my duck fresh like that, if I freeze any, I’ll make poppers or something else with them. I like to age them 3 to 7 days as well when I cook them fresh.

How do you pick them to get the skin that clean? No matter how hard I try there always seems to be a few pin feathers I miss on mine.

Thanks my friend!

Plucking a whole duck is hard, but plucking off just the breast is easy. I pluck the breast good first, rubbing your thumb over the breast will get the pin feathers off pretty good. Then fillet off the bone. Some times there are some pin feather around the edges that are hard to get off, I just cut that skin off if it gives me a hard time. You can do one final pluck under running water.

Also I normally only cook like this if the breast is not shot up.

That looks awesome.

Score the fat, salt, let rest 30min-1hour. Cold pan, medium heat, cook fat side down, turn once and cook do medium. Serve.

That's a good idea, I been meaning to try that and keep forgetting.