Eva Pau's Asian Kitchen S2Asian

Aromatic Duck Pancakes

Name: Aromatic Duck Pancakes
Total time: 320 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Asian
Ingredients: For the duck:; 1 full duck (2-2.6kg); 3 tsps Chinese five-spice powder; 1¼ tsp salt; 2 tbsp neutral oil; 30g fresh ginger, peeled and sliced; 4 spring onions, cut into 1 inch pieces; 8 star anise; 8 bay leaves; 4 cinnamon sticks; 3 tbsps Shaoxing wine; Basting sauce:; 2 tsp light soy sauce; 2 tsp honey; 2 tbsp hoisin sauce; For the hoisin sauce:; 90ml hoisin sauce; 30g sugar; 100ml of water; To serve:; 1 pack of 24 Chinese-style pancakes, warmed according to packet instructions; ½ cucumber, cut into thin matchsticks; 8 spring onions, finely shredded

Eva PauFrom the series · Eva Pau's Asian Kitchen S2

320 min totalServes 4Medium

Time320 min

Serves4

SkillMedium

ShowEva Pau's Asian Kitchen

Method

Preheat the oven to 210C /190C fan.

Pat dry the duck. Mix the Chinese five spice and a pinch of salt together in a small bowl and rub or brush this mixture all over the whole front and back of the duck.

Add the oil to a small frying pan and place over a medium heat. Once hot add the ginger, spring onions, star anise, bay leaves and cinnamon sticks and fry for about 40 seconds until aromatic. Scoop ⅓ of this mixture into the cavity of the duck and pour the rest onto a baking tray then arrange the duck on top and drizzle over the Shaoxing wine.

Place in the oven for 1 hour until the duck is cooked and the skin has turned a lovely dark roasted colour. Whilst the duck roasts, make the hoisin sauce by adding all of the sauce ingredients into a saucepan and bring to the boil, then turn the heat down to a simmer and cook for a couple of minutes. When it has thickened, pour it into a bowl and set aside.

When the duck is cooked, transfer it onto a new tray. Mix together your basting sauce, and brush it all over the duck skin. Turn the oven up to 220 C / 200 C fan and place the duck back into the oven to crisp the skin for 5 - 10 minutes - keep an eye on it as it cooks as you don’t want the skin to burn, just to turn a lovely, dark golden brown colour.

When the duck is cooked, remove the skin and meat from the bones and place onto a serving platter. Serve with the hoisin sauce mix, the pancakes and the shredded vegetables.

Cook's notes

Pat the duck really dry, then poke small holes all over the skin with a skewer before the five-spice rub goes on. If a whole duck feels like too much, four duck legs work for this recipe too.
Fry the ginger, scallions, star anise, bay and cinnamon for about 40 seconds — the heat activates the aromatics, so wait until you can really smell them before a third goes into the cavity and the rest under the bird.
Hoisin straight from the jar is quite salty, which is why it's tempered with sugar and water and simmered for a couple of minutes to thicken — drizzle it into the pancakes or use it as a dipping sauce.
Watch the final basted crisping closely — at the higher heat, with honey in the baste, the skin goes from dark golden to burnt fast, and crispy is key. Then let the duck rest a few minutes before you remove the skin, slice it, and shred the meat into rough strips.
Warm the whole stack of pancakes in a steamer over a pot of boiling water with the lid on — they soften beautifully, and stay covered so they don't stiffen as they cool.

Serve with The classic table: warm pancakes, matchsticks of cucumber, shredded spring onion and the tempered hoisin for smearing and rolling. Add carrot matchsticks if you like — not traditional, but nobody will mind. A pot of jasmine tea cuts through the richness nicely.

Make ahead & storage Shredded duck keeps 2-3 days in the fridge and reheats well in a hot oven or pan to crisp it back up; microwaving turns it soft. Warm pancakes fresh each time rather than reheating twice, and the hoisin sauce keeps in a jar in the fridge for a week.

Asian

Recipe by Eva Pau · From the series Eva Pau's Asian Kitchen S2 · Photography © Appetite Media
Published 15 July 2026

Nutrition

Per serving · estimated

1587kcal

170gprotein

84gcarbs

63gfat

Approximate — calculated from the ingredient list using USDA food data. A guide, not a medical figure.