Chef's Table, August 30th, 2013

 

Chef’s Table,

August 30^th, 2013

 

Amuse Bouche

Popcorn Soup, Caramel Foam

Simple soup base.  Onion & garlic sweated, deglaze white wine.  Redux. Half water/half cream.  A few yukon gold potatoes.  Pureed fine and popcorn dust added to desired thickness.  Reseason.  Acidity fixed with lime juice.  Heat from tabasco. 

1^st Course

Oysters & Truffle Glacage, Cabernet Salt

 

Fresh East Coast oysters, bed of red wine tinted Maldon salt & calendula flower petals.  Glacage is a mornay containing egg yolk & black truffle.  Broiled until sexy.

2^nd Course

Lobster & Carrot Ravioli, Beet, Carrot Butter

 

Each ravioli contains Korean chili bean paste, carrot puree, a half a lobster, salt, pepper & butter.  Carrot butter is redux of carrot juice, white wine & aromatics (fennel seed, peppercorn, lemongrass, saffron, ginger, chili flake, bay leaf & coriander), splash of cream, light thicken with cornstarch & then mounted butter.  Acidity from sherry vinegar, heat from tabasco, a few drops of truffle oil.  Beets raw & marinated with sherry vinegar and extra virgin olive oil.  Chives barely bound together with extra virgin.

3^rd Course

Petite Filet of Beef, Sweet Potato, Watercress Hollandaise & Port Wine Jus

 

Seared 4 oz tied beef filet, rested in duck fat kept at 120*F.  Sweet potato gratin is paper thin shaved sweet potato, nutmeg, salt, white pepper, heavy cream and grana padano cheese.  300*F oven, waterbath, pressed down with a fish spatula every 15 minutes as it cooks.  Pressed overnight before cutting.  Watercress hollandaise is three egg yolks, 1 bunch of watercress in a blender to which hot melted butter is emulsified.  Salt, sherry vinegar & tabasco to taste.  Star anise & port wine demi contains red wine, port wine, coriander, orange zest, star anise, bay leaf and thyme reduced until sauce ready and then finished with demi, cream, and a touch of sherry vinegar.  Strained though a chinnoise.  Cauliflower caramelized in clarified butter.  Salt, pepper and nutmeg to taste.  Watercress lightly dressed.  Pate choux garnish.  Piped through a #3 round tip onto a silpat, 300*F oven, low fan until designs begin to lift and color.  

4^th Course

Orange Sorbet

 

Purple Door ice cream (currently do not own an ice cream machine), blueberries tossed in orange simple syrup, candied orange zest.

5^th Course

Artisan Cheeses, Fig & Honey

 

House made ricotta & black pepper, Californian camembert & Wisconsinite bleu cheese.  Honeycomb, fig syrup to finish (not shown on pic.)

Dessert

Key Lime & White Chocolate Cheesecake

 

Charred citrus salad, white chocolate ganache, lime syrup & candied orange zest, raspberry gelee.  Gelee is one cup puree to four sheets of gelatin.  Mixed in a quart container with a meat fork after set for "gem-like" presentation.  Addition of choux garnish.  Crust is gingersnap.

Chef Talk with Kyle Cherek - Robert Druschitz / Interview

Chef Talk with Kyle Cherek - Robert Druschitz / Recipe Demo

Cous cakes

Orange juice, carmelized shallot, chicken stock, standard breading procedure.

Coursed Dinner Party Menu, December 30th

 

 

 

Tentative Menu

 

 

Caramelized Celery Root Pave, Lemoncello Cured Salmon

 

This amuse course should be fun, a faux custard of blanc cooked celery root, pureed & strained overnight in cheesecloth.  Finished with yuzu juice.  The salmon will be cured with kosher salt & brown sugar overnight and then basted with meyer lemon infused vodka until a pellicle is formed.  I'm planning on brulee-ing the top of the pave served in black miso spoons and garnishing the top with the thinly sliced gravlax.
 

Foie Gras & Chestnut Soup, Seared Foie Gras Awesomeness

 

Soup course of course!  Onion, garlic sweated in butter (lard or bacon fat, kinda waffling on this), white wine & a touch of sherry, chestnuts, orange zest, chicken or duck stock, cream.  Finished with foie gras butter (3:1 butter to passed liver scrap, keeps from curdling) & sherry vinegar.  Served in mini 4 oz. soup cups with a metal fleur de lys skewer holding a seared piece of foie gras over the top.  Decadent, maybe.  Tasty, damn right!  My homage to the late, great Jean-Louis Palladin.

 

Lobster Custard Timbale, Vanilla & Star Anise Scented Root Vegetables, Beet Emulsion

 

1/2 quart of cream : 4 whole eggs.  Buttered timbale molds, parchment round in the bottom.  Cooked, diced lobster, dried on towel before folding into the custard.  Season with salt, pepper & herbs as necessary.  Cook in water bath in 300* oven until set.  Chill overnight, run paring knife around edges and unmold.  Star anise & vanilla bean oil just infused for a few weeks (grapeseed or neutral oil preferred).  Thinking a mix of fun root veggies, whatever I find at the market or through Tom Cornille if I can fit in a visit.  For the Beet Emulsion, cooked red beet pureed with some balsamic & sherry vinegars and some nice extra virgin olive oil.  Might garnish the top with something crispy, a beet, lotus root chip or fried leeks.     

 

 Poussin, Citrus Cous Cous Cake, Baby Carrot, Blueberry Jus

 

This is the course that's most likely to change depending on what I can get my grubby little mits on.  [Insert diabolical laughter here.]  Any game bird that I can find fresh, poussin (baby chicken), squab, pheasant or duck in a pinch.  If poussin, I'm planning on removing the breast & thighs from the carcass and cooking them seperately, confiting the thighs and roasting the breasts.  The carcass will be roasted for the jus, which will be finished with syrup reconstituted dried blueberries & foie gras butter.  The cous cous will be cooked in orange juice & chicken stock, drained without rinsing onto a sheet pan, frozen, cut into shape, and then egged breaded and pan fried to golden sweetness.  The baby carrots will be treated with love and affection, and some charred orange may make an appearance.  'Cuz that's how I roll, guy.   

 

Roquefort, Aerated Dark Chocolate, Candied Cilantro

 

Sound strange?  It isn't.  Blue cheese, chocolate & cilantro are wickedly awesome together.  Just ask Chef Don Yamauchi who first introduced the combo to me back at Le Francais.  I've changed it to a more contemporary take, by aerating the chocolate.  To aerate chocolate, first temper dark chocolate and pour into an Issi.  Charge with two cartridges.  Shoot chocolate into a metal 3rd or 1/2 pan and put into a cryovac machine, *uncovered*, and run the machine until the mix almost overflows the pan.  Repeat a few times and then freeze to set the mix.  This causes the chocolate to take on tons of tiny air bubbles, almost making a solid mousse without cream or eggs.  The candied cilantro with be done up with lightly frothed egg white and caster sugar.  The blue cheese will be the best I can find, tempered to room temperature, of course.

 

Rose Touched Creme Brulee, Currant

 

I found a recipe for rose creme brulee in a French cookbook by Joel Robuchon called Facile.  I'm planning on adapting Le Titi de Paris' old creme brulee recipe to include rose instead of vanilla notes.  Currants are the fruit of choice, but if something else catches my attention, this is apt to change.

 

Mignardises & Coffee

 

Is it only me that wants to pronounce mignardises, MIG-nards?  Planning on coating a foie gras flavored cream cheese with Callebaut dark chocolate.  Or something else you wouldn't normally find filling chocolates.  Any suggestions?

French Laundry, Chef & Vegetable Tastings, 9/28/12

 

 

 



                           
                 

 

 

 

  

 

 

                              

                              

                              


                              

                              

                               


                             


                              


                              


                              


                              


                              


                             


                              

X-Mas Gift Project, Fennel Crusted Pistachios

 

I forget exactly where I heard about crusting pistachios with fennel pollen, but I believe a pastry chef from one of Nobu's restaurants was credited for having 'em on a menu.  I wanted something to accompany the pistachio liquor I infused, and when we were in Napa, Anne & I found a really reasonably priced fennel pollen from a company called Whole Spice.  For about two pounds of unsalted, untoasted, shelled pistachios, I lightly whipped 1 egg white while the nuts toasted.  After they had nice color, I let them cool a bit.  After the nuts would no longer cook an egg white, I tossed them together in a bowl with the lightly frothed white, a generous amount of sea salt & fennel pollen, then lowered my oven to 200*F.  I spread the mix out onto a silpat lined sheet tray and dried them out for a while. 

 

I can't stop eating the damned things.