Beautiful Pairings: A Delicious Duck Breast Recipe With Wine And Figs

We're in the midst of the most beautiful season, the peak of autumn, filled with the blazing red of fall foliage and vibrant orange of pumpkin patches. Culinary speaking, autumn is a lovely time for cooking, with gorgeous seasonal ingredients bringing flavor and color to our tables, and the weather allowing for heartier main dishes with meats. Today we're featuring a duck breast recipe that highlights some of our favorite ingredients: earthy duck breast, sweet figs and voluptuous wine.

This duck breast recipe starts with boneless Muscovy duck breasts. Muscovy duck is fabulously flavorful fowl meat, with a bold and succulent flavor, much more complex than what you would expect. Paired with the sweet figs cooked in Beaujolais wine, it's absolute perfection - a sophisticate melding of sweet and salty flavors, a buttery on the inside yet crispy on the outside texture, and just a sublimely rich dish.

Cooking Tips For Our Muscovy Duck Breast Recipe

This duck breast recipe is simple, but there are some things to know.

• Muscovy duck breast should always be cooked medium (or medium rare). Overcook it, and it'll be dry and tough. So...
• Use a kitchen thermometer if you have one, to make sure you don't overcook it. Our duck breast is ready once the inside temperature reaches 120 degrees.
• Look for the ripest figs you can find, they're the sweetest! They should be soft (but not mushy), and have small wrinkles on the skin.
• You don't need oil or butter for this Muscovy duck breast recipe; the duck meat itself has enough fat to cook to perfection by itself.
• Save the rendered fat from the pan where you cooked the duck breast, this concoction is full of delicious flavor and perfect for sautéing veggies or potatoes
• Serve with your favorite red wine, especially great with Burgundy wine or Pinot Noir.