Jamie and Jimmy's Friday Night Feast (2014) s02e05 Episode Script

Michael Sheen, Brisket and Crispy Duck

1 Me and my best mate Jimmy are back at very our own cafe, here at the end of Southend Pier.
~ Who's hungry? ~ ALL: Yeah! Because we're passionate about cooking up great food to share with friends and family.
~ A lovely flavour.
~ That's delicious.
~ That's really, really good.
We've invited down a host of very special mates.
Hello! To help out in the kitchen.
It's getting hot, it's getting hot! ~ Because the weekends are for feasting.
~ Thank food it's Friday! ~ It's Friday! ALL CHEERING SEAGULLS CALL On tonight's menu We're talking about flavours and textures galore.
So let's do it.
I've got the ultimate winter warmer.
A heavenly, slow cooked chilli feast.
You know this is gonna be the antidote that just makes you happy.
I'll show you how to pimp your barbecue into a cracking Peking duck oven.
Whoa! Look at these beauties.
It is incredible.
And our food fight heads to the seaside, to cook up all the delicious bits of fish we normally chuck overboard.
Fish waste isn't about the old bones, not gonna taste 'em much.
Cheeks, liver, but, in fact, it's the best bit.
Thank you very much.
Lovely.
There we go.
Kerry Ann, my love, need one more tea out there, please.
~ I've already made your tea.
~ One more cup of tea, love, no sugar.
Lending a hand in the caff is my old student, Kerry Ann.
~ It's for you, innit, Jim? ~ You do make a good cup of tea, I'll say that.
We've got a menu full of amazing feasts for you to try this weekend.
And joining us in the kitchen is the actor who starred in Twilight and The Queen.
~ Ahh! ~ Hello.
Oh, ladies and gentlemen, it's only Michael Sheen! ~ Wow! Good to see you, sir.
~ Good to see you! How nice to see you.
~ May I sit down? ~ Welcome.
~ Yeah, sit down.
~ Cup of tea? ~ I'd love one, thanks.
~ Is this the first time you've been to Southend? ~ It is.
~ Welcome.
The longest pleasure pier in the world.
~ So long it needs a train to get all the way down.
~ I know.
How did you get into acting? Are you from an acting background, with your parents in the theatre? ~ One whole side of my family were all carnival, travelling fairground people.
~ Yeah.
But my great-great-grandmother, er, was an elephant and lion tamer.
A lion mauled her and took off her, her left breast, and the claw of that lion is on a chain ~ in a little box in my house in LA now.
~ No way.
~ Yeah, yeah.
That is insane.
But tell us about growing up.
I wanna know about food.
Well, where I came from wasn't the most, sort of, adventurous in terms of its food.
My dad very conservative in what he likes.
I grew up thinking of food as being a punishment more than anything else, cos there'd always be, you'd be at the dinner table, and it would be, ~ "You're not getting up from here until you've eaten that.
" ~ Yeah.
So you start associating food with something that's, like, gruelling to get through.
When did you find food, get excited about it, get switched on by it? The first major turning point, I'm in a relationship with a posh girl ~ from Chiswick.
~ Yeah.
~ Kate, who's the mother of my daughter, who I was with for many years, who's fantastic, and she'd had a different food background to me, at that point.
But we were living together, and she said, "Can you pop down the shops, get some potatoes?" ~ Lovely.
~ She still talks about this to this day.
So I go down the shops, I came back with a tin of potatoes.
She sent me off for potatoes and an avocado.
I came back with a tin of avocado pears.
~ I had no idea.
Never seen an avocado.
Didn't know what it was.
~ So food for you came in tins? ~ Yeah.
~ That was the big turning point.
~ That's answered the question about the level of cooking we'll be having this afternoon.
~ Before we crack on - ~ Yeah.
~ The beginning of today's beautiful feasts, for you and this lot here, is an incredible, comforting winter night's chilli.
~ It's gonna blow your mind.
~ Oh, nice.
But before we serve it up to Michael and the diners, I'm gonna show you lot at home how you can make it too.
This is the one! I wanna give you a recipe for the most awesome winter's night chilli.
I wanna take you to the next level.
This is an epic dish of unctuous, tender pork belly and soft beef brisket in a rich, smoky sauce.
Cooked low and slow for super flavour.
We're talking about flavours and textures galore.
So let's do it.
In front of me here are the ingredients that's gonna make this chilli that's gonna rock your world.
So, let's start with spices here.
First, we want an intense flavour-packed spice rub.
Two tablespoons of coriander seeds.
Savoury, perfumed.
Wonderful with meat, beans, and particularly any roasted veg.
Then add two tablespoons of fennel seeds, a good pinch of salt and peppercorns, and bash it up.
And then we're gonna go in with the smoked paprika, OK? So you want two tablespoons, and then we just kind of go from bashing to sort of muddling.
So there you go.
That's your rub.
Happy days.
So, right, let me just get this lovely meat in.
So, in this chilli, there ain't no mincemeat going anywhere near it.
I'm using one kilo of belly of pork.
There's a nice mixture of fat and beautiful sweet meat here.
And I'm using a brisket, a really nice cut of beef.
It needs to be slow cooked.
Er, you can see it's got that lovely sort of open texture, so when you slow cook it, it just falls apart.
Sprinkle the rub on the meat and drizzle with a little olive oil, and massage in.
This two kilos of meat will feed at least 12 people.
Then brown off in a hot pan to start some incredible flavour.
SIZZLING If we have a little move around, that's what we want.
Letting the meat get dark, creating flavour.
We want kind of gnarly, sizzling fat.
While the meat finishes browning, onto the sauce.
Let's go to more traditional places with the base of our chilli.
First, dried porcini mushrooms.
It's got deep kind of savoury flavours.
It's really incredible.
To bring out their rich, earthy character, rehydrate the mushrooms with a swig of boiling water and leave to soak.
So I'm gonna take that brisket out now.
Next, chop up two large onions.
Mix it in all that gorgeous fat from the meats.
I want that kind of sweet and sour, er, sort of flavour going on.
So I'm gonna go in with about two tablespoons of sugar.
150ml of balsamic vinegar.
Reduce, and then add 90 percent of the soaking liquid from the mushroom.
The reason I say 90 percent is sometimes you get a little bit of gritty sediment at the very end.
Can you see that right there? You don't really want that.
Roughly chop the mushrooms and add them to the sauce, along with two tins of tomatoes.
Scrunch it through your fingers.
It's kind of the perfect consistency.
Not too big, not too small.
Add a tin or jar of delicious chickpeas and one tin of cannellini beans.
And then place our meat here, and submerge it in all of that glorious sauce, and hopefully what you're getting from me is every stage is important.
The proficiency of browning stuff off, sweetening off the onions.
The selection of spices.
It's not hard, but just let's not rush the stages.
We're not boiling stuff, we're kind of creating different layers of flavour and stuff like that.
Bring it to a gentle simmer, then cover with a scrunched up piece of greaseproof paper and a double layer of foil.
It's now ready to cook, low and slow, at 150 degrees Centigrade for about five hours until the meat just falls apart.
So just go off, have a nice day, go for a walk, go shopping, go to the pub, go to the football.
Whatever makes you happy.
Er, but when you come home, the smell in the house will be incredible.
After an afternoon of slow cooking, I'm gonna add a defining layer to this awesome dish.
Blacken some peppers and chillies over a flame, or under a grill.
This beautiful, toasted, charred peppers are getting stirred in at the end, that'll make it the full spectrum.
Slip off the blackened skins, de-seed and roughly chop them.
At the end of cooking, if we can fold in texture, flavour, attitude, and sort of different perfumes, that is clever.
Finish off with some chopped coriander, a drizzle of olive oil, and a splash of cider vinegar.
And mix.
Let's have a look at our investment.
Five hours.
Yeah! Look at that.
Got an amazing sauce round here.
Here's the pork belly.
And what do you get from five hours' cooking? You know it's gonna be good.
Look at the brisket, the grain of it.
Phoar! I mean, I'm really pleased with how that chilli is, as is.
But then when we start adding our peppers, you've got that char that's going through it.
Next level.
And there's just one last thing.
I've roasted some butternut squash earlier, in our spicy rub, and I'm gonna mix that through the finished chilli.
Look at the colours.
You know that this is gonna be the antidote that just makes you happy.
This is chilli reinvented.
Chunks of soft, tender meat infused with warm spices, and all wrapped in that rich, smoky sauce.
I'm serving it with fluffy rice and a fresh, zingy apple salsa.
And then if you just can't decide whether to have rice or bread, just have a little bit of both.
Come on.
Oh! So good.
So many flavours.
So there you go, guys.
Winter night's chilli.
I'm sold.
I just hope Mr Sheen loves it as much as I do.
SEAGULLS CALL ~ What kind of rice is that? ~ It's a brown rice, just steamed.
~ Very simple.
~ It's not tinned rice.
You're OK.
~ Oh, right.
Service, please! ~ Nice, innit? ~ Feels so tender.
Really nice spices.
Ooh, this looks amazing.
This is delicious.
Don't get too comfortable, cos you now have to cook for this lot.
What is your dish you're gonna cook for this lovely audience? I'm going for a classic, Welsh traditional dish.
It's called cawl.
It's a stew.
It's something my grandmother used to make for me when I was a kid.
Usually made with lamb.
I remember potatoes, parsnips, carrots.
~ It wouldn't happen to be this lovely lady here, would it? ~ Yes, it is.
I'd always associate it with being round at my gran's.
My grandfather'd be watching the horse racing on the TV.
We'd have a game of cards with pennies and that kind of stuff, then I'd I'd sit there and eat the cawl with bread, and it was just delicious.
~ You're a very passionate Welshman.
They have competitions for this stew in Wales, don't they? ~ Yeah.
They take it very seri There's a festival.
I'm glad you said that, Jim, because in this show we take our research very, very seriously.
So we chose one of the, I think a five-time champion of the Welsh cawl competition.
~ She's like the World Cup winner.
~ We got the recipe.
It's simple but explicit, and very stagey.
Cawl is the national dish of Wales.
A delicious, comforting lamb broth, it was originally a staple for miners and farmers.
Everyone gives it their own spin, but no one cooks it better than Sue Jones.
The World Cawl Championships are held every year in Saundersfoot, and five-times winner Sue has given us her recipe.
She says that the key is to add the ingredients one by one.
So we'll be following her very precise instructions to the letter.
~ You've got to cook this cawl for this whole room.
Are you ready for this? ~ I am.
~ Are you a pinny man, or are you gonna go naked? Not naked, but as you are? ~ Naked.
~ Go naked but witha pinny.
Next, our food fight gets us eating bits of fish we never knew existed.
~ The best meat on any animal on the planet is generally in the cheek.
~ That is beautiful.
And Michael gets to grips with vegetables that don't come out of tins.
Mr Sheen is using a speed peeler.
~ But I am a trained technician.
~ ALL LAUGH So don't try this at home.
SEAGULLS CALL Here in Southend, we're cooking up a menu full of fabulous feasts fit for the weekend.
Hollywood star Michael Sheen is getting a much needed cookery lesson from yours truly.
~ How many people have you cooked for before? ~ Er ~ I think we know what the answer's gonna be.
~ One.
~ Is it? We're revisiting his Celtic roots with an authentic cawl, a Welsh broth of sweet vegetables and tender lamb, and it's Michael's favourite dish since his nan cooked it for him as a young boy.
What's really interesting, although this is the Welsh version of cucina povera, ~ poor people's cooking - ~ Mm.
~ It's humble, it's nutritious.
It's very nutrient-dense food.
So this is gonna make you feel good.
I've got the recipe and precise instructions from Sue Jones, five-times World Cawl Championship winner.
She says it's all about adding the different ingredients one by one, and it starts with the meat.
This is neck of lamb.
Still very affordable, but if you just look at that cross section, you've got bone marrow, you've got bones.
You got different little cuts of meat.
Sweet meat, but it will be tough.
So a kilo of this neck chops goes into some water, OK? Add a whole onion and simmer the lot for ten to 15 minutes.
Then it's time to get stuck in, stripping the meat off the bone.
There is all sorts going on in here.
The neck is the most working part of the animal, cos animals are greedy, they wanna eat, they're down all the time.
~ But what you get is a cut of meat that will cook sweet.
~ Yeah.
~ And delicious.
The meat goes back into the pan of stock, and now for the vegetables.
World champ Sue says the first veg to go in must be swede.
~ What I'd like you to do, just take your time and do one centimetre slices.
~ OK.
~ And then we can line that up, and do one centimetre slices.
~ Yeah.
~ And then line that up, and guess what? ~ One centimetre cubes.
~ And we're doing that because Sue said so.
OK.
~ OK.
~ Over to you, sir.
~ Alright.
So what I'd like you to do, Mr Sheen, is pick up your beautifully chopped veg.
Put it into our just returning to the simmer stock, with the lamb.
~ We're gonna simmer that for exactly 15 to 20 minutes.
~ Right.
~ Peel two carrots and cut them at an angle into centimetre slices.
~ Right.
~ We'll add it.
And guess what, we cook it for another 15 to 20 minutes.
~ Because that's what Sue said.
~ You crack on with that.
~ Alright, then.
So, ladies and gentlemen, Mr Sheen is using a speed peeler.
ALL: Ooh! ~ Yes.
But I am a trained technician.
~ ALL LAUGH So don't try this at home.
While novice cook Michael gets to grips with the basics, we're getting stuck into our food fight.
This series, Jamie and I are waging war on food waste, and tonight we're off to the seaside.
This is a little journey for the fish of the world.
This is about not wasting.
This is about appreciating fish.
~ Are we doing it on a big scale? ~ Yeah Well, we're gonna try.
We've become a nation obsessed with pre-packed supermarket fillets, and thanks to this, a whopping 170,000 tonnes of fish in the UK ends up on the scrapheap every year.
For lots of people, fish is a minefield.
They think, "I don't know how to cook it.
I don't wanna get a bone stuck in my throat.
" But what they don't know is that a huge quantity of fish is wasted because you just take the fillets out and throw the rest away.
It's crazy when our seas are already over-fished, and sustainability is a worldwide issue.
If all of us that buy fish fillets every week, week in, week out, bought a whole fish half of the time, the way that would affect environment, you know, fish stocks, ~ also it'd lower the price of fish in total.
~ It'd change the industry.
It's all about trying to get the public to try something other than fillet of salmon.
If we're gonna cut down on waste, we need to embrace whole fish again, including the bits.
If you look at meat like pork, that's gone through ~ the whole nose to tail eating experience.
~ Yes.
Everyone's like, "I'm gonna try and make brawn.
I'm gonna be eating livers, do trotters.
" ~ Terrines, sausages.
~ Fish hasn't gone through that revolution.
~ Not yet.
I think it's starting to happen.
To find out more, we're heading down to Hastings, home to one of the UK's oldest fishing fleets, to meet a couple of local experts on the fishing frontline.
~ Hey, hey! Tush! ~ Nice hat, Tush.
How you doing then, boys? Ex-fisherman turned fishmonger, 72-year-old Tush.
He's spent his whole life knee deep in fish.
~ What you up to? ~ We're gonna find some beautiful fish.
~ You are? ~ We wanna meet some handsome fishermen and talk about fish.
~ Right.
Let's go.
Paul Joy is a lifelong fisherman.
His ancestral fishing credentials date all the way back to the Doomsday Book.
~ Jim, we got fish coming off.
~ Look at that.
Do you know what? I can't help but still be excited when this happens.
Today we've got a bit of plaice.
Got two or three mackerel.
A couple of mullet.
You know, a little bit of a mixture.
Gurnards.
But because us Brits are so attached to our imported fillets, there's no market here for these whole fresh fish.
At what point did Britain stop buying whole fish and enjoying it, and be obsessed by fillets? It come in, in the late '70s to the '80s, and it's progressed and got worst ever since.
Now it's all packed and ready boxed.
All in fillets from Iceland and Norway.
Cos you've been doing this all your life, what would it mean if consumers changed how they bought fish? They no longer went for fillets, but said, "Maybe I'm gonna go for a whole fish"? It'd make fish cheaper for the consumer.
It costs more to have it filleted than it does for the product.
You're paying man labour to fillet it.
Do it yourself.
~ By utilising the bits, you get a better tasting fish, less waste.
~ You get it cheaper.
~ Fresher.
~ There's cheaper fish and you get more profit.
~ Absolutely.
~ I mean, in the old days, we used to eat fish like this.
My father used to eat herrings and cook 'em on the fire.
That's the way to eat fish, you know? ~ There's not a clever foodie culture ~ in the world that advises people to cook fillets.
Not one.
~ No.
Everyone says cook on the bone.
And there's another sad by-product of our mania for fillets.
With the UK market for whole fish dwindling, most of Paul's catch now gets shipped overseas.
~ So your fish have just gone in now? ~ Yeah, it's just goes to market.
~ It's graded straightaway.
~ Off the boats, get it sold.
So the species are separated, all the fish put in their different weights.
Where are they actually going? 90 percent of what we catch goes to France or Belgium, because people won't buy it in this country.
The public are missing out in a big way cos they don't eat fish whole.
It's such a shame, isn't it? ~ Come on, Tush, what you got for me? ~ Ooh! Got a bit of a selection today.
~ Look at this.
~ Look at this lot.
~ Joyful.
~ So let's have a look.
We got little John Dory here.
~ Yeah.
Whiting.
Little whiting.
Little gurnard.
Lemons and plaice.
Couple of Dovers.
I think a big part of the problem is that we've become whole fish phobic.
We don't know how to cook it, and we're terrified of the bones.
But it's time to face the fear and see just how easy and super-delicious it is to cook a fish whole.
Let's just season 'em with a little salt, both sides.
I'm not gonna do any prep to 'em at all.
So a whole Dover Sole, a little bit of salt and pepper, and a little oil, in a pan.
Bosh! It's that simple.
Just a few minutes on each side, and then we're raring to go.
People are nervous to undercook fish, but if you wanna check if a fish is ~ cooked, if you go to the thickest part, which is always near the head.
~ Yeah.
~ If you can remove that from the bone.
~ Yeah.
~ Then it's cooked.
And if you want to de-bone it, it's a doddle.
We just do it with two forks.
Stick my fork in 'ere, take the head off.
Then if you go to those little bones there, the whole bones just come out.
~ Yeah.
~ See that? ~ Yeah.
All I do then, is I go down to the bottom, and you hit the spine.
Watch this.
Just push it to the side like that.
It comes straight off the bone, just like that.
Then I'm left with this bone here, and what I do is I give it a zip.
I go, one, two, three, and you watch this bone just come straight off like that.
Look at that.
You just can't beat it.
Local fresh fish, cooked on the bone, so much more flavour and moisture than a standard fillet.
Beautiful.
Now it's my turn to learn.
I'm used to cooking whole fish, but Tush has a few secrets up his sleeve about how to enjoy the bits.
Even the bits I usually leave behind.
So we got a couple of rays here today.
~ Wow! So is this like the same family as skate? ~ Yeah.
~ Cos skate's a bit touch and go at the moment, but rays are still plentiful.
~ Rays are, yeah.
~ You're gonna - ~ Right.
To get the wing, cut up round the edge.
Most of us would only eat the wings, but not Tush.
He has a full on nose to tail approach.
Just put your knife in there and take that away, look.
In behind there.
See what's left, look.
Can you see that? ~ We would call that a skate cheek.
~ Yeah.
Interestingly, for anyone in the know, the best meat on any animal on the planet is generally in the cheek.
~ That is beautiful.
~ And you have the most tasty, delicious, tender meat that just melts in the mouth.
That is beautiful.
There's one each side of it.
~ You don't see these in fishmongers - ~ Not very often.
~ Is this what fishmongers and fishermen get excited about? ~ Yeah.
We call this the crown.
The crown of ray.
So it almost look like It looks like a saddle of rabbit, almost.
Now, in that big one, we would take out the gullet.
~ Ahh.
~ Ends up like a scallop.
That's what it ends up like.
~ Yeah.
~ So far, we got liver, cheeks.
We got a bit of the gullet there.
~ Right.
Alright, big boy.
You're gonna show us how to use these other bits.
~ All these other bits.
Ray cheeks.
~ Yeah.
~ These are absolutely beautiful.
~ Takes two or three minutes, right? ~ They look lovely.
And, of course, if you were at home, you could put in, you know, ~ a little bit of bacon or something.
~ Yeah.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
~ What's going on, then? Hooray! ~ Hi.
~ We are hungry.
~ Smells nice anyway.
~ You've been cooking up the bits that would usually go to waste, if you'd taken the fillets off? ~ Yeah.
The cheek muscles, the liver, roe, all those kinds of things.
This is the ray liver.
~ We'll get to taste that, but what's your favourite liver? ~ Conger.
~ Conger liver's the best, cos it's firmer texture.
~ This is the exciting stuff.
~ Let's have a look at the cheeks.
~ What about that, then, eh? ~ That meat is delicious.
~ Do you know what? That's a bit like having ox cheek or pig's cheek, ~ in relation to tenderness.
Now, what else have we got here? ~ Liver.
Not many people would think of eating fish liver, would they? ~ That liver ~ Unbelievable, innit? ~ .
.
is incredible.
It's so light and fluffy, and that is absolutely delicious.
~ So we need to get this message out there.
~ Yeah.
It's shocking to think just how much fish is being wasted by our fillet obsession.
Tush has got us excited about eating nose to tail fish.
But to get this bandwagon on the move, we'll need to pull in some top class fish chefs to help us show the good people of Hastings what they're really missing.
Gullets and all.
But first it's back to the caff to drum up some enthusiasm with our diners.
Service, please! Never had a cheek before.
Just falls off the bone as well.
It does.
Absolutely delicious.
~ That is gorgeous.
~ See, what a difference, cooking it on the bone.
~ Can I have another bit? ~ Finish 'em? You haven't got time to eat.
Get on cooking.
~ Aww! ~ Let's go, let's go! ~ They're getting restless.
Next, I'm gonna show you how to turn your barbecue into an epic Peking duck roaster.
Right, these beauties are ready.
Raar! Look at that.
The meat is so tender.
It just falls off that duck.
And Michael's looking for stage direction.
Am I doing these like the carrots, on an angle? ~ Do whatever you like, actually.
~ You've given up on me, it sounded like.
"Do whatever you like.
" SEAGULLS CALL Our Southend caff is buzzing, and we've got a menu packed with weekend feasts.
~ More tea, guys.
~ Oh, thank you.
So far, we've served up Jamie's epic smoky chilli.
Nice, innit? And we've dined on some fabulous whole fish.
Absolutely delicious.
Now, it's time for today's special.
Michael Sheen's favourite childhood dish.
A classic Welsh stew called cawl.
~ When I do that, how does it make you feel? ~ Nervous and patriotic.
Champion cawl-winning grande dame Sue Jones has given me her recipe.
And we're following it to the T.
So far, we've boiled the lamb neck meat, added swede and carrots, followed by the potato quarters.
There you go.
And we've cooked them with love, care and attention because Sue says so.
~ It's not just the flavour that comes out.
The potatoes cook quicker.
You don't want it to go to mush.
~ Yeah.
Obviously she's staggering the kind of textures as well.
But now for something radical.
Sue's adding two veg at once.
~ You've got parsnip.
You peel away.
~ Alright.
OK.
I have your patriotic veg, the leek.
~ On St David's Day in Wales.
~ Yes.
Every school has a celebration of Welsh arts and things like that, and the leek obviously is the Welsh symbol, and so you're encouraged to wear a leek on your school jumper, and I'm not kidding, some people wear them that size.
Then people start nibbling them throughout the day.
At the end of the day, the kids are going home, going, "Ooh, I feel sick.
" ~ Cos they'd eaten a leek that size.
~ In Essex, however - ~ What do you wear? You have to wear stilettos, a boob tube and a doner kebab for the day.
So one centimetre thick.
Am I doing these like the carrots, on an angle? ~ You can do whatever you like, actually.
I think we have - ~ What, you've given up on me? ~ No.
~ "Do whatever you like.
" ~ Yeah.
~ That's nice.
~ You approve? ~ Yeah, I do.
Good lad.
~ There you go.
~ Just before we put it in, I think now it's gonna start bringing you memories back.
Just get your head round there.
~ Memories? ~ Oh yeah.
The smell of the meat with the potato and the swede.
It is really, um, developing now, isn't it? Although parsnip, for me, is one of the key ingredients.
So we're just gonna mix that up.
So the cauldron is coming along.
The cawl is doing well.
I do feel like a Welsh wizard now.
You can top it up with a little water, if you want.
But we're gonna let that cook now for another 15 to 20 minutes.
~ Guys, you still hungry? ~ ALL: Yes! ~ A lot of pressure for you, mate.
It's building, it's building.
~ Oh, they're so demanding.
While Michael builds up the flavours in his classic Welsh stew, I'm gonna show you a great little DIY build that'll mean you'll never have to send out for Chinese again.
Crispy Peking duck has got to be one of the best Friday night feasts you can have.
Traditionally roasted in vertical walled ovens, it's the tender meat and irresistible crispy skin that makes it one of our favourite takeaway dishes.
Professional ovens cost thousands, but I've come up with a cheap and cheerful DIY accessory that will transform your barbecue into a duck oven whenever you like.
All you need are some aluminium sheets, and a colander.
Crispy duck is thought to go back over 600 years, and I'm gonna reproduce a traditional walled oven, transforming this old barbecue into a beauty.
To allow the ducks enough room to hang, I'm creating some oven walls by bolting together two aluminium sheets.
You can get these from most DIY stores.
Aluminium is fantastic because it's really flexible, so I can bend it all the way round to fit in the barbecue.
And it's gonna reflect all the heat back at those ducks, making the skin really crispy.
Once you've got the aluminium in place, clamp it and bolt it together to form one large cylinder.
Now I need to create some hanging rails to hang the ducks.
This is essential.
So I've got these rods.
Pop them through.
Secure the threaded rods into place and that's your rails done.
The ducks are gonna hang off of here, like that, and then roast.
Next, I'm drilling holes into an old colander to create my fire basket.
That's perfect to let the air in and get the charcoals super, super heated.
Right.
Let's put this thing together.
That goes in there.
Place the fire basket in the middle of the barbecue so the fat from the ducks doesn't drip onto the hot coals.
Look at that.
Brilliant.
To really make the most of your oven, you've got to prep the duck the night before you cook it.
If you want that skin to go really crunchy, follow this.
First, separate the skin from the meat.
And the reason I'm making that gap is because I want the fat to drip all the way through.
Then, add some white wine vinegar to a pot of boiling water, and dunk your duck.
There we go.
And I'm scalding that skin.
Raar! Now look at that skin, compared to the duck that I haven't dunked.
It's sort of gone rrrmm! Like this.
See, flaccid round here, really tight and springy here.
And that's the beginning of getting that really, really crispy skin.
Then, prick the skin all over with a fork.
The drier the skin, the crispier it'll get when it hits the oven.
So dry it with a fan for at least a couple of hours before leaving it in the fridge overnight.
Right, my ducks are lovely and dry.
Perfect.
Right.
Here we go.
Ooh! That is incredibly hot.
So, Mr and Mrs Duck, in we go.
Now, I don't want it over the coals, cos I don't want the fat spitting up.
I've got a little tray under each duck.
Right.
Lid on.
No peeking at these guys for an hour.
So I'm gonna get on with the glaze.
Mix some honey, soy sauce and vinegar in a pan and let it reduce down.
It's gonna add a wonderful flavour to the duck, that incredible colour.
~ TAPPING ~ Can you hear that? Can you hear that tap, tap, tap, tap? That isn't rain.
The heat is causing the fat to render out of those ducks.
As it's doing that, it's basting all the lovely duck meat and forcing that skin to almost explode and get really crispy.
It's annoying because it's one of those times when you're cooking and it's really active.
You wanna go and have a look but you can't.
After an hour at 240 degrees, stage one of the roasting is complete.
I'm so looking forward to having a look at these guys.
Wear thick gloves to carefully lift the ducks out.
Check those out.
They are incredible.
That is the best thing that's ever happened to this little barbecue.
Right, I've got to get the glaze on.
Cover that glaze all over.
My mouth is watering.
You just know that this dish is just gonna be unbelievable.
Slather the glaze all over, then pop the ducks back into the roaster for another half hour, or until they're fully cooked.
Right, these beauties are ready.
Out you come.
Agh! Oh, wow, wow, wee-wa.
Raar.
Look at that.
Leave the ducks to rest and then get stuck in.
You know, there's no fancy carving here.
The meat is so tender, it just falls off that duck.
Right.
Pancake time.
A bit of spring onion, a bit of cucumber, and the star of the show, beautiful, tender duck and some of that lovely crispy skin.
Hoisin sauce.
That's to die for.
Oh, my God! The skin, the softness of the duck, the flavour.
The secrets of crispy Peking duck revealed from an old barbecue.
Magic.
Ladies and gentlemen, Jimmy's Peking duck.
WHOOPING AND CHEERING Look at this.
And it just falls away.
That skin's outrageous, Jim.
Yeah, don't be polite, everyone.
Get stuck in, rip it apart.
Our diners are having a right royal feast.
600 years ago, this dish was the food of choice for emperors, and rightly so.
I like that, I think that's really nice.
~ Michael, would you like to try one of these, darling? Do you like Peking duck? ~ Ooh, I do.
Love a little bit.
~ Have you got an old barbecue floating around your garden? ~ D'you, it's funny you should say that.
When I moved into the house I'm in, in Los Angeles, there were three old barbecues just hanging around in the garden.
~ And what have you done with them? ~ Er, they're still there.
~ You can make your own duck roaster now.
~ Mmm! Mm.
Oh! Perfect.
Look at him, stuffing his face.
Right.
You've got to crack on.
~ What? ~ Get on with it! ~ We've got all the people to feed soon.
~ The natives are getting rest Yeah.
OK, Jamie, thank you.
~ Get on with that cawl.
Next, we want to see who's got the guts for our nose to tail fish.
~ Have you ever eaten a crispy prawn head? ~ No.
~ Right, go for it.
And the memories come flooding back for Michael.
~ So what would your nana say? ~ "It's nice, but it's not as nice as mine.
" It's late afternoon at the caff, and our weekend feasts are delivering on all fronts.
This has got a really nice flavour to it.
It's so good.
But our diners still have today's special to come.
Michael Sheen's childhood favourite.
Welsh cawl.
~ It's beautiful colours.
~ It really is.
And seemingly, it hasn't fallen apart to nothing.
~ It's a vibrant dish, is what it is, Jamie.
~ It really is.
This dish is a joy.
It's clean, sweet and fresh, with bags of flavour.
It's a great classic for a reason.
Here we go.
Representing Wales right there.
~ I'd always get too much potato, not enough lamb.
~ Oh, really? ~ That was always my complaint.
~ You've earned your stripes.
You're gonna get an extra bit.
~ Ohh.
I hope we've done justice to Sue's championship-winning recipe.
~ That is amazing.
~ Sir, here is your cawl.
~ I hope I've done you proud.
~ No, this is an emotional dish for me.
I might, might shed a tear.
~ Mmm! ~ May I? Mm.
It tastes amazing.
But it's the combination There's a sweetness.
What makes it sweet? ~ I think, honestly ~ Is it the swede? It's the order in which she tells you to cook the veg, the size in which she tells you to cook the veg.
All the different qualities that I remember are there, and more so.
So what would your nana say, if she could see you today, tucking in like this? I think she'd be very proud.
Although she'd probably say, "It's nice, but it's not as nice as mine.
" I would imagine.
~ How is it? ~ It's unbelievable.
~ You look like you're in paradise.
~ Ohh.
I am.
Let me have a little That is incredible.
Listen, you've got to do the whole thing again.
~ Right, 30 people.
~ Get a wiggle on.
This lot.
~ Guys, you still hungry? ~ ALL: Yeah! Less reminiscing, a bit more cooking.
~ Let's give it to 'em.
~ That's enough of the nice stuff.
~ I'm handing over to you.
You OK? ~ Yeah.
~ Good luck.
Alright.
Thank you.
OK.
~ How you doing, Michael? ~ It's not ~ Are you using the right side? ~ Am I doing the wrong side? ~ The wrong side.
This is the blade side.
~ Right.
Michael's got the whole caff to cook for, but they could be in for a bit of a wait.
Aah.
Now you're talking.
No, it was the peeler.
~ Of course.
~ Of course.
Leaving Michael to muddle through, it's back to our food fight.
This week, we're on a mission to kick-start a nose-to-tail fish-eating revolution.
Thanks to our love of mass-produced fillets, we're chucking away half of every fish that's filleted.
And in the UK, that's over 170,000 tonnes of fish that goes to waste.
We cannot have arguments about having enough fish in the sea and sustainability when half of what we catch is going in landfill.
We just need to start celebrating the whole animal.
The liver, cheeks, head and even the gullets are some of the tastiest and most nutritious parts of the fish.
The best meat on any animal on the planet is generally in the cheek.
That is beautiful.
We want to get the nation to ditch their pre-packed fillets and embrace the whole fish.
~ What about that then, eh? ~ That meat is delicious.
So I've arranged for four very impressive fish chefs to come down to Hastings for a big old cook up, to see if we can inspire the locals to try parts of fish that usually end up in the bin.
All of 'em are gonna celebrate nose-to-tail fish-eating.
I think we're gonna see some gorgeous things.
First up, Caroline Bennett These two are devotees to Asian nose-to-tail eating, which in China and Japan is a way of life.
Next, my mate Nathan Outlaw from Cornwall.
With two Michelin stars, I'd say right now he's the number one fish chef in the UK.
And finally, new kid on the block, James Lowe He's to me one of the most exciting chefs in Britain at the moment, and he specialises in neglected British ingredients to serve up in simple yet sublime ways.
Let's get cooking.
And let's taste some of this amazing food.
Can't wait to see this magic.
James is kicking things off with the monkfish cheeks.
Monkfish are enormous fish.
They're a good catch off the British coast, but about two-thirds of the weight is the head.
When the fishermen bring it aboard, there's no point keeping it, so they gut it and throw the head overboard.
~ So in with those cheeks.
~ They're nice cos they always do a lot of hard work.
They've always got a lot of collagen, which when you break it down is a joy to eat.
And he's not finished there.
He's adding monkfish liver to the dish, a sought-after delicacy in Asia.
In countries like Japan, monkfish liver is around 80, £90 a kilo.
~ Over here it's about £5 a kilo.
~ Yeah.
And it's the bits of monkfish that people don't use.
~ That is unbelievable.
It's like a little silky cloud of ~ Yeah.
.
.
beautifulness.
Flying the flag for Asia, Hon is knocking up one of Moshi Moshi's most popular dishes.
Deep fried prawn heads.
It was a by product of the popular dish we've got in the restaurant, the sushi prawns, and we were throwing away the heads, and you've got all the goodness in that.
It's like the brains of the crabmeat.
It's really good for you and loads of calcium.
~ Salt, pepper, cornflour.
~ It's super-simple.
I mean, really, anyone can do this.
And there's more crispy, crunchy goodness in their next dish.
Flatfish bones.
Yep, bones.
This is the ultimate snack food in Japan.
~ If you treat bones right, it's as delicious ~ Completely.
~ .
.
as pork crackling.
So tasty, aren't they? ~ Yeah, very nice.
Very tasty.
~ You could say to your fishmonger, "Put aside half a kilo of prawn heads next week, will you?" ~ Yeah.
Cos they're peeling this stuff all the time, aren't they? Really good.
Nathan is taking nose-to-tail all the way.
He's using a whole brill, offcuts and all.
When you look around, the ingredients that you're using, all these cuts, they look like the kind of stuff that would be in the fishmonger's bin, don't they? It's knowing what to do with it, and I think, as a nation, it's, here we are, we've got to learn about it.
Little morsels in the hair, bits on the tail, the shoulder.
~ Little special bits.
~ We should get to the end of this with not much in the bin, which would be nice.
From the fillets, he's making ceviche with grapefruit, and a pistachio dressing.
And cured brill with horseradish cream.
That is beautiful.
It's such a delicate dish as well.
Which leaves the head, but nothing goes to waste here.
He's using that and the bones to create a flavour-packed broth.
From my point of view, I don't like seeing it wasted.
There's tastier things at other parts of the animal or the fish that are just never used.
And it's a bit of a mystery to me why people don't use 'em.
That is unbelievable.
There's no need to convince us these dishes are incredible, but can we turn the locals of Hastings onto our fishy offcuts? ~ Hello, lovely people.
~ Anyone, fish liver? Monkfish liver? ~ Did you like it? ~ It was nice.
~ Before this, would you have ever eaten monkfish liver? When you're buying fish, what do you buy? ~ Something that's already filleted.
~ So eating a prawn head for you is? ~ Quite scary.
Go for it.
Crispy prawn head is where all the flavour and goodness is.
~ It's good, isn't it? ~ Mm-hm.
~ Delicious.
Would you eat fish bones? Break some off.
Dip them in the sauce.
~ This is Japanese fish and chips.
~ It's quite nice, actually.
~ It is.
~ Do you buy whole fish, or a nice fillet? ~ A fillet.
~ A fillet.
~ Fillet.
~ Why do you go for a fillet? ~ I don't like all the bones.
~ Is that the big reason? ~ It puts me off.
~ Try those crispy bones and see what you think.
~ That's lovely.
So, ladies and gentlemen, use the bones, use the cheeks, use the whole thing.
Thank you very much, Tush.
You're gonna be the poster boy for whole fish.
Honestly.
HE LAUGHS Who knows, maybe the good people of Hastings will help us kick-start a nose-to-tail fish revolution.
But if we seriously want to stop thousands of tonnes of fish being thrown away, we need the revolution to go national, and fast.
~ Just crunchy and fishy.
~ There's still quite a lot of meat in the head and on top of it.
That's really tasty.
I love that.
I could eat those.
~ Just like a seafood restaurant prawn cracker.
~ Yeah, really good.
Michael! Have a little taste of that, mate.
A lovely, crispy prawn's head.
Don't be afraid.
Go full head.
Full head.
~ The The full head? ~ Yeah.
~ D'you know, that is the best prawn head ~ DINERS LAUGH .
.
I have ever tasted.
So, be brave, guys, and buy the whole fish.
And start eating the bits you wouldn't look twice at.
And I promise you, you won't regret it.
All right, mate, get back into service.
He's a He's a harsh mistress.
Back to the main event.
It's the moment of truth for Michael's classic Welsh cawl.
But will this warming, fragrant lamb dish get the thumbs up from our diners? ~ It tastes like it's good for you, doesn't it? ~ Yeah.
So flavoursome and tender and the meat just melts in your mouth.
Put that in the middle of the table, everyone tucks in and gets involved.
Really nice.
Right.
How are you getting on? Good.
Now, have you enjoyed it? I've I have.
It's been amazing.
The skill of making the dish.
But it's got incredible depth of flavour, hasn't it? Never made it before, really fulfilling.
I can see why this was an important dish for your childhood.
Absolutely.
It's been wonderful and emotional.
It really has.
~ Guys, did you like the cawl? ~ ALL CHEER There you go.
We've kept our crowd happy by serving up some heavenly weekend feasts.
My pork and beef chilli.
Jimmy's crispy Peking duck.
And Michael Sheen's classic Welsh cawl.
If you want to join the feast, you can get the recipes and more at On Friday Night Feast.
I'll be making sticky, super-tender, fall off the bone Chinese ribs.
That is a big, juicy, incredible rib.
I'll show you how to brew your very own craft beer, in a DIY microbrewery.
Wow.
That just smells wonderful.
And we're picking a food fight over how much delicious meat we're allowing to go to waste.
~ Do you come across squirrel? ~ It's a delicacy.
And pop star Paloma Faith is cooking up a classic Portuguese salt cod feast.
That's delicious.

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