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REPASTS: CANVASBACK DUCK

Though canvasback ducks have fallen from favour since Edith Wharton's time, they remain delicious, "with the gamy taste and muscular chew of wild meat," writes Jon Fasman in his latest column about meals in books ...

From INTELLIGENT LIFE Magazine, Autumn 2009

“People…said they were ‘going to the Beauforts’ with the same tone of security as if …they were going to Mrs Manson Mingott’s, and with the added satisfaction of knowing they would get hot canvasback ducks and vintage wines, instead of…warmed-up croquettes from Philadelphia” ~ “The Age of Innocence” by Edith Wharton (1920)

The canvasback duck’s Latin name, Aythya valisineria, hints at its tastiness: Vallisneria Americana is a type of celery native to American marshes and ponds; it comprises the bulk of the canvasback’s diet. Canvasbacks were a favourite at banquet tables during the Gilded Age of the late 19th century; today its hunting is heavily restricted across the continent, largely because the Beauforts, Manson Mingotts and their ilk ate so many of them.

Canvasbacks are classed as game in Charles Ranhofer’s 19th-century “The Epicurean”. (This is to cooking what the Old Testament is to smiting: a great deal of both activities occurs between the covers, but the authors make clear that each is beyond the skill of mere mortals. It makes wonderful reading.) Ranhofer, a leading chef of his day, sauced canvasbacks with bitter-orange-based Sauce Bigarade, or a currant and port concoction, and generally waterfowl such as this beg for some Madeira and perhaps a squeeze of lemon for deglazing.

Consumption of both canvasback ducks, and that other luxury food, terrapin, declined from the start of the first world war—partly because they were tainted as food for the rich in times that valued austerity. Today, Chesapeake Bay is swimming with terrapins, but few people would consider eating them. In a sort of reverse process, bottom-feeding crustaceans such as crab and lobster have become expensive delicacies, whereas in Wharton’s time they were considered trash (prisons in Maine were forbidden by law from serving lobster to their inmates more than once a week).

Canvasbacks remain delicious, with the gamy taste and muscular chew of wild meat, rather than the pillowy flab of factory-raised ducks. They certainly outshine reheated Philadelphia croquettes; one suspects the shrewd and independent Mrs Manson Mingott knew this, and was either indifferent or secretly pleased. Her position in society was secure enough that she did not need to resort to duck and vintage wine; that was for eager-to-impress arrivistes like the Beauforts.
 

Picture credit: Let Ideas Compete (via Flickr)

(Jon Fasman is an editor for Economist.com and the author of two novels, both published by the Penguin Press: "The Geographer's Library" and "The Unpossessed City".)