Feeling Quackish? Duck In, Duck Out, Surry Hills

Duck In Duck Out is as the name suggests a fast food eatery featuring what else but duck. Duck confit burgers, duck hot dogs, duck fat fries, duck spring rolls and salads (duck free) feature on the menu. It's for the duck enthusiast!

Duck In Duck Out is the idea of chef and My Kitchen Rules judge Manu Fieldel and Balinese Restaurateur Phillip Davenport. It's Easter Saturday when we visit with Mochi in tow-she's a big duck enthusiast and it is her favourite food. Located nearish the north end of Central Station there's a woman standing outside cajoling people to come in. What was formerly a beer garden has been converted to outdoor seating. People order and pay at the counter and pick up their food. Maybe it's just me but I find the space a bit odd, maybe it's best on a Friday or Saturday night but on a quiet day the space seems a bit too sparse.

Service is upbeat and friendly and they give me some suggestions of what has proved popular in its first week. We end up ordering quite a bit as we have skipped breakfast and it's after 1pm.

The Quack Daddy is one of two burgers on offer (the other one is a duck confit leg with Asian slaw). This one has a duck confit leg, celeriac remoulade, rocket, red onion jam, harissa aioli and pickles. Duck confit is a very rich duck dish, cooked twice the first time in duck fat and it really needs the pickles to lighten it up. The burger is appealingly saucy with plenty of salad and I like it although we both find that the harissa aioli is missing a chilli hit.

The Ducking Hot is an excellent and moreish spicy duck sausage sticking out both ends of a soft hot dog bun. It comes with buttered sauerkraut, harissa aioli, fried shallots and pickles. The sauerkraut really dominates the flavour in the centre while the ends really are all about the excellent sausage. The bun is also very good too-soft, fresh and warm.

Mr NQN was famished so I ordered something else, three duck drumsticks with a side of sauce a l'orange. The duck batter is appealingly crispy. I didn't expect to like these as much as I do but it's such a crisp batter with soft meat underneath. The orange sauce has a slight bitterness to it that it needs the duck is so rich.

There were only three sauces available and I chose the harissa aioli because I love chilli but as we have mentioned it is missing that element. The duck fat chips are good-very crispy but I ask Mr NQN to get some aioli because the harissa aioli is not hitting the spot. I almost wish that they had dusted these with a duck equivalent of chicken salt-duck salt anyone?

So tell me Dear Reader, are you a fan of duck? Would you go to a duck only eatery? Which dish did you like the sound of the best?

This meal was independently paid for.

Duck In Duck Out

202 Elizabeth St, Surry Hills NSW 2010
Open 11:30am-10pm, 7 days a week
Closed Easter Monday and Tuesday