Zombie Duck followup, or How to Make Your Butcher Weep, & the Return of the Pigeons

I've been tormented by birds this week. First the Zombie Duck debacle, then my old foes, the Pigeons, who attempted to splat on me Friday while I waited on the platform for my connecting train.

Me (Hears splat and looks down at puddle of white next to the toe of my boot): Bloody pigeons. (Looks up. There is a large black feathered bag of evil smirking at me & wiggling its tail feathers.)
Bag of Evil: *CoooEeee!* It carefully shuffles further across on its perch and aims a feathered butt at me. 
I move. Splat!
Me: Missed, you bugger!
Bag of Evil: *Gah!* Shuffle. Aim. Fire.
Me: WTF? Missed again, though. At this point I moved further down the platform, to the very edge of the sheltered area.
Bag of Evil: *OooooOOOOO* Shuffle Shuffle Shuffle. Aim. Fire.
Me (hastily side-stepping): I swear I will climb up there and kick your feathered arse...

It should be pointed out that issuing threats of violence at pigeons while shaking your fist at them results in a very clear space around you, and the general refusal of any fellow traveller to meet your line of sight. I spent the remaining 8 minutes on that platform in the unsheltered area, keeping an eye out for incoming bird missiles and feeling my face turn numb, which did not improve my temperament. Nobody got on the same carriage as me.

                                                       ******************


On Saturday I wandered down to the butcher shop. I needed mince to make hamburgers, and these guys also sell some organic vegetables that blow the supermarket produce out of the water for taste, size, and price.

I also wanted to warn them about Zombie Duck, since I have no idea what caused it or whether any other customers had the same issue.

The guy I usually deal with is a friendly chap - always smiling, always with a cheery greeting for everyone. It's one of the reasons I keep going in there; that and their meat quality is excellent. Zombie Duck was an aberration.

Butcher: Hello, there. How were the tongues?
Me: Tongues were great, thank you. Bit of a problem with the duck, though.
Butcher looks mortified: What happened?
Me: It turned green in the oven.
Butcher: What???? (His lower lip starts to quiver.)
Me: Never had that happen before. Has anyone else had that?
Butcher (Shaking head violently): No. Oh, god. Oh, my. I'm so sorry. I'm just-
He breaks off to ring my stuff up. His eyes are starting to - Oh, my dear Gods - my butcher is trying not to cry.
Me (starting to babble): I just thought you needed to know. I'll probably order more tongue soon. Thanks, bye!
I grabbed my purchases and fled. As I stepped outside, I glanced back to see the poor man slumped against a wall, shoulders shaking ever so slightly, and one of his colleagues patting him on the arm.

I walked home feeling mortified. I don't like feeling that I was cause of someone feeling so desolate they had to cry. To be honest, I never know what to do when someone starts crying at the best of times, and having it happen over £10 bird was a bit more than I expected.

I have even more respect for the powers of the undead, though.

Zombie Duck made my butcher weep.

Zombie Duck!

Well, that didn't take long.

It's not often something goes spectacularly wrong in the kitchen at my little pit of doom in East London, but when it does, it goes all the way.

The plan was to roast a whole duck. I got the duck at the local butchers just before Christmas, put it straight into the freezer, and spent a couple of happy hours researching recipes.

The plan was to have whole crispy-skinned roast duck with a soy and honey baste and some vegetables on the side.

What we got was... erm ... probably best described as crispy roast uck, with a side of potential plague. The four horsemen of the apocalypse rode through my kitchen and left holding their noses and gagging gently.

The first indication that something was wrong came around the beginning of the second hour of slow roasting, when an indescribable aroma began to fill up the flat.

Now, I've cooked duck before. Never a whole one, usually the legs and breast. It smells great. It does not smell like a werwolf rolled in a sewer and then duct-taped itself to an exhaust outlet.

I checked to make sure the giblets were out, and there weren't any feathers left. The duck had been defrosted and salted, and if the meat was off I'd expect to smell it at that point, or see discolouration. I wondered if some cleaning product had gotten into the oven.  I'd left some of the extra skin in the pan to get crispy so I took a tentative nibble. It tasted okay. Fifteen minutes later my mouth and throat were burning.

A skype conversation with the folks confirmed that duck shouldn't reek badly while cooking, so I decided to haul it out and see what the hell had happened.

By this point my cousin was walking around with her top pulled up over her nose and mouth, like an extra from a cowboy movie. The stench was dying down a little, so I pulled open the oven door and hauled The Bird That Shall Not Be Named out.

Stacey and I looked at it. At this point, I may have thrown up a little in my mouth.

The top of the bird had turned a hideous shade of grey-green. The meat on the legs had collapsed, leaving shards of brown bone sticking through. The sides were splitting and peeling apart. (The skin was crispy, though. Definitely got that bit right.)

By all appearances, I had just roasted seven shades out of zombie duck.

(I ate some of that. It was a nibble, true, but not the point. I ate some of that. I'm hoping not enough to get me sick.)

At this point the smell was overpowering, and both of us retreated from the kitchen to our respective bedrooms. The dialogue below is an extract of the text message conversation that followed.

Me: This is an ex-duck in every sense of the word. Chicken again?
Stacey: Maybe it shagged the dog. (When the smell started, she thought a dog had gotten in. A large, dirty, wet dog.)
Me: Fluffy duck! Or, Fluffy got ducked? 
Stacey: Fluffy got ducked then stuffed into a duck suit.
Me: Duffy does Fluffy?
Stacey: It could have been Pluto or Goofy.
Me: Duffy is a bad, bad duck.

Eventually, for the sanity of all concerned, Stacey got dressed for outdoors while I double-bagged Zombie Duck, and she took it downstairs to the outside bin.

I put on the extractor fan to the highest setting and scrubbed everything down with malt vinegar and soap.

We ordered Chinese takeaway, and I sulked over the perfect crispy duck pancakes that arrived as part of the order.


                                                   ****************

It's back to work for me tomorrow, so the blog posts will slow down a bit.  If anyone has any clue how I ended up roasting zombie duck, I'd love to hear it.

We've ended up putting a diffuser into the kitchen; as the smell of roast zombie duck faded, it started to smell more and more like said zombie duck defecated as it was hauled out of the kitchen.

There are easier ways to clear your sinuses.