DUCK CONFIT AGNOLOTTI, WITH WITH ROASTED PUMPKIN, SMOKED CHESTNUTS, RICOTTA AND SAGE BROWN BUTTER

Recipe by Matt O'Connor, Culinary Director/ Executive Chef at Wee Burn Country Club, Darien, Connecticut, USA

Ingredients

Duck Confit
(Yields 50 Small Agnolotti)
• 4 Duck Legs (raw, skin on)
• 2 Tablespoons Kosher Salt
• 2 Lemons (zested)
• 6 Garlic Cloves (crushed)
• 2 Tablespoons Allspice Berries
• 2 Tablespoons Juniper Berries
• 4 Thyme Sprigs
• 4 cups Rendered Duck Fat

Pasta Dough
(Yields 1 Pound of Pasta Dough)
• 4 Whole Eggs (large)
• 4 Egg Yolks
• 4 cups Caputo “OO” Flour
• 1 teaspoon Kosher Salt
• 1 Tablespoon Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• Water as Needed
• Extra Flour for Rolling

Agnolotti Filling
(Yields Enough for 50 Small Agnolotti)
• 1 ½ cups Whole Milk Ricotta Cheese
• 2 Egg Yolks
• 1 Orange (zested)
• 1 Lemon (zested)
• 1 pound Duck Confit Meat (removed
from bone and shredded)
• 1 Tablespoon Fresh Parsley (minced)
• Salt and Pepper (to taste)

Smoked Chestnuts
• 5 Chestnuts (deshelled and roasted)
• Wood Chips
• Sea Salt

Roasted Mini Pumpkins
• 10 Mini Pumpkins
• 3 Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 Tablespoon Sea Salt
• 1 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon Sugar

Saged Brown Butter
• ½ cup Unsalted Butter
• 2 Tablespoon Fresh Sage (minced)

Garnish
• Crispy Sage Leaves (deep-fried for
20 seconds and season with salt and
pepper)
• Shaved Parmigiana Reggiano
Cheese
• Baby Pumpkin Blossoms

Preparation

Duck Confit
Chef Note: Prepare the duck legs 24 hours
before.
Combine the salt, lemon zest, garlic cloves, allspice, juniper, and thyme in a bowl. Rub the spice blend over the duck legs, wrap tight, and marinate for 24 hours. Rinse the duck legs under cold water and pat dry with a paper towel. In a baking dish, submerge the duck legs in the rendered duck fat, cover with foil, and bake in a 200 °F oven for 6 to 7 hours. Cool the duck legs in their fat, and once cold, remove the meat from the bones and chop finely. Set aside.

Pasta Dough
Add all the ingredients into a Kitchen Aid mixing bowl and blend at medium speed with the dough hook attachment for 10 minutes. The dough should pull away from the sides of the bowl and be shiny when it is done mixing. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and let it rest at room temperature for 1 hour before rolling it through the pasta machine.

Agnolotti Filling
Place all the ingredients into a food processor and thoroughly pulse until all the ingredients are combined. Put the mixture into a piping bag with ¼-inch hole cut at the bottom.

Agnolotti
Cut your Pasta dough into 4 pieces and run each piece through a pasta machine to make wide sheets. The pasta dough should be thin enough to see your fingers through it, but not translucent. Keep your dough covered and sheets covered at all times so that they do not dry out. Working with one pasta sheet at a time lay the sheet on a lightly floured work surface. Pipe a tube of the duck confit filling across the bottom of the pasta sheet, leaving a ¾ -inch border of pasta along with the left, right, and bottom edges. Pull the bottom edge of the pasta up and over the filling and press down to seal the edge of the dough to the pasta sheet, then seal the left and right ends of the dough. Press to make sure there are no air pockets To shape the agnolotti starting at one end pinch the filling in 1-inch increments leaving about ¾-inch of pinched dough in between filling pockets. Run a crimped pastry wheel or pizza dough cutter along the top edge of the folded over dough, separating the filled strip of pockets from the rest of the pasta sheet. Now separate the agnolotti by cutting through the center of each pinched strip with your pastry cutter. Place the individual agnolotti on a baking sheet dusted with cornmeal, not touching each other. Continue this process with the remaining pasta dough; you should have 50 finished agnolotti once you have used all of the dough and filling. Chef Note: If you wrap these tightly they will keep overnight, or you can wrap and freeze them, and you can cook them frozen.​

Smoked Chestnuts
Put some wood chips in the bottom of a 4-inch deep half-hotel pan and place directly on the flame of a stove. Cover. Once the smoke forms, put the chestnuts in a perforated half-hotel pan and place them in the smoker. Cover and let smoke for 5 minutes. Remove the chestnuts, season with sea salt, and grate the chestnuts with a micro plane. Reserve for serving.

Roasted Mini Pumpkins
Steam mini pumpkins for 30 minutes at 220 °F and allow to cool completely. Once cool, cut to the top of the pumpkin off, being careful to keep the stem intact, and scoop out the seeds and as much pumpkin as possible. Season the inside of the pumpkin with the salt and spices, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, and bake the pumpkins for 10 minutes at 350 °F. Hold in a warm place for serving.

​Sage Browned Butter
Get salted water boiling. In a large sauté pan, melt butter and allow the butter to turn a light brown color, but do not burn. Remove the pan from the heat. Drop agnolotti into the boiling salted water and cook for 3 minutes or until they float to the top. Strain the agnolotti in a colander and add them into the browned butter; gently toss them, add the fresh sage, and toss again. Place the roasted pumpkin on a small plate. 

Assembly

Spoon 5 agnolotti into each pumpkin, sprinkle with the shaved smoked chestnuts, add some parmesan cheese shavings, spoon some extra browned butter over the agnolotti. Garnish with some fried sage leaves and pumpkin blossoms. Put the pumpkin lid on top and
serve immediately.