Free Stirring It Up with Molly Ivins by Ellen Sweets Page B

knew she was famous until she came to Paris and spoke to the Democratic party here, and when she had that Thanksgiving party at the Ile St.-Louis. I knew she knew impressive friends, but I didn’t know
how
famous. But then, that was Molly.”
    MOLLY ’ S FAMOUS “ ORPHANS AND STRAYS ” Christmas dinners were legendary. Give friends half a chance and anyone who participated will tell you a tale from one of them. One year she decided to make
caneton à l’orange
, known to the rest of us as roasted duck with orange sauce or, by its more familiar name, duck
à l’orange
.
    The way these dinners worked, Molly provided the main event and everyone else brought a side dish, salad, bread, dessert, or something to drink. As always, the guest list might range from ten to twenty. One never knew. Courtney Anderson still gets a giggle out of recalling the orange duck evening.
    â€œSo Molly bought all these ducks and had them lying out on the counter to come to room temperature. She had rubbed them with butter and herbs and more butter and who knows what-all inside. Anyway, she counted out the ducks, and counted to herself the approximate number of dinner guests. She made periodic visits to the living room to survey the celebrants, refill wine-glasses, and pour more eggnog, only to return to the kitchen and notice what seemed to be an empty space where she was sure a duck had been.
    â€œFiguring she had miscounted, she ran the numbers again, this time certain she was one duck short. Failing to associate a vanished poodle with a missing duck, Molly rejoined her guests momentarily, only to return just as Athena bolted with duck number two locked in her perfectly groomed aquiline jaws.”
    Molly quickly contemplated the probability of rescuing the duck and possibly quietly assigning it to her plate—it would be instantly recognizable as the duck with the canine tooth marks—if she could catch Athena.
    Which, of course, she couldn’t.
    The bad news was the purloined ducks were never to be seen again; the good news was Athena was strangely subdued throughout the remainder of the evening.
    Molly’s house sat on a quarter-acre corner lot with lines of demarcation intersecting at the bottom of a steep slope. Somewhere down there, in addition to duck bones, is a purple Birkenstock sandal that vanished several years ago during one of those visits when I brought only one pair of shoes—the ones I wore. Fortunately Austin’s only Birky store at the time had another pair.
    Athena’s secret hiding place area was so overgrown that no one save the surveyor was ever known to have set foot at the bottom. In fact, it was so overgrown that it was a year or two before Molly knew it was also home to a lovely fox family. Apparently Mr. and Mrs. Fox lived in one section and Athena’s stash occupied another.
    It was here that the ebony purebred standard poodle sequestered shoes, bones, rubber balls, and as of that Christmas, butter-rubbed ducks.
    Molly’s response was predictable: “
Caneton à l’orange
,” she intoned, in her best French accent. “What did you expect? She’s a French poodle.”
    DUCK À L’ORANGE
    Â 
    If I were roasting this duck, I’d save the skimmed fat and freeze it for future use in a cassoulet. This recipe, another Molly fave, first appeared in 1943 and was reprinted in
Gourmet
in 2006.
    INGREDIENTS
    1 tablespoon kosher salt
    1 teaspoon ground coriander
    Â½ teaspoon ground cumin
    1 teaspoon black pepper
    1 (5- to 6-pound) Long Island duck
    1 juice orange, halved
    4 fresh thyme sprigs
    4 fresh marjoram sprigs
    2 fresh flat-leaf parsley sprigs
    1 small onion, cut into 8 wedges
    Â½ cup dry white wine
    Â½ cup duck stock, duck and veal stock, chicken stock, or reduced-sodium chicken broth
    Â½ carrot
    Â½ celery rib
    SAUCE INGREDIENTS
    cup sugar
    cup fresh orange juice (from 1 to 2 oranges)
    2 tablespoons white-wine