I have made cassoulet several times recently using this recipe. This is beyond delicious. It's pure comfort. I did alter a few things. I made the duck confit so I had both duck stock and loads of duck fat. I cooked the beans in the stock and sauteed the veggies in the fat. I also had a couple tbls of tomato paste on hand so I caramelized it in the duck fat and added it with the canned tomatoes. I used fennel instead of celery and added some of the fennel fronds to the crumb topping. I used a combo of andouille sausage and garlic sausage cooked in red wine(after all- what's French food without a little wine?) till the wine had reduced to a few tablespoons. I added the reduced wine to the cassoulet and then browned the sausage. I cooked the cassoulet up to the second addition of crumbs then refrigerated overnight. I reheated the next day and added the final topping of crumbs and baked till I got those slow sticky bubbles Chef John calls for. This stuff is beautiful.
My husband is French and he loves to make Cassoulet. However, in his recipe, he uses Pork hocks which he cooks separately, with the bay leaf, garlic, thyme, rosemary, parsley and onion and he doesn't use the duck confit. He adds chopped morsels of chorizo and slices smoked sausage into rounds. The Pork hocks are deboned and the meat shredded, and he chops the skin of the hocks into bite size pieces. He adds carrots and celery with the beans and adds all to the meats in one pot on the stove with salt and pepper to taste. No need for the topping listed here in your recipe. It's quite a bit more simple to do it his way and delicious. For me, I like to add more bean liquid or beef and chicken broth and eat it as a delicious bean soup.
Tasty but requires quite some effort. An impressive dish that can be made ahead for a crowd.
I tried to follow the recipe as written. Any substitutions were as close as my grocery store can come. I did use duck stock and some chicken stock. The broth that was left after the beans cooked was great. I froze the left over broth. I made two medium deep-dish batches of the cassoulet and they look & taste great.
I stuck closely to the recipe and maybe it turned out the way it was supposed to but I didn't care for it. If I fix it again the things I would change would be to crisp up the bacon first remove and drain add veggies for sauteing then add the broken bacon pieces back in (flabby almost cooked bacon is not high on my list). Then I'd skip the panko topping altogether. Then I'd add a bunch of olives as a counterpoint to all the meat. That's enough for now but this dish definitely could use some fiddling with in my opinion.
This is so rich and soo good. yes it took some time. I followed this recipe to the t. No substitutions, no short cuts, even my picky daughter loved it. Thank you so much for this recipe Chef John!!
I did substitute lamb shanks for the duck confit as I didn't have that on hand. Beautiful dish. Will make this over and over.
It is time consuming but the steps are simple and the end product is worth it. I admit I didn't find duck confit and substituted kielbasa for the herb sausage so it can't be as good as the real thing. I was also out of carrots so threw in a green pepper and some leftover butternut squash. The end result is creamy, hearty, and delicious! I also reduced the salt to 1/2 tsp total and didn't miss it (there's plenty in the bacon and sausage).
Add more beans and pork bits.
