The wild ducks
New Zealand Listener|July 23 - 29, 2022
First catch your duck. By which I mean, of course, first shoot your duck. I don’t shoot ducks, or any creatures, but I wanted to cook, and eat, some mallard ducks. So, first catch your duck hunter.
MICHELE HEWITSON
The wild ducks

Duck hunters don’t much bother eating mallard ducks, which pretty much come in the same category as possums. There is an old joke about cooking possums: put one in a pot with an old boot, cook for eight hours, remove the possum and eat the boot.

I asked our mate Blokesy Stokesy, who lives right around the bend, to shoot me a couple of ducks. He said: “Are you going to pluck them?”

“Of course,” I said, airily. Greg said: “Do you know how to pluck a duck?” I didn’t.

I asked Stokesy to deliver my ducks with their heads cut off . I once ordered some ducks for a Christmas lunch and they arrived with their heads on. I put paper towels over their heads. I didn’t want to look at them looking at me with their beady dead eyes while I cut their heads off . I asked Stokesy to also cut my mallards’ little legs off , and gut them. I don’t ask for much.

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