Suggested wine pairing for confit de canard ?

Anyone with personal experience of a successful pairing? Will be served with sliced potatoes fried in the duck fat. Thanks.

Best pairing I’ve ever had was a mature beaujolais. But it was in France and I was on vacation and the restaurant was quaint, so… YMMV

Cote Rotie

I’m having guests tomorrow and want to drink a barolo. I read that duck goes will with barolo.

Barolo: Yes.
Xynomavro: Yes.
BURGUNDY! YESSS!!!
Priorat: Yes.

Dan Kravitz

Dan, Ok I am leaning towards the Barolo, but what would you think of Malbec? Either Cahors or Argentina? -Jim
p.s. I see what you did putting your “grk” in there.

Tannat. Like they drink in the Sud-Ouest.

Pairs well with a lot of stuff. Cahors is pretty traditional, but red burg, Pinot do well

Pinot Noir.


Other suggestions will undoubtedly work well, too, but my initial reaction was “Pinot! Duh.”

Brian, Does your Pinot reaction come from personal experience having it with confit de canard or from the generally accepted “playbook”. A couple of other responders also were strong on the Pinot recommendation. Thanks. -Jim

Duck confit is not an obscure dish one has to guess or speculate about. It’s probably safe to assume folks responding here all have personal experience of a successful pairing of duck confit with any number of wines, including various burgundies/pinots, and do not need to rely on any common wisdom. Duck confit is crazy easy to pair. Pretty much anything red with balance and body will do the trick - maybe not lambrusco or zinfandel, and an old CA cab might not have enough acid, but there are no big wrongs. It’s incredibly wine friendly, and what works best out of all the good options will depend on what exactly you are doing with it. If you are doing a classic confit over frisee, even the right rose can work. If you are putting it in cassoulet, drink madiran. Past that, it’s largely preference.

OK

What Sarah said. Duck confit is super wine friendly and personally I’d drink an aged old world red that I want to drink. It is not one of those dishes that you really need to think much about a specific pairing.

Story time, three of us were have a Cote Rotie themed dinner. I think we had La Las but really does not matter. The resto had duck confit as an appetizer so we immediately all ordered one. It was great with the wines. I forget the entree. Then dessert time came and nothing really seemed to fit the bill with the wine nor what we wanted to eat. So the light bulb went off for all three of us and we laughed and looked at the each and said, “duck confit for dessert.” Again it was one of those magical moments where friends, food, and wine pair perfectly. Dessert was great.

As Sarah said, more important than the confit itself, is the actual prep/sauce (if any).

Another Burgundy vote.

Personal experience (and, therefore, preference).

That said, most other recs. are resonating with me, too, although I wouldn’t personally go for Malbec, Tannat, or Barolo. Not saying they wouldn’t work, just saying that’s not where my preferences would go.

I agree with Sarah (doesn’t everybody?) that duck confit is an easy pairing. However for me, it is better with the earthier wines… Burgundy, Piedmont Nebbiolo, Rhone. To me, Malbec or any other Atlantic red is a far better pairing for duck breast, or its analogs such as lamb chops or steak (beef).

An anecdote: I recently had a newly met close relative over for dinner, with her husband, here at home in Maine. We had the obligatory lobster and scallops, and a lot of other seafood. For our final evening’s dinner, I grilled duck breast and loin lamb chops. Turns out she had never before eaten duck!?! (they are not foodies). She said that she had never imagined that duck tasted like that… far, far more similar to the lamb chops than to the dark, gamy chicken she imagined. To me, the foursquare, stately, steakish red meats, whether steak, duck breast, elk or grilled lamb loin, are perfectly matched by foursquare, stately red Bordeaux (especially Cabernet based), or Napa or Washington Cab, or Lujan de Cuyo Malbec.

Dan Kravitz

Thanks to all for the comments and suggestions. Unfortunately they may be a case of

since our confit de canard will be from the “can” and prepared very simply, served with sliced potatoes fried in the duck fat with a vegetable side. Not a pretentious meal, but one we have enjoyed many times before without paying too much attention to the wine. This next time, since we will have friends over, I thought that I would try to pair it with a “suitable” wine which was the thrust of my OP. You have provided me what I need to know.

and it’s so easy to make duck confit and save it forever.

I have often enjoyed duck confit from a can. Yes, it is very easy and essentially foolproof to make. However it also takes time… quite a bit of time.

An anecdote from 30 years or so past (late 80’s): I was in Bordeaux with some customers. At the time I represented an organic grower in Entre-deux-Mers. The “Chateau” was an old, modest, rather decrepit farmhouse. The linoleum floor had probably been washed at least once a decade since the 50’s. The wife of one of my customers was a budding vegetarian. The first course was salad with a liver pate that was almost too strong for me to eat (you can’t possibly understand how strong this is). We all pushed it around. My customer’s wife was torn between eating the excellent salad, but leaving enough on her plate under which to bury the pate before the plates were cleared.

The main course was duck confit, dug out of the fat in a multi gallon jug. Her facial color turned from wan to pea green. The legs with the fat were put in the pan to warm and crisp. The aromas were beyond heavenly. Her face returned to normal, then to avid, then to ferocious. We each had a leg. There was one left. As I was politely reaching for it, she stabbed her fork right through it, missing my hand by a millimeter. If she had had to skewer my hand to get to that leg, it would not have been an issue for her.

Dan Kravitz