Dead Duck Day

Holidays are strange things – often they are celebrations of odd and even morbid events from the past. Dead Duck day is no exception. The birth place of this holiday is Rotterdam where the original dead duck was “enjoyed”. The whole Ig Noble prize winning story behind this holiday is described in the video below. Be forewarned, it contains talk of homosexual necrophilia amongst ducks.

So after watching the video I know you are eager to make this day your own. I did by taking a trip to The Mandarin Garden in nearby Willow Grove, Pa for a meal of Crispy Duck with a goji berry sauce..

Thoroughly enjoyable, although not in the same fashion as the Rotterdam duck.

 

Or maybe you like to do it yourself. Get down and ducky in your own kitchen. Here’s a recipe that will suit your needs. From the Gas Cookery Book published by the Hong Kong and China Gas Co., Ltd. (1966) – so you know it’s going to be a real treat. I’ve taken the liberty of copying the page as I think it’s nifty having the English and Chinese versions side by side.

 

What next on this grand occasion? A drink you say? What’s better to wash down your duck dinner than with a Fuzzy Duck cocktail? It’s make you feel all kinds of fuzzy.

Fuzzy Duck

1 oz Malibu coconut Rum
1 oz Bailey’s Irish Cream
1 oz brandy

 

Pour all ingredients into an old-fashioned glass 1/4 filled with ice cubes. Stir well, and serve.

(from drinksmixer.com)

And while you’re sipping, relax and enjoy the Homosexual Necrophiliac Duck Opera

Still not enough duck for you? Well what could be better to top the holiday off than a delicious slice of dead duck cake?

All the credit for this cake goes to njkitchenangel on the Wilton Discussion forum

Happy Dead Duck Day!!!

Update: This year’s Dead Duck Day Message was by Linda Lombardi, author of Animals Behaving Badly year’s dead duck message.  Her acknowledgement of the importance of dinner is both endearing commendable.

Human beings have the strange idea that no other animal has sex solely for pleasure. But if our fellow creatures only care about the perpetuation of the species, why do they do it in so many ways that don’t result in babies? From manatees to manakins, all kinds of animals get it on with members of the same sex, and many have figured out that if you’ve got a stick, a rock, or a prehensile tail, who needs a partner?

As I collected material like this for my book Animals Behaving Badly from the comfort of my office, I came to admire the people who observe and report the sordid truth about the sex lives of the animal kingdom. When I read about a black-winged stilt pleasuring itself with a piece of driftwood, twenty or thirty times at a go, every thirty seconds, I thought about the researcher who carefully recorded this data. Were her feet wet? Was she regretting her decision not to go to medical school instead?

But no one inspired me more than the man who had the fortitude to observe for a full seventy-five minutes the spectacle of the homosexual rape of a dead duck – and then, because it was time for dinner, said, Enough is enough, collected his specimen, and went home. Kees Moeliker knows that if we all waited to eat till animals stopped behaving badly, we’d starve to death. And if that’s their wicked plan to drive the human race to extinction, he won’t let them get away with it. [Linda Lombardi, June 5th 2014]