Give a chef a cooked duck, a package of crepes, a bundle of asparagus, habanero peppers, morel mushrooms, and — plot twist — a bag of tater tots, and what do you get? A boundary-blurring tour of the world via burrito, according to chef Luis Herrera of the Brooklyn mariscos restaurant Ensenada.
After shredding a Peking duck (also known as Beijing duck), Herrera first makes a pineapple and habanero butter. It’s a nod to the crowd-favorite at his restaurant: The pineapple butter there — itself an homage to Cosme, where Herrera once worked — is served alongside the whole branzino al pastor. From there, Herrera’s inspiration goes further afield.
He uses the tater tots to make an airy tempura batter, in which he dips morels stuffed with the duck meat. He crisps up the duck skin and uses the rendered fat to warm crepes, which will become wrappers for his extra-fancy burrito. Asparagus and scallion salad adds freshness and also calls to mind the classic duck-in-pancakes preparation. All of this gets wrapped and rolled inside the crepes, and if you’re counting, that’s Chinese, Japanese, French, and Mexican influences. It’s ostensibly a “work lunch,” though Herrera jokes that it might make you late for work instead.
What, your work lunches aren’t this frou frou? “I guess, you know, the definition of a work lunch — it doesn’t really matter how hard it is to make,” Herrera says. “What matters is how easy it is to eat.”
Watch the latest episode of On the Fly on YouTube to see how Herrera makes this all-frills burrito.
