Yesterday I headed over to Bellevue to spend a gift certificate at [Porcella](http://www.porcellaurbanmarket.com/). Porcella is the highest of the high-end gourmet delis in the Seattle area, unless there’s another one in a penthouse that requires a golden key to enter. Porcella makes a full line of charcuterie, and they also serve lunch and dinner. I got the mixed salumi plate, with coppa, guanciale, soppressata, bresaola, and duck prosciutto. Everything was good, and it came with unlimited lengths of very good ficelle. For dessert I had a slice of chocolate pavé, a rich chocolate terrine, not too sweet, with perfectly smooth texture. While I ate I read the new magazine 425, a glossy about the Eastside. I think there is a rule in journalism that any jurisdiction wealthy enough to put out its own glossy magazine is too boring for anyone to give a shit.

This left me with a bit of gift certificate left, although not enough for more than a sliver of Porcella’s cured foie gras ($70/lb). Instead I got half a pound of pancetta (it’s great) and two pieces of duck confit.

Duck confit sounds like the sort of thing that should only be written about in a magazine like 425. It’s got duck, it’s got a French word, it just sounds expensive. But it’s not. Duck confit is thrifty. A confit duck leg typically sells for about $5. They’re plenty rich, so one of them makes a satisfying supper. Think of how much you’d spend on a good steak. You can’t screw up reheating the confit, either: just stick it in a 400°F oven for half an hour. You can also use one leg to feed two or three people by making hash.

Or, if you’re really hungry, you can do as we did last night and make the ultimate winter supper. Duck confit, of course. Potatoes roasted in duck fat–the recipe is from Nigella Lawson’s Feast, and it’s also in her earlier book How to Eat. The trick is to parboil the potatoes and then sprinkle them with semolina flour for extra crunch before roasting. And then some smothered savoy cabbage, made with Porcella’s pancetta.

I think I need another nap.