The War On Cookbooks

The Late late Christmas food diary.

 
 

Venison loin with venison stuffing ballotine, triple cooked goose fat chips, soubise of leek, caramelized onion hearts, parsnip crisps with a creme de cassis sauce and an orange sabayon.
 

Sorry sorry sorry, but due to feeling slightly under the weather and working over christmas and new year this is all coming a little late. 

I'm still not feeling great (COUGH!! SPLUTTER!!) so this is still going to be a short update. I have a week or so of work so I'll make sure I do a more meaningful update before its back to the kitchen.

So pictures and brief unsatisfying explanations it is then...ok ?

 

Roast pigeon on brioche, with pancetta and watercress in a maple syrup vinaigrette.

 

Boozy Mincemeat Pithivier with Beurre noisette ice cream, nutmeg anglaise, lemon pith marmalade and a brandy sabayon.

Unfortunately I forgot to consider colour when putting together the dessert. So it all looked very beige but tasted rather nice... I promise. The ice cream maybe being the star of the show if not the year. 

The lemon pith marmalade was made COUGH!!by blanching an refreshing lemon pith 10 times (to get rid of the bitterness) and then boiling it down in sugar syrup until the pectins thicken the sauce almost to a jelly.

The leek soubise was also pretty exciting in my little world. Slow cooked leek in butter and white wine for about 12 hours at 75oC, it falls apart COUGH!!almost to a sauce consistency and went well as a counterbalance to the sweet reduction sauce.

As always I'm happy to share recipes if anyone is interested, just ask kids.

happy new year and all that COUGH!!

x

 

Beurre Noisette Ice cream recipe for Mat

100g butter

200g double cream

150g milk

125g sugar

5 egg yolks

This Ice cream is easy and delicious. Burn the hell out of 100g of butter until black in a pan, leave to infuse for a few minutes then sieve out black bits with a fine cloth or muslin. Cool to room temp.

Add this to 350 grams off creme anglaise (My preference is 5 egg yolks, 200 ml cream and 150 ml milk but any ice cream quantity should do) brought to thickening consistency and then cooled to the same temperature as the butter. 

Combine whilst mixing well and instantly churn.

 

Pork Belly Tortellini with Prosecco Poached Pears, Pecorino and a Sage Brown Butter

I’ve been so consumed with exam stuff and final projects that I have sadly neglected this site a little.

That’s not to say that I haven’t been cooking but as I don’t want anyone to know what my Tante Marie final exam dishes are, I can’t really blog them. So I was relieved today to find the time to do something a little different…a distraction if you will. 

Eatlikeagirl set a challenge on her blog to come up with a perfect food match to some Bisol Jeio Prosecco. I relish a new challenge and seeing as when I tried the stuff at her stall a few weeks back and liked it I thought this might just be for me. Find out more about this competition and her excellent website here . 

After securing a bottle myself we had a few taste tests to see what we thought it would work well with. We did our best Jilly Goolden impressions and came to the conclusion that the predominant flavour notes were toasted nuts with lots of fruit which we thought were either apples or pears (I think more pears).

From that I went on to construct a dish, which would compliment those characteristics in a simple relaxed Italian style, much like the prosecco. Relaxed style is not really my bag these days (as some might have noticed) but I have to admit it’s nice to get back to it. It’s also nice to see how far I can take dishes like these given my journey into doing all the hideously complicated ‘gastronomic Lego’ stuff. Actually at the end of it I feel the ‘less is more’ bug might be coming back to bite me…which in itself has made this a worthwhile project, even if nothing else comes of it. 

My dish I settled for was a pork belly tortellini with poached pears, pecorino and sage brown butter. The cheese and the brown butter give the perfect kind of nutty vibes with the pear complimenting the fruitiness. The addition of the prosecco itself into the menu doesn’t harm the combination either but the effect is a subtle undercurrent. 

For once I wont bang on about how good or bad it is and contrary to my track record write you out the full recipe with all the numbers and stuff so you can see for yourself if you like. 

Pork Belly Tortellini with Prosecco Poached Pears, Pecorino and a Sage Brown Butter. 

Serves 2 

500g pork belly with skin 

300ml chicken stock 

1 bay 

1 sprig thyme 

peppercorns 

half a carrot 

1 leak 

half an onion 

1 garlic clove 

150g butter 

small bunch sage 

200g pecorino 3/4 grated and the rest shaved 

100 ml Bisol Jeio Prosecco 

2 pears (peeled cored, and cut into 8 slices.) 

100ml water 

100g caster sugar 

200g 00 flour 

6 egg yolks 

1 egg 

1 tbsp olive oil 

pinch of salt 

salt and black pepper 

a little hazelnut oil 

Separate the skin from the belly and brine belly in a 15% water to salt mix for 2 hours. Drain, pat dry and place fat side down in a cold pan and turn on to a high heat. Melt the fat and brown on all sides. Remove from pan and drain of the fat. Deglaze with a little stock and then add the rest of the chicken stock, herbs and veg and the belly and braise for minimum of 2 hours in a covered pot or in the oven at 140oC. It’s done when it pulls apart easily with a fork. 

In the mean time salt the skin until the juices start to come out. Dry and salt again and put into the oven for about 45 mins at 220oC basting with its own fat regularly. Remove when blistered and crispy. Put to one side. 

To make the pasta, make a well with the flour and add all the ingredients. Mix with your finger in a circular motion and combine when it begins to come together. Knead for about 10 mins or until it springs back. Leave to rest for an hour in the fridge covered with cling film. 

Mix the sugar, water and prosseco in a pan and heat until sugar dissolves. Add the pears and cook until tender. Remove dice up half and leave to one side. 

Remove the belly and place in a bowl with some of the braising liquid. Leave to cool in the liquid so as to absorb some of the juices. Sieve the remaining braising liquid and put back in a wide bottomed pan and reduce to a thick constancy and season appropriately. 

When the pasta is ready, roll out with a floured pasta maker to the second from last setting and cut into large rectangles. 

Drain the belly and pull apart with your hands and a fork. Add the reduced braising liquid and mix well. Chill. 

Fill the pasta with a ball of the belly and shape into tortellini’s. 

Boil some salted water and cook the pasta for about 3-4 mins. 

At the same time brown the butter in a large frying pan and when the nutty aroma is at it’s peak and brown dots start to appear add the sage, the pear and the grated cheese and then the pasta with a little of the cooking water. Emulsify everything in the pan and toss till everything is warmed though. 

Season with salt and pepper and pour onto the plate. 

Decorate with a few deep fried sage leaves and some of the crispy skin and drizzle with a little hazelnut oil.

The Front Line Food Diary (Sea Bass done three ways with pil-pil sauce)

Sea bass sous vide in sea water, pan fried and raw marinated in soy, olive oil and orange peel with crispy fried skin. The three opposing methods give lots more textures out of the same fillets and I think make for a more interesting dish. It's a pity I didn't get a better picture of the pan fried one. I was really proud of how well it came out.

The pil-pil sauce I made by making a rapid white wine reduction with the bones and adding some garlic and chili infused olive oil as a slow emulsion to the result. I also added lemon juice, a little sherry vinegar and parsley at the end. It's not a traditional pil-pil which should be made with slowly emulsifying salt cod with olive oil in a pan, but its my interpretation...also I didn't have any salt cod.

The Front Line Food Diary (Tuna and Watermelon Tartare)

If Carlsberg were to make snack food it would probably be something like this.

The tuna was simply diced and marinated in a mixture of freshly squeezed orange juice, soy and rice wine vinegar. Don't leave it for too long as you want it raw and the longer you leave it in the citrus juices the longer it gently cooks.

The watermelon you could just chop, but I compressed it first in a vacuum bag on a very high setting and let it rest for a few hours. This changes the structure of the melon entirely making it more like steak tartar. It was then finely chopped with a little salt and olive oil.

To season just a little togarashi and were done. 

My only wish is that tuna become less endangered so I can feel ok buying more in the future. Its a really indulgent treat and I firmly believe I would never get bored shoveling it down my big fat throat.

The Front Line Food Diary (Glazed Pork Belly, Wine Poached Apples and a Lemongrass and Thyme Jelly)

I've always found Pork Belly a bugger to do. Although in fairness I hold that down to one thing and one thing only... lack of patience. 

This one was brined for several hours and then cooked low and slow for 12 hours at 82oC. Normally I don't have the time do do that when home cooking. 

The crackling was cooked separately and the pork was finished of in a pan using a reduced stock sauce to glaze it.

I did mean to do a vinaigrette using the poaching liquid. I didn't, so I now have to find the 12 hours to do this baby again. That's not a bad thing.

It's almost there but I feel I need to by those fancy sprouts we use in the restaurant. Really that's all great food is these days, nice plates and those fancy sprouty things. In fact I may stop cooking until I find some.

... ;)

The Front Line Food Diary (Salmon with Beurre Blanc and Confit Fennel)

A Lightly Cooked Fillet of Salmon with Beurre Blanc, Confit Fennel and Yellow Beans.

At first Helen looked pretty satisfied with the ingredients list. We had made a pact to start cooking healthier meals during the week and on the surface this looked just about perfect. Her opinion changed however when she witnessed me making the beurre blanc.

My beurre blanc recipe goes roughly like this 

2 finely diced shallots

Good glass and a half of nice white wine

150ml of white wine vinegar

500-750g unsalted butter (2-3 bars)

salt and pepper

No prizes for guessing which ingredient ruined the pact. 

I owe this recipe to one of my teachers at Tante Marie, its not actually a school recipe but he was a chef at The Waterside Inn  so it's unlikely to be a bad place to start.

Put your shallots in a frying pan with the white wine and reduce rapidly until you get a syrupy consistency (almost nothing left) then do the same with the vinegar. When the vinegar gets to the syrupy stage add the butter in small pieces (one at a time) and whisk with all your might. Only adding new butter when all the previous lot has been fully emulsified. This will take some time and some whisking power. Alternatively you could lower the heat and do it in a more casual fashion, but where's the fun in that ?

If it splits then you can just add a little cold water off the heat and whisk it in. Stop adding butter when it feels and tastes right...season to taste.

You wont be able to keep you sauce for much longer than the day you make it but it will keep at room temperature for some time. When your ready reheat it and maybe add a little more water if necessary. 

In case you are interested the Salmon was cooked in prawn infused oil at 48oC in a water bath and the skin was fried separately. If you don't have a water bath you could do much the same thing if your oven goes down to 50oC. 

If I do it again I would substitute the fennel for something else. It was great by itself but just didn't work well in the dish. It felt like a loud guest at a dinner party. What it had to say could well have been interesting but whatever it was it was distracting you from the rest of the room, so by default became annoying and unnecessary. Something sweet or neutral would have worked much better.

The Front Line Food Diary (Monster From The Deep)

I didn't know quite what else to call this. I started out innocently enough constructing what I thought would be just a simple seafood lasagna. 

I made some squid ink pasta and fried of some squid and layered them with some pan fried prawns.

I then threw some clams in the pan I cooked the seafood in, threw in some white wine to deglaze and steamed the clams under a saucepan lid until they opened. 

I then added them to the plate along with some of the reduced sauce from the pan.

Looks innocent enough ?

The last step was to add some of the prawn bisque I made for my canapés.

I then fried some of the prawns heads in olive oil and threw them on top and a few chives. It was at this stage that I realized I had created a monster.

A very tasty monster none the less.

The Front Line Food Diary (Moroccan duo of lamb with minted pea puree)

A minced lamb neck, harrisa and coriander burger in a brioche bun, braised lamb and apricot spring roll seasoned with ras el hanout with a pea and mint puree, raw cauliflower, harrisa jus and some spiced flower petals.

It feels good to be cooking again. Back to work tomorrow though.

The Front Line Food Diary (7 course tasting menu for Helen's birthday)

Helen's Birthday tasting menu.

If you're doing a tasting menu for only 2 people you may as well (except for maybe the washing up) do it for 10. It's a phenomenal amount of work for one person to do and I don't recommend it unless you feel like punishing yourself. Also taking into consideration the fact that the guest lives with you and they are not supposed to know what your cooking there are countless other problems that can arise.

So mission one is getting girlfriend out of the house and 2 is to cook as fast as possible. 

Still all this said I did get to enjoy what I cooked and drank lot's of wine while cooking (maybe a little reflection of the small mistakes in my last two courses...only little ones mind)

Starter 

Insalata Caprese

A basil sorbet, spherification of mozzarella, 

roasted cherry tomato and balsamic and olive oil crystals.

This was essentially an experiment in temperature and texture using traditional flavour combinations. The Mozzarella sphere bursts into a sauce for the rest of the dish and is seasoned with the crystals. I need to work a bit on the seasoning balance but it works very well. 

The great thing about the temperature variances is that it delays the flavours in your mouth so you taste everything one after the next all in one mouthful.

Fish Course

Fish and Chips (A French Laundry rip off)

Pan fried red mullet, a garlic palette, parsley coulis and a salad of milk blanched garlic chips and shallots.

The palettes are made from blending lots of blanched garlic with hard boiled egg yolks and butter. You then freeze them, cut out circles and pan coat them in panko breadcrumbs using cream and flour. The garlic chips are blanched in milk to make them less bitter and the coulis is self explanatory. 

You can get the full recipe from The French Laundry Cookbook.

This is the only recipe that wasn't mine. I did it mostly out of curiosity and also because Helen likes fish and chips and she'd already eaten all of my variations. 

It turned out beautifully and not bad looking either. The only thing that didn't look like it was supposed to was the palette. It looked great on its own but without 40 staff at my side to help me plate up and by the time I had done everything it had melted a bit with the heat and weight of the fish (The fillets

were also way too big portion wise but what was I going to do with the rest ?). 

Amuse Bouche

Scallop sashimi with balsamic and strawberry hearts.

Simply some very nice scallops from atari ya sliced and plated with some finely sliced strawberry hearts( I say hearts because I only uses the middle cut of the strawberry, otherwise is didn't look as cool with all the veins and stuff) and a balsamic reduction. Also drizzled with small drop of very expensive (Seriously I must have been drunk when I bought it) balsamic vinegar. Dressed with some watercress and fresh basil.

I served this with some sparkling sake at the table. It was all very nice as expected. There really is no way to go wrong with this so I wont bore you with any tasting notes.

First Meat Course

A Chicken, Bacon and Avocado Sandwich.

The surprise star of the show for me. I had based this dish on 

Helen's favorite sandwich which as it turned out she luckily 

didn't have for lunch that day. As far as experiments go this 

was pretty last minute. I honestly had never practiced this 

nor did I have any idea if it would even work.

The dish is composed of a sandwich of poussin (cooked at 

56oC) and loin of pork (also cooked at 56oC) with the loin 

sandwiched in between two breast cuts. I have to admit I 

did want pork belly for this but I didn't leave myself enough 

time in the end to cook it well.

The meat sandwich is then wrapped in the whole poussin

skin and is pan fried in deep hot oil and 

butter until it's crispy.

It's served with an light avocado sauce made minutes 

before plating.

The lightness of the sauce with the fatty skin and the 

texture of the meat inside was surprisingly good.

I do want to try it again with belly though. I think 

that would be top notch.

Main Course

72 hour cooked Veal with a thyme butter sauce.

I do have a picture of this but it is so out off focus and 

burry its not worth looking at. This could 

have been a result of the fading light outside or the volume 

of wine we had both drunk by this stage. It is more likely 

some sort of combination of the two.

The shoulder of veal was cooked at 56oC for 72 hours 

in a water bath. The reason for the long cooking 

time is because of the way the collagen breaks down 

at lower temperatures than normal and the effect it has 

the meat during this. Apparently it actually tenderizes 

the meat. I don't know if any of this is true or not but 

what I do know is that Alain Ducasse cooks it this way 

and the veal I had in his restaurant in paris was the best 

thing I've eaten in my whole life...'nuff said I think ?

Whatever happened it was like butter. I simply pan fried 

it with some enoki mushrooms and plated both. I then 

browned some butter in the pan, to which I thew in

a few sprigs of thyme at the last minute and poured over 

the veal. I then garnished with some deep fried shallots.

It needed nothing else. If you get the veal cooked right 

the butter is enough of a compliment. Simple and 

perfect. 

Dessert

Chocolate honey sphere with a toblerone sauce.

Once again no picture, but this time I am slightly 

annoyed. It looked really good.

I made four chocolate half circle moulds using some 

egg poachers. I also made some honeycomb and a 

honey ice cream.

I placed a ball of ice cream and some honeycomb 

inside one of the half circles and places another

half circle on top. So what we had was a chocolate 

football filled with the ice cream and honeycomb.

I then heated a sauce of melted toblerone and 

cream and served it so as when you pour the hot

sauce over the ball it melts it and reveals what is 

inside.

It looked good...honest.

Petit Fours

Cherries and Almond

Chocolate coated cherry fudge, a profiterole filled with 

kirsch cream patisserie and covered in boiled

fondant, some caramel coated cherries and a shot of 

Disaronno.

We ate these much later on that night and we were 

feeling a bit full and sick straight after the meal. 

I also ate some the next morning with my hangover, 

which I don't recommend.

+ The Wine

The Front Line Food Diary (Salmon Fillet with an Orange and Ginger Risotto and a Carrot Puree)

Sous vide Salmon fillet with an orange and ginger risotto and a carrot puree.

Helen's first dish on the front line diary. I didn't make this but I did eat it and it was lovely.

My girlfriend has always made lovely food, but this is the fist time it has looked as good as it has tasted. I'm sure she'll have a few more up here from now on.

I'll let her explain how it was made if she want's to comment.