Slow Cooking – Using Low-Temperature Cooking for Foie Gras

Cooking in a water bath in vacuum sealed bags is called sous vide.

The advantages include:

• all of the meat is cooked to the desired temperature, and no higher, so you get 'perfect' doneness.
• The fibres of he meat don't contract due to the high temperatures and squeeze out the moisture, so the meat stays very tender
• if you have the right setup, you can put it on an leave it
• you can include flavourings in the vacuum bag so your meat steeps in the flavouring whilst it cooks.

Disadvantages include:

• it can be expensive to set up (though not always, as work arounds exist)
• it can be difficult to keep at a constant temperature if you don't have an expensive set up
• the meat does not have any outer crust (although this is easily remedied after the cooking)
• takes a lot longer to cook.

I think it will be difficult to do in an oven as it is not often that ovens go as low as this type of cooking requires.

The main reason why you want to cut the duck in half and roast them with the skin side pointing upwards is so the skin of the duck is nice and crispy. Unlike most roasted poultry where you don't eat the skin, the duck's skin is considered a huge delicacy if it is crispy.