Duck is considered one of the most popular types of meat among meat eaters and cooking enthusiasts. Cooking options differ in their variety - this bird is stewed, boiled, fried, baked in the oven and on the grill. A baked duck is always an adornment of any table, but how many people wonder what damage such food does to the human body. It is worth noting that in many countries, and especially in Asia, duck meat dominates, which is used to maintain their health. In this article we will analyze this issue and identify the harm and benefits of duck meat.
About the benefits
The duck contains many useful substances and components, on which the performance of most systems in the human body depends. Experts say that the meat of this bird can work wonders.
Antioxidant
Duck meat contains a large amount of selenium, which helps protect cells from free radicals that adversely affect the human body. It is worth noting that one hundred grams of this bird contains about forty-three percent of the recommended daily intake of selenium.
Immunity
The high content of vitamin D helps not only strengthen bones and muscles, but also increase immunity. In addition, important antioxidants such as zinc and selenium have the same goal. Everything else, they remove toxins from the body.
Fighting Anemia
Several useful elements are contained in duck meat that fight anemia. Firstly, it is vitamin B 12 , the use of which is necessary as a prophylaxis, and its concentration is approximately three times higher than in other types of meat. Secondly, iron helps to increase hemoglobin. It is worth noting that the iron reserves in the duck are four times greater in comparison with pork or chicken. And thirdly, phosphorus is an important trace element necessary for energy production.
Skin and hair
A gram serving of ducklings is able to restore the structure and maintain healthy skin and hair. And all due to the fact that the meat contains about thirty percent of the daily norm of riboflavin. This vitamin, together with fatty acids and niacin, works wonders and is an indispensable component for maintaining healthy hair and skin.
Physical and mental health
The body needs copper to maintain mental and physical health. The required amount of this mineral is found in duck meat. In addition, it is famous for its large supply of B vitamins, which are also important for the proper functioning of the nervous system.
Metabolism improvement
Polyunsaturated acids and B vitamins help accelerate the metabolic processes in the body and help prevent the accumulation of excess fats. With the help of zinc, enzymatic processes that play a major role in metabolism are activated. In addition, a high protein content contributes to a feeling of satiety for a long time, which is also an important point for effective weight loss.
Strong bones
The biochemical composition of duck meat helps to strengthen teeth and bones, as well as bone mineralization. This product serves as a preventive and natural remedy for osteoporosis.
In addition to the above, the beneficial properties of duck meat contribute to:
- Purification of the liver due to its high content of betaine. This component is an internal salt, which positively affects the work of the digestive tract.
- B vitamins cope with heart ailments and improve metabolism, treat arthritis, as well as allergic reactions.
- In addition, the use of poultry meat improves eyesight, strengthens the immune system, enhances potency in men, stimulates brain activity, removes carcinogens, which are considered responsible for the appearance of cancer cells, and prolongs youthful skin integument.
Potential harm
Despite the huge list of beneficial properties, duck meat can also harm the body. You can learn more about the dangers and benefits of duck meat from this video:
So, note the following detrimental effects of duck on the body:
- Excessive fat content of the product affects the formation of cholesterol, which contributes to the disruption of physiological processes in the blood vessels.
- Duck meat is notable for its rigidity. This property can not do harm to healthy people, but people suffering from ailments associated with the gastrointestinal tract should refuse to use it, as it can cause serious damage to the body.
Contraindications
Experts recommend abandoning the use of duck meat in the following cases:
- With diabetes.
- If there are chronic liver diseases and problems with the gastrointestinal tract.
- In case of excess weight.
- With diseases of the thyroid gland.
- With individual intolerance to the product.
Dietary or not?
Let's understand, duck is a dietary meat or not and how many calories it contains. It is worth noting that this is a rather controversial issue. Some experts do not attribute this product to dietary meat due to its high calorie content. And others, on the contrary, recommend its use because of the huge content of useful vitamins and minerals. From a dietary point of view, ducklings are considered more beneficial than beef fat or butter. It is also worth noting that calorie content depends on the method of preparation. So, for example, calorie content of duck meat without skin is about 200 calories, and with skin exceeds 300 calories.
Duck fat
Duck fat has long been one of the most important components in dietary supplements. Its special property is a low melting point, which indicates the ease of excretion from the body. By the content of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, the product is usually compared with olive oil. Linoleic acid, which helps to convert fat into energy and accelerate muscle growth with constant physical exertion, is much more in duck fat than in beef or chicken.
Duck Selection Tips
Summing up the benefits and dangers of duck meat, it is worth noting that not only the preparation of the product, but also its quality plays a huge role. When choosing meat, it is worth giving preference to indochka, mullards or wild ducks. These varieties are less caloric than the home counterpart.
There are certain rules that must be followed when choosing a duck:
- Choosing a carcass is not frozen, but chilled. Firstly, the effect of low temperatures negatively affects the structure of the fibers, and secondly, it is possible to more accurately determine the quality and freshness of the product.
- Duck meat should be bright red. In order to check the quality of the bird, you need to look inside the carcass.
- The skin of the duck should be slightly shiny and yellowish.
- When choosing a carcass, you should touch it with your finger. A high-quality product must be resilient and free of stickiness.
- As a rule, individuals of a small size turn out to be sinewy, and too large - old ones, which are suitable only for storing fat. Therefore, it is important to choose a medium-sized bird.
- In addition, it is worth paying attention to the legs of the bird and its beak. In a young duck, the beak will be slightly soft, and the legs should be light yellow. Many sellers try to mask the age of the bird by removing these parts of the carcass. Therefore, be careful not to be fooled.
Cooking secrets
Many housewives are interested in the question of how much duck meat is cooked. We can confidently answer that cooking meat takes a lot of time. To make duckling tender and soft, you need to cook it for a long time. It is not only tasty, but also safe, especially for children and pregnant women. But besides the fact that ducklings can be cooked, there are a huge number of recipes for cooking in the oven and on the grill. We suggest finding out what can be prepared from duck meat.
Duck slices in the oven
Such a recipe does not require much time and effort from the hostess. There are many opinions on how to cook duck meat slices. Weβll share one of the popular options right now. To prepare it, you will need the ingredients:
- one carcass or certain parts of the duck (it can be legs, hips, etc.);
- three oranges;
- a couple of sprigs of rosemary;
- two tablespoons of honey;
- pepper and salt to taste.
The method of cooking soft and juicy duck in the oven is as follows:
- The carcass must be washed, dried and cut into portions.
- Grate with a mixture of honey, pepper and salt.
- Put the blanks in a baking dish.
- From one orange, squeeze the juice and pour meat on it.
- Cut the remaining fruits into thick circles and arrange in shape with the duck.
- To make a soft and juicy duck in the oven, it is necessary to cover it with foil and leave to marinate for three hours.
- Then bake for about an hour in a preheated oven to two hundred degrees.
- After this time, remove the foil and let the duck brown in the oven for another ten minutes.
- Before serving, pour the dish with orange juice mixed with duck fat.
Stew Recipe
For a change, you can cook duck stew. This will require:
- bird carcass;
- two liters of water;
- salt, bay leaf, black pepper, peas - optional.
The work process is as follows:
- The carcass is washed, dried and divided into medium pieces.
- The workpiece must be lightly salted.
- In pre-sterilized jars, put the meat, add spices and fill with water.
- The container is closed with several layers of foil and placed in a wide pan with water.
- Prepared dishes are sent to a cold oven.
- Stew is prepared at a temperature of 180 for at least three hours.
- Then the dish is rolled up with pre-sterilized lids.
Homemade sausage
You can delight your household with the help of sausages from duck meat, which is not difficult to cook at all. You will need:
- duck carcass;
- intestines - 2 meters;
- one head of garlic;
- milk - 400 ml;
- salt to taste;
- various spices: nutmeg, bay leaf, dried herbs, black pepper, paprika, coriander, rosemary and more.
Cooking process:
- The carcass must be washed, peeled and cut the meat from the bones.
- Skip the garlic and skins through a meat grinder.
- Cut duck meat into thin sticks.
- Combine the chopped meat with the garlic mixture, adding milk, paprika, salt and spices.
- Stir the resulting stuffing thoroughly, cover with cling film and put in the refrigerator for two hours.
- We clean the intestines, soak in cold and slightly salted water for thirty minutes. Before preparing sausages, it is necessary to check the integrity of the intestines, for which you can pass water through them or simply inflate.
- We measure out the required amount of the intestine, put one edge on the nozzle of the meat grinder for sausage, and tie the other edge with a thread.
- Manually or with the help of a meat grinder, we fill the intestine with not too tight minced duck.
- All voids in the sausage are pierced with a needle. This action is necessary so that excess air escapes from the product during cooking.
- So that the sausage does not disintegrate during cooking, it must be bandaged in several places using cooking twine or a simple thread.
- To cook sausages, boil water in a small saucepan, add salt to taste, black allspice and peas, as well as three bay leaves. Lower the sausage into boiling water and cook over low heat for about thirty minutes. During cooking, a small portion of the fat from the sausage will come out, but this will not affect the taste.
- Then fry the cooked product in a pan, adding a little vegetable oil.
- Fry the sausage over medium heat on both sides until golden.
- We give the finished product to cool completely, after which we put it in the refrigerator for a day.
The cooled sausage from the duck does not break up, does not crumble and has a beautiful cut. In finished form, it can be frozen in the freezer. To summarize the above, it is worth noting that the benefits and harms of duck meat should be evaluated individually for each person, given that the detrimental effect depends on the amount of meat eaten and chronic diseases.