Cantonese Roast Duck Salad with Radicchio and Orange

A delicious pairing of bitter and sweet flavours on one plate balanced with savoury umami Cantonese Roast Duck, this no cook warm salad recipe is super easy to prepare!

Why I Love Cantonese Roast Duck Salad with Radicchio and Orange

Easy. No cook salad. But full of flavour. Some days we literally run out of time to get dinner ready and grabbing another take out meal can feel like argh.

This warm salad recipe is fantastic for those nights especially having to work from home and manage kids homeschooling.

Yup, I said no cook. But there is roast duck? Yes, we get that.

For this recipe, we have chosen to purchase Cantonese roast duck at our local Chinese barbeque restaurant. But why? Because we leave this tasty morsel to the experts.

To get the authentic Cantonese flavours and famous crispy skin, the cooking process for Cantonese roast duck is long and laborious.

Plus we don’t seem to have the right kind of oven for it. Grabbing a roast duck at your local Chinese barbeque restaurant is the way to go.

We have exactly the same for our Roast Duck, Caramelised Grapefruit and Wombok Salad too!

Easy Salad Recipes For Quick Midweek Meals

When we have a big week ahead, having a few easy to prepare salad recipes in our locker is a game changer.

Juggling between home schooling kids, work from home and life, some days we just don’t have the time to prepare fancy dinners but we also don’t want to compromise on taste.

Our Cantonese Roast Duck Salad is perfect for this. No cooking involved, just cutting and tearing ingredients to create a savoury and flavoursome work from home dinner.

You should also try our asparagus pasta salad with pecan pesto or Santa Fe salad with chicken.

What Goes Well with Duck?

Duck has a reputation of being fussy and fancy but it doesn’t have to be. Just need to find the right pairing. We don’t often cook it at home but we do love it when we give it a go.

As duck has a more gamey flavour and more meaty texture than chicken. The flavours that I find that goes well with duck include more robust spices like five spice, cloves, ginger, star anise, cumin and coriander seeds plus sweeter fruity flavours.

Let’s not forget apricot, blueberry, cherry, lemon, orange, cranberry, currant, pear, peach, prune and pomegranate.

Pairing with Cantonese roast duck, I have created a peppery radicchio salad with sweet oranges, fresh mint and sharp red onion. All tied together with a tangy citrus red wine vinaigrette.

It may seem strange to pair traditional Chinese flavours with western vegetables and a red wine vinaigrette but the combination of refreshing ingredients work magic together in the savoury roast duck salad.

How to Make Radicchio Less Bitter

I love radicchio’s bold, peppery flavours and it is fantastic raw or grilled. However, for some people, radicchio may be considered to be too bitter. So how to make radicchio less bitter?

For raw radicchio, the best way to make radicchio less bitter is to soak small cut leaves into chilled water. The longer you soak, the more bitter compounds are released. If you like to retain most of the bitter flavours, a quick rinse will do.

Another popular method to take out the bite in radicchio is to cook it. Grilled radicchio, as found in our Radicchio, Baby Gem, Orange and Ruby Grapefruit Salad, takes the edge off the bitterness and becomes slightly sweeter in taste.

Instructions

Step by step instructions for how to make Cantonese roast duck salad:

How to Prepare the Cantonese Roast Duck

Purchase a whole Cantonese roast duck at your local Chinese barbeque restaurant but remember to ask them not to cut it up and that you would like it whole.

Place the roast duck with breast side up and cut the roast duck into 4 quarters.

For the breast quarters, slice through and remove the breast meat off the bone. Then cut the breast meat into 0.5cm slices.

For the thigh quarters, use a small knife and slice off bite sized chunks of duck meat as close as you can to the bone.

For parts that are tricky to remove all the meat, use your hands and tear the flesh off the duck. Keep going until you get as much meat as you can.

Discard the bones if you wish. We normally keep and freeze the bones for stock later.

Set aside duck meat for assembly.

How to Prepare the Salad

Cut radicchio in half lengthwise. Placing half radicchio cut side down, chop radicchio from top to bottom into about 1.5cm slices. Repeat with the second half of the radicchio.

Give chopped radicchio a good rinse and if you like to take the edge off the bitterness, soak it in icy cold water. Drain after 5 minutes and shake dry.

For this salad, I like to cut oranges into wheels. Make sure you have a very sharp knife otherwise you will squish the fruit and release too much juice.

First slice both ends of the orange and then hold the fruit on its base. Cutting a downward motion, remove all the peel. Then turn the fruit on its side and cut into 0.5 cm thick rounds. Then cut rounds into quarters. Place aside ready for assembly.

Thinly slice a red onion in half moons.

Wash and roughly chop mint leaves.

How to Make Red Wine Vinaigrette

A light citrus vinaigrette using orange and red wine vinegar to create a balance between all the flavours. Place all ingredients, olive oil, red wine vinegar and orange juice in a jar. Shake well and taste.

Add salt and pepper to red wine vinaigrette according to taste.

How to Assemble the Salad

You can easily serve the radicchio salad as individual main meals or on a large platter for sharing. Either way, it is pretty much the same way to assemble just make sure you divide the salad ingredients into 4 equal portions!

Start layering the plate with chopped radicchio leaves at the bottom.

Next add a layer of shredded duck and then scatter sliced orange and red onion.

Drizzle half the red wine vinaigrette over salad.

Place duck breast and thigh slices on top and then scatter with chop mint.

Drizzle the remaining red wine vinaigrette and serve.

Perfect no fuss roast duck salad that is excellent for lazy evenings or when you have no time to cook after working a long day. There is more than enough Cantonese roast duck for 4 main serves and possibly for 6 people as light lunches.

If you are looking for a great entertaining salad, this warm salad recipe is also fantastic to share along with other dishes. Stunning colours and impressive to serve. Can easily be transported with all ingredients chopped and then assembled when you need to serve.

This delicious easy work from home dinner recipe with radicchio, roast duck and orange is perfectly balanced between bitter, sweet, tangy and umami flavours. Definitely worth adding to your menu this week.