Being the man of my word that I am, here is the first of the farmers market cook ups (cook ups? Not the cleverest way of putting things, but its early in the a.m and I may or may not be a little hazy headed from the night before.)

Thai duck curry of any description is an all time favourite of mine and I just want you to give it the opportunity to be a favourite of yours, too. An opportunity that we never had as children, growing up as the child of a poor giblet farmer.

The ingredients. No Fleetwood Mac tickets there I’m afraid. Duck legs, lemongrass, kaffir lime, asian greens, chilli and organic brown rice. And the beer is just for me.

AJ the duckman says a lot of people ask him how to cook duck to put in a curry. This would be the easiest way I think. Braised simply in coconut cream with a few aromats. You could pass out drunk for a couple of hours and this would still be OK.

4 duck legs, 2 cans coconut cream, 1 can water, 3 kaffir lime leaf, 1 stalk lemongrass

Put it all into a pot, cover, and simmer for 1.5 hours-ish. The meat will be ready when it starts to fall off the bone or you can pull it apart with tongs (or your fingers if you are heaps tough, or showing off to a pretty girl, or an ugly one, or whatever). If the meat isn’t super tender, cook it for a little longer until it is. This will ensure a pleasant dining experience and you will feel very good about yourself… Your self esteem will sky rocket… Dammit, you might even feel inclined to ‘give yourself one’ tonight.

Now we make a curry paste. I’ve kept it nice and simple so once again, any inbred giblet farmer can do this (there are people out there who have carers who do everything for them and they can’t actually cook or wipe their own bottoms or anything, and they can still cook this dish). If you don’t feel that you are at this level yet, maybe just get a curry paste from the shop.

1 brown onion, 2 long red chilli, 1 birdseye chilli if you like it hot, 1 thumb sized knob of galangal (or ginger if you don’t know what that is), 4 cloves garlic, 2 Tbls coriander seed (toasted), 1 Tbls cumin seed (toasted)

Pound or blitz into a paste. Yeah that’s right. Show it who’s the boss… Scream at it… Who’s your daddy, who’s your step daddy… Now that you have that out of your system, fry the paste off with a splash of oil, 6 kaffir lime leaf and 2 lemongrass. When it starts to brown (not blacken) add 2 tins of coconut cream, 2 Tblsn palm sugar (or castor will do the job just fine) and 2 Tbls fish sauce. Cook out for 5-10 minutes.

Now add your cooked duck legs and 2 bunches of asian greens. Simmer for a further 5 minutes.

Serve with some fresh coriander and thai basil if you have some, and cooked rice (do not forget to cook the rice or this is going to be not very good). Mmmm. Duckman say yum yum.

*duck seams to be one of those things that is best eaten around midnight…