Smoked Duck Cassoulet

Saturday October 17

Holt actually smuggled the legs and thighs from last week's smoked duck into his carry-on luggage, so we could share them in Canada. What to do with them, though? He decided to make a seat-of-the-pants cassoulet, using our new slow-cooker from Canadian Tire. A couple of cups of white Northern and red kidney beans went into the cooker, with some celery tops, two cloves of garlic, fresh sage leaves, a chopped onion, some chopped green tops of leeks, and a bay leaf, covered with salted water (that thing about not salting beans is - snigger - a canard). They cooked on high for a couple of hours, then got reduced to low all day, while Holt added, at various times, some rashers of chopped double-smoked bacon from the Farmers' Market, chopped carrot, more chopped onion, the said duck legs and thighs, and some fresh thyme as it simmered. And oh my, was it delicious.