IDEAS IN FOOD

Brown Butter Cavatelli

If there were any question, we can definitively say that brown butter has now become not only a flavoring or an accent in our kitchen, it has become a star ingredient.  In continuing our tribute to brown butter we, specifically Aki, made one of our tastiest pastas to date--brown butter cavatelli.

The consistency of the dough, the aroma, and the depth of flavor all highlight the complex flavors of brown butter.  We made a quick pan sauce of straight up brown butter and balsamic vinegar, enriched with a small dollop of brown butter puree.  The cavatelli are accented with leaves of arugula and shaved Emmenthaler cheese.  The warmed sheet of shrimp is an ideal compliment to these chewy brown butter bites.

Mussels

A bowl of steamed mussels and a loaf of crusty bread is great fuel for the body and the mind.  The olives, onions and fennel are tasty accents to the sweet and briny shellfish.

Now if only the mussels would hurry up and get to work on our minds.

Caviar, Cauliflower and Onions

Ideas and our pantry are often like a puzzle.  Sometimes the pieces  come together, other times we are stuck with a pile of pieces and no notion of what the heck we are looking at.  Thankfully we work with more than one idea at a time. 

A very simple dish came together this morning.  We had encapsulated cauliflower, though we did not have a plan for its end use.  I enjoy the combination of onions and cauliflower and so I brought the onion glass to the table.  We are fortunate to have some sake cured steel head trout roe on hand, a fine accent to both the onion and cauliflower.  I enjoy the fact that we can stick herbs, spices and other flavorings to the exterior of encapsulated liquids.  It allows for additional layers to be incorporated and the aesthetic value of these last minute additions is something to behold.

This dish, like a puzzle, revealed its secrets that easily.  Well, except for the debate over whether or not we should serve the cauliflower hot or cold.  Cold won because duh it's caviar, and in doing so opened a number of doors which I had previously overlooked.

Caviar, cauliflower and onions...today it tasted like the breakfast of champions.

Inspirations

Today I came across a a blog post by one of my favorite fiction writers, Marjorie M Liu, about finding inspiration which links to an article by musician Andrew Bird (I've never experienced his music although I will definitely make it a point to check it out after reading his piece). Inspiration is something that we struggle to find on a daily basis. It rarely arrives in a flash of light or as an explosive discovery. Instead our search is more like fitting together the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. For quite some time you can connect the pieces almost absently, it's more about individual couplings than the whole. At some point you realize that you can see the image that you're chasing. It may be rough and unfinished but it is clearly visible and the remaining pieces almost fall into place.

Well, that is if you're lucky. There is certainly a rush of exultation when an amorphous idea becomes a reality and a surge of adrenaline appears to carry you towards the finish line. In cooking many times those moments are where the real work begin. We often craft individual versions of our ideas first and the real test is recreating them so that they can be reproduced in volume by other hands with no discernible loss of quality. It is a constant challenge and one that we enjoy.

Our path this past year has been a surprising one. Had anyone asked us a year ago where we would be now I'm sure that we would have answered "in a restaurant". Clearly that hasn't happened and instead we have wandered an entirely different and novel path. The cooking classes have been amazing for us. We are constantly inspired by the people who come to our sessions. They question us, challenge us, and teach us new things every day. On the one hand we miss having an audience to cook for every day. On the other hand we have the flexibility to explore all of ideas and share them with others in ways that we might not be able to in a restaurant setting. For today this blog is our inspiration. Our readers are a big part of our motivation. We thank you for visiting us today and any other day you wish to join us. We couldn't do it without you.

Hollandaise Sauce on Demand

When to sauce a dish?  That is always a question. We have continued to work with re-heatable hollandaise sauce.  Today we took another step.  We wanted to incorporate hollandaise sauce in a dish and we wanted to keep its integrity  and consistency intact until the diner actually began to eat the dish.  The solution was to encase a spoonful of warm sauce in a thin skin of pectin which is easily pierced by fork or spoon. Using our method the sauce stays warmer and may be released at the last moment.  The sauce may be dipped in, spread, moved about or even eaten in one luxurious bite according to the whims of the diner.

Tonight we used our sauce on demand to compliment shattered shrimp.  A few leaves of tarragon act to pique the sweet flavor of the shrimp and unify the sauce.  We are quite happy with the composition and with the control of the sauce which we have now handed over to the person enjoying the dish.

A Brief Reminder

If you're still looking for something to do this weekend, we have room in our classes. More Hydrocolloids at Home on Saturday, March 29 at 10am and an Introduction to Activa on Monday, March 31 at 10am.  What could more fun than learning some new techniques and tasting some of our creations? You know you want to join us...

Dusting Off the Glass

We were asked to revisit onion glass for a private lesson.  It was fun to go back and look at an idea which was getting dusty on the shelf.  The crispy texture and rich favor is redolent of onion soup.  I suppose we could call them onion soup crisps, though there is no cheese.  With the onion glass back in our pantry fresh ideas are starting to blossom.

My initial thought was to cover a tartare or a raw fish preparation with the glass.  That way the diner can break it and then incorporate crunchy bites of onion with the cool refreshing fish beneath.  Of course, my short attention span and lack of patience may not see this dish develop.  Tonight we're munching on shards of onion glass.  Tomorrow will tell whether or not we do more.

Crackers and Jam

I was talking with Sean about low country cooking, oysters, hot sauce and Saltine crackers.  My mind jumped and I found myself pondering a Saltine puree with oysters.  I felt it might be too heavy.  What about Saltine pudding pearls?  I set about testing the process and failed miserably in front of an audience.  I ended up with noodles, extremely dense noodles, of Saltines.

Still, I was not going to let this one get away.  I made a much lighter Saltine base.  The flavor was still intense, although it tasted more focused than my original version.  That is the beauty of failure.  We get a chance to rethink and correct our mistakes.

Yesterday the Saltine pearls worked perfectly.  While my initial idea was to pair the pearls with oysters, I took another path.  I thought about after school snacks, for me there was jam spread on Saltines, a way to curb hunger and pass the time.  I really enjoy the combination of salty and sweet.  With that in mind we set about creating a raspberry base which we could form into similar pearls.  In this case, failure was not an option.

The result was magnificent.  We have tiny pebbles of Saltines and raspberry jam which may be eaten individually and together.  I opted to take the two flavors and use them to compliment peekytoe crab meat which we flavored with tarragon.  At first glance you may think that we perhaps we are stretching.  The doubt is whisked away with the first bite.  The different bites are salty, sweet, tart, herbal and redolent of the ocean.  It brings to mind hot summer afternoons under a clear blue sky. The dish is quite simply delicious.

Scallops, Chicken and Melon

Melon is out of season.  Still, we were working on some interesting new dishes and I let seasonality slide.  We were working on the hows of a dish.  We presented our seared melon terrine in today's hydrocolloid class.  We did not serve it with anything, simply the seared terrine on a plate.  I was really excited with the results.

After the class ended I went back to the refrigerator and pulled out a chicken skin crusted scallop.  It was the result of yesterday's Activa class.  With both of these ingredients on hand we had the beginning of a dish.  We slowly rendered the chicken skin so that we would have a crisp crust for the scallop.  The terrine was seared in a touch of olive oil.  When the scallop was cooked and the terrine lightly caramelized we brought the two together.  The simplicity of the dish is what makes it really beautiful and exciting.

We had a bit of a debate about this dish because the melons were not at their peak. Fortunately the act of cooking them helped to concentrate their flavors and accent what was there to work with. Honestly though, this is a summer dish. Imagine it with crisp, juicy watermelon, firm, fragrant honeydew, and luscious, yielding cantaloupe, a bit of lovage for the garnish wouldn't be amiss. It is actually a pretty delicious early spring dish. It's just tough knowing how much better it will be in a few months.

Crabtastic

Every day beauty comes in a variety of shapes, forms, moments, and visions.  I am lucky enough to work every day with my better half.  While I look from afar, delicate hands gently mix crab meat with herb and garlic bread crumbs, bound gently with Russian dressing.  I asked her to pause so that we might capture this moment, two delicate pieces intertwined, making dinner.

Passion Fruit Onion

We used to make a grapefruit, onion, and lovage relish.  We made a dark caramel and added minced onions and ruby grapefruit segments and slowly cooked the ingredients into a rich relish.  A sachet of lovage infused everything with a cleansing, bitter celery note.  We paired this relish with a watermelon cube, lime salt and balsamic syrup as an amusebouche when we were in Maine. 

Several months ago we dined at wd-50 and were served a hamachi tartare with a grapefruit-shallot condiment.  This condiment had a clarity and unique balance which struck a chord.  Its color and brightness seemed to be a more refined version of the relish we conjured up years ago.  There was also no accent of lovage, though why would there be, these condiments were created by two different individuals with different palates and goals for the end composition.

After enjoying the grapefruit-shallot condiment I was re-inspired by the combination of allium and acidity.  I started looking at possibilities.  One idea which has continued to capture my attention is the combination of passion fruit and onions.  We borrowed theories from our initial relish and from the one we experienced more recently and cooked onions down in passion fruit juice.  A pinch of salt and a slow reduction yielded an incredibly decadent passion fruit and onion relish.

We paired this bold condiment with a seared scallop and a schmear of our brown butter puree.  It is amazing the true luxury of tastes that develop when combining a few simple ingredients.

Upcoming Classes

Cooking Classes
*Each class is a single session running from 10am-1pm unless otherwise noted and costs $125 per person. Classes take place in Forest Hills (Queens), NY.

Introduction to Activa

Transglutaminase in the kitchen. Transglutaminases are a family of enzymes that are used for cross linking proteins in culinary preparations essentially working as a natural glue. They can be used to create flourless gnocchi, chicken skin crusted fish, mozzarella noodles and a variety of other delicious and unusual creations.

Sunday, March 23, 2008
Monday, March 31, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008

Exploring Methocel

An in depth look at the family of Methocel products which are used to create thermoreversible gels, foams, and a variety of sweet and savory crisps.

Saturday April 5, 2008

Gelatin and Pectin

These are two commonly found and often overlooked hydrocolloids with uses ranging from gelatin clarification to pectin encapsulation. Sometimes the easiest answers are right in front of you.

Sunday, April 6, 2008
Saturday, April 12, 2008

We will be traveling for the second half of April/beginning of May so the next round of classes will begin in mid-May. Schedule will be posted in the second half of April. Private lessons may be arranged by individual appointment. Please email us for more information.

Skirt and Hangar Steak

In looking at the characteristics of different steaks and cuts of meat we have become inspired to blend the rich decadence of the usually thin skirt steak with the meaty flavor of the sometimes chewy hangar steak.  We butterflied both steaks and seasoned them with sea salt.  We used our jaccard on both pieces of meat and then rolled the hangar steak into a roulade.  Once we had a uniform piece of hangar steak we placed it in the center of the the butterflied skirt steak.  Then we rolled the hangar inside the skirt steak. 

A light dusting of Activa RM on both the hangar and skirt steaks united the two pieces of meat into what I consider a truly wonderful piece of meat.  The rich, marbled skirt steak encases the intense, meaty essence of the hangar steak.  Tomorrow we start working on dishes with this hybrid steak.

Nooks and Crannies

Yesterday, we stumbled across these beautiful scallops.  Their firm, light pink flesh glistened at the fish counter, enticing shoppers to pick them up and devour them.  Once we got them home, the first dish we started working with paired a single scallop with an onion and passion fruit relish, topped with a brown butter and passion fruit sauce.  The combination of flavors is simple and straightforward.  It tasted delicious.  Unfortunately the aesthetic presentation was horrendous.  The photo went into the bin.  Time to rework the dish.

We nailed the second dish.  We cut the scallop into chunks and then pounded them into a uniform sheet.  We cut the sheet into a round and topped the chilled scallop with a hot vinaigrette which marries dried and caramelized apricot oil and smoked balsamic vinegar.  The flattened scallop is full of nooks and crannies for the vinaigrette to flow into, seasoning it in random levels.  A sprinkle of garam masala salt finishes the dish.  The sweetness of the scallop is enriched by the apricot oil.  The smoked balsamic vinegar accents the flavors and the garam masala ties it all together.  Each bite is unique with a varying levels of salt, acid and spice to keep the palate interested.

It is always exciting when we stumble across beautiful ingredients to stimulate the mind and the palate.  In spite of minor setbacks, today was a very good day.

Crackers and Caviar

I have an affinity for caviar and ice cream.  In fact, I adore the combination so much that it has warranted its own chapter in our culinary repertoire.  Our most recent blend of savory and sweet is centered around the Ritz Cracker ice cream.  We paired the salty, buttery ice cream with savory parsley tapioca, rich brown butter puree and sake cured steel head trout roe.  The floral nature of the sake infused roe and its textural pop add the final notes of harmony to the dish.  What is exciting about pairing caviar and ice cream is that people tend to view the combination with skepticism.  We then have the pleasure of watching faces transform from suspicion to surprised delight as they experience the dish.

Caviar and ice cream, try it, you'll love it.

Looking for the Light

Some days the band won't play, the muse won't sing, the ice cream melts and the photographs make you wonder what the heck you were thinking.  On days like these we look to others for inspiration.

Wearpalettes is an interesting look at color combinations expressed through fashion. It may not be about food per se, although in our mind the color combinations bring to mind ingredients.

The Devil Dog cake inspired me because they were the one snack cake I honestly adored. Admittedly I would scrape out and discard the cream filling because the rich layers of chocolately goodness were quite enough for me. One day someone who loves me will have to make me this cake.

Food For Design is always worth a visit because you never know what you'll find there.

Science Daily because truth really is stranger than fiction.

Smoked Onsen Egg

This is our smoke powder infused egg cooked in the style of an onsen egg.  It sits nestled in a bed of scrambled peas (a spontaneous result from yesterday's class) and is surrounded by a draping of hot mozzarella. 

This dish brings together a number of ideas and tastes in a delicious combination while also acting as a springboard for spring dishes. Of course after we started eating the dish Aki suggested some crushed wasabi peas for a bit of texture and heat.  Some days you have to taste the dish a few times before you can actually finish it.

The Corned Beef Burger

As St. Patty's Day approaches our thoughts turn to thick slices of juicy corned beef, meltingly soft cabbage and fluffy boiled potatoes.  There's nothing like good corned beef. When you cook it at home inevitably there are leftovers. I love a good corned beef hash or a thick sandwich as much as the next person. Occasionally though, I need a change of pace. Enter the corned beef burger.

To make this beauty we diced and shredded some leftover corned beef (what can I say, we couldn't wait until Monday). We folded the cooked meat into some lean ground beef with a bit of cold, grated butter, a pinch of salt and a touch of cayenne pepper. We seared the burgers in a hot, dry pan allowing them to cook in their own rendered fats. The outsides crisped beautifully and the smell was intoxicating. While the burgers were resting we fried English muffins in the drippings and used them to cradle our patties.  The corned beef burger, it doesn't get much better than this.

Brown Butter Liquids

Brown butter is still on my mind.  I had a bounty of brown butter solids and was going over ideas.  Then the anvil hit.  Why do they have to be brown butter solids?  What if I made a brown butter puree?  Only one way to find out.

I took 170g of brown butter solids, 25g of agave nectar and 100g of water and pureed them for ten minutes in the blender.  The result is a new source of inspiration: brown butter puree.  (Our mixture does not contain salt, because the butter solids were already seasoned.)  The resulting puree screams brown butter.  It is smooth and luxurious on the palate.  The picture shows the mixture in a warm state from blending.  As it chills, it thickens into a more workable puree.

The liquid brown butter opens up a number of possiblities and applications.  We will use it to simply dress noodles and use as the noodle itself.  We may sauce lobster with the puree or thin it out and poach the shellfish in it.  Brown butter pudding and cake may now be spiked rather than simply accented with this intense flavor.  Brown butter mayonnaise is now just one small step away as is brown butter bread. The flavor is reminiscent of caramel without the sweetness. It is haunting and inspiring. What will you do with your brown butter?

Thoughts on Blogging

A big part of being a blogger is a need to be heard. You know that you’ve got something to share and blogging is your venue of choice for communicating that information. The soul of a chef revolves around the desire to feed people. You want to create amazing, delicious food and nurture your diners in whatever style works for you. For some chefs that means creating old fashioned comfort foods, for other that means pushing the envelope and challenging the senses with modern creations. The beauty of our profession is that it makes room for chefs of all different varieties to find their audience. The blogosphere does the same thing for its bloggers. It creates a medium through which people can reach out and find their audience.

Of course every action produces a reaction. They may be positive or negative or somewhere in between, there are always reactions to the things we do. Over on Eggbeater Shuna is talking about whether blogging openly about work can be a positive thing. In her case there were serious ripples and repercussions stirred up by her writing. That happens. Lots of people are driven to shut down their blogs or write anonymously to protect their peace and privacy or that of the people close to them. The creation of parameters is a personal decision, one that is more fluid than most because bloggers can always reconsider and shift directions according to their comfort level.

Creating a blog is insidious. Once you begin it eases itself into other aspects of your life. You begin to look at experiences as blog posts, debating whether something is interesting enough or perhaps too interesting to write about on the site. You discover that the line that you have drawn in sand about what is material for the blog and what is personal begins to blur. You feel as though your readers accept you completely, forgetting that they are only exposed to the small fragment that gets published each day. You are complimented and vilified by turns and you wonder how people find the vitriol to fling at someone they don’t know. Somehow we rarely question the compliments, a quirk of  human nature and our own egos. You remember that you have donned the target of your own accord and remind yourself that when you speak publicly you invite any and all responses. Still, at least in our case, you keep on blogging.

Some days it’s tough to say what you believe. There are moments when omission feels like the greater part of valor. There are always people who will agree unequivocally with what you have to say and those who will disagree completely. You will be alternatively an inspiration and a scapegoat.  You’re going to make big mistakes and accidentally step on lots of toes. You’re going to meet very interesting people and make connections that would never have been possible before you started blogging. You’re going to learn where those lines underneath the shifting sands are actually etched in the stone beneath. Your website will be a tool for self-discovery if you’re open to the process. As we say in the kitchen, it’s all about execution.  If you’re going to blog, do it wholeheartedly and make it your own. Authenticity is more important than polish.

Leeks

At first I thought this dish was about the combination of leeks and potatoes.  Then while looking at the components for the dish I realized while the potato and parsley gnocchi are the focus of the dish, it is the soft and silky leek puree which steals the show.  The shavings of Brouere cheese accent the gnocchi and add an earthy richness to the composition.  Still the smooth, decadent allium puree provides backbone and stability to help highlight the combination of these few ingredients.

It dawned on me that I have never really made a leek puree.  Onions sure, leek and potato are a given.  Straight up leeks, never once.  Until today.  This puree is just blanched leeks, salt, pepper and some tapioca starch to prevent syneresis.  It is quite delicious.  The smooth texture and full flavor makes me wonder why such a simple thing has been overlooked for so long.

The puree of leeks lends itself to a number of ideas, from a last minute addition to a sauce to add body to the starring role in a tapioca pudding we are working on. There's a reason why the French prize these long green beauties. Their sweet, earthy flavor has the ability to complement and make almost any other ingredient taste exponentially more delicious.

LA Times and Chef Blogs

It was great to see an article on chef blogs by one of our favorite food writers  in the LA Times today.  And we pleasantly surprised to see that we were mentioned.  A friend of ours sent us a picture of the article.  And yes, that is our website in the background on his computer screen. (Thanks Mark!)

What is exciting about this article is that more and more chefs are starting blogs and sticking with them.  We can honestly say that Ideas in Food has been instrumental in our own culinary development, refinement, creativity and quest for tasty.  It's been a great experience for us and our readers have been a fountain of new ideas.  We look forward to more chefs finding their voices and creating new inspirations for us all.

The Porous Egg, Revisited

As it turns out, our initial calculations for infusing eggs with smoke flavor via smoke powder were slightly optimistic. We ended up utilizing the paste method and leaving the eggs in a mixture of smoke powder and water for 48 hours versus our initial plan of twenty four hours in just the powder. Breakfast this morning was a revelation. The smoke flavor was concentrated in the yolk and a bit more delicate in the white. It had a rich and well rounded smoke flavor that evoked visions of country ham and cheesy grits without any of that ancient ashtray flavor that sometimes appears in overly smoked foods. These eggs are amazing. If you have any smoke powder in the pantry get going. They'll be ready in time for Friday night supper or the perfect weekend breakfast. The results are totally worth the two minutes of effort it will take to make the paste, rub it on the eggs, wrap them up, and leave them in the fridge for two days. Seriously, these eggs will make your meal.

Next up rubbing eggs with flavored oils and letting them infuse for 48 hours, black truffle being the first on deck. We're also going to rub a few with some pureed lime pickle just for fun. We'll see what develops this weekend.

Crispy Chicken Skin Wrapped Shrimp

During last Saturday's Activa class we created these crispy chicken skin wrapped shrimp balls. They were small enough to consist of one or two bites, depending upon the size of your mouth, with intense flavors and contrasting textures. In retrospect they are the perfect crispy, chewy bar snack.

The chicken skin has been blanched, chilled, and then wrapped around a seasoned filling of shrimp and parsley.  The Activa helps it all come together.  A brief poaching allows the Activa and shrimp to set, enabling us to deep fry these tasty little balls.  (I know the first picture is misleading, but they're not that kind of balls.)

Meanwhile, the saga of our basement continues. For those of you just joining us, there was major flooding on our block during the freak storm last August, causing substantial damage in the finished basement of our home in Queens. The basement has been under construction, so to speak since last October. What began as a two week project stretched out over almost six months. Last weekend we parted ways with the "gentleman" in charge of the project. On the bright side, the majority of the work had been finished, although we will have to bring in someone else to complete the work, we should finally be able to use the basement again relatively soon. This is a very good thing since it has been a wasteland since August.

Anyway, because of this recent parting of the ways Alex and I have been painting. The rooms were basically primed, top to bottom, and there was one coat of paint on most of the walls.  We needed to finish the entire job, including three doors. The baseboard and trim have not been installed yet so there will be more painting in our future once we get through this part. Painting is a lot of fun in the beginning. As the day goes on you realize that you are discovering lots of dormant muscles and that trying to run a roller across the ceiling in a straight line when you're under five feet tall can be challenging. At the end of the day we were paint spattered and feeling pretty good about our progress. We had gotten a lot of painting and cleaning done without killing each other. Now we were looking for a cold beer and quick sustenance.

Let me tell you, there's nothing like an ice cold Molson XXX and some chicken skin wrapped shrimp  to take the edge off. Now we're off to the showers.

The Porous Egg

In the beginning we used to smoke eggs.  We had a smoker where we could set its temperature and then smoke ingredients at that temperature for any period of time.  We worked on smoking eggs.  The flavor was good, though we wanted a bit more smoke in our eggs.  We served it in a warm black truffle broth with bacon lardons and a clear cloche to capture aromas and allow diners to see and anticipate what was about to be uncovered.

Playing with different times and temperatures in the smoker yielded a variety of results.  Smoked egg salad is tasty, even if it is not the anticipated end result.  After we ran through an array of ideas with smoked eggs we put the idea back on the shelf.

After a recent meal the smoked egg memories were evoked.  Questions emerged.  We know that egg shells are porous and will absorb flavors.  Our previous smoked eggs and the proven technique of storing truffles with eggs to infuse them with their flavor may have been the initial spark.  Why stop there?  What if we could infuse eggs with smoke without putting them in the smoker?  That would be quite clever.  It turns out that we can.  We took raw eggs in their shells and rubbed them with hickory smoke powder from Terra Spice.  We let the eggs infuse for twelve hours and the results produced a faintly smoky flavor on the egg.  We believe another twelve hours of infusion will produce the balanced smoke flavor we are looking for.  The next experiment will be to to make a paste with the smoke powder and water and apply that to the egg shell for complete coverage and more rapid infusion.

If the infusion works with smoke what other essences and infusions will emerge?  Fresh herbs and citrus zests and juices, jalapenos and vanilla beans, cinnamon and szechuan peppercorns, ground chiles and evaporated tequila.  Freeze dried powders could be a great resource here as well as kasu and miso.  The variety of options they provide are almost endless. The aromas will be captured by the egg, which can be served simply, without the inclusion of the ingredient in the egg itself.  And if an infusion works, what about soaking eggs in brines.  Can we make bacon  broth and soak eggs in it?  Will we then have bacon in eggs?  Imagine the possibilities.

Pork Belly Chop

We unveiled the pork belly chop yesterday in our Introduction to Activa class.  Not many things are better than pig on a stick.  We cooked the belly chop sous vide for twenty hours at 67 degrees Celsius and then chilled it.  Once it was cold, we sliced chops and seared them first on the skin side to create crackling goodness, then we kissed the sides to caramelize the rich and decadent meat.  For the class we all just ate meat on a stick, though we are working on ideas for complete dishes starring the belly chop. It's our ultimate vision of porky goodness (this week anyway).

Putting on the Ritz

It just had to be done.

Ritz Cracker Ice Cream

480g half and half
105g sugar
180g crumbled Ritz crackers
200g sour cream

Combine the sugar and the half and half and the sugar and bring to a boil.  Pour over the crumbled Ritz crackers and then stir in the sour cream.  Puree in a blender and strain.  Freeze in a Pacojet canister or chill and then process in an ice cream maker.

Eating this is like eating pie crust ice cream. It captures all of the best qualities of the Ritz crackers and loses that slightly oily flavor that they sometimes have. I can imagine eating this with a fresh fruit compote as a kind of inverted pie and a la mode. Even without gilding the lily, it's simply delicious.

I eat it alone in the kitchen by the spoonful, I suppose I could break out some cheese or fruit but that's just not how I roll.

Pork Belly Chops

Now this is something I can sink my teeth into.

Mastic

Mastic  or Masticha is the resin from the Pistacia Lentiscus tree. The trees are commercially cultivated for the purpose of harvesting mastic tears. The very best mastic is said to come from the south side of the Greek Island of Chios. In July and August the producers go out early in the mornings and make small slits in the bark to release the resin. The resin dries on the bark into a Clear, crystalline “tears” which are collected at the end of August, cleaned, sun dried, sorted, and sold. The tears are divided into two categories: immaculate otherwise known as dahtilidopetres or flintstones and the second rate softer, spotted ones referred to as kantiles or blisters.

The teardrops were the first version of chewing gum in Greece.  As you masticate, they soften into a firm, chewy mouthful with flavors of licorice and pine. Mastic has been utilized for a wide range of purposes such as a flavoring for alcohol, a spice, as toothpaste and breath fresheners, in cosmetics, dental fillings, natural adhesives, and varnish. Mastic has been found to have antibacterial and antifungal properties and is often used in holistic medicine to treat a variety of gastric ailments. Typically mastic is sold as teardrops although it can also be found as a paste or a powder. The teardrops must usually be ground to a fine powder, usually with sugar, in order to be used for culinary purposes.

High quality mastic has a slight edge of bitterness and a soft resiny flavor. Mastic may have hints of licorice and vanilla, it is a little reminiscent of Pledge, but softer and more subtle. It is used in various culinary applications from drinks to breads to desserts and ice creams. In Cyprus it is often paired with orange flower or rose water and served as a spoon sweet. It is a trendy ingredient at the moment, popping up in kitchens everywhere. We love the soft woodsy flavor and have played with a variety of applications from savory to sweet. Mastic works especially well with seafood and is a wonderful earthy counterpoint to sweet, briny oysters, succulent chewy cod,  and rich, delicate turbot.

Grinding the mastic drops can be a challenge. Cooking with resin can be hard on your stainless steel, months later I still haven't gotten all of sticky residue out of the pot from Alex's first experiment with mastic tears. So when we were shopping at Titan Foods in Astoria we were both excited to come across a mastic paste.  The one we picked up by Sarantis is made with Sugar, glucose syrup, E220 (a preservative; sulphur dioxide) and mastic. The combination of sugar and glucose means that paste is not overly sweet. It has been much easier to work with than the tears, and allowed us to really play with mastic in new ways. It's a very versatile ingredient and with the onset of Spring it seems like the perfect season for experimenting with its pine infused flavor.

Yogurt and Mastic

We put our caramelized yogurt in a Pacojet canister and froze it.  After a turn of the machine we did not get a smooth and creamy frozen yogurt.  Instead, I was looking at a fine frozen powder of caramelized yogurt.  And the taste and texture kept me from spinning the yogurt again.  The powder was light and delicate and melted into the rich decadent caramelized yogurt that I was hoping for.  The slight grainy texture we experienced pre-Pacojet was now gone. 

We were also working with one of the incredible products we found at a local Greek grocery store.  One of our discoveries was a mastic confection made with glucose and mastic oil.  The confection is incredible and warranted immediate use.  I took small dollops of it and placed it in the freezer.  When it became ice cold I was able to shape it into mastic pearls.  The combination of the yogurt and the mastic pearls is amazing.  Bright and refreshing, rich, and clean, acidic and soothing.

I debated adding more elements to this dish.  It did not need anything.  It is a rare day when two ingredients can unite and elevate each other in perfect harmony. Mastic and caramelized yogurt, it's a smashing combination.

Caramelized Yogurt 2008

I have often debated whether or not to try to cook sous vide in a pressure cooker.  I have asked others for their thoughts on the process.  We felt that we could produce some exciting results in the process.  Unfortunately, I was not confident enough to test it in our pressure cooker.  What if the bag explodes in the chamber?  What if the pressure cooker explodes?  These fears kept me thinking instead of acting.

Thankfully, I received an email from Richard Blais who mentioned his recent success pressure cooking pork bellies sous vide.  And like a lemming, I jumped off the cliff.  My first test was caramelized yogurt.  We used to make caramelized yogurt by cooking the yogurt in sealed mason jars standing in a water bath in the oven at 180 degrees Fahrenheit for 24 hours.  Yesterday I was able to caramelize yogurt in ninety minutes.  That is a heck of a difference in time and the results are the same.

We removed the yogurt from the pressure cooker and drained it.  As the water leaches out it becomes firm and cheese like.  We then puree it with uncooked whole milk yogurt.  The result is a fluid, decadent yogurt, which has complex flavors with the caramel notes and a lactic acid tang.  It is a wonderful addition to the pantry and a strong building block for new dishes.

March Classes

Since March has already begun we are clearly a bit behind this month. We're juggling a few different things and so it's not always easy to plan ahead. Here are our offerings and we hope you can join us for one of the classes.

Hydrocolloids at Home

Monday, March 10, 2008 10am-1pm
Saturday, March 15, 2008 10am-1pm
$125 per person

This course is designed to give cooks and chefs an understanding of what they are and how to work with them. We will be working with xanthan gum, agar agar, carageenan, locust bean gum, Methocel A15C & F50, and gellan.

Getting to Know Activa

Saturday March 8, 2008 1pm-4pm
Sunday, March 29, 2008 10am-1pm
$125 per person

The endless possibilities of working with tranglutaminase from chicken skin crusted fish to flourless potato gnocchi.

More Hydrocolloids at Home

Saturday, March 22, 2008 10am-1pm
Monday, March 24, 2008 10am-1pm
$125 per person

This class will be designed for people already comfortable using hydrocolloids and will focus on complete dishes and recipes utilizing items like the false egg or the pectin encased soup.

*As always, the classes take place in Forest Hills, NY. Please email us for more information or to make a reservation. Private classes are available by request.

Brown Butter Bounty

One of the great things about the internet is the open exchange of ideas. There is always the possibility of making a new discovery or finding an inspiration when you open a new web page. You never know where it will happen, although you know the possibility is always there.

Last week Michael Laiskonis blogged about brown butter. This led to a discussion in the comments about the best way to extract the most milk solids from dairy and how to get the best yield of brown butter solids to play with. The discussion culminated with a comment by Cory Barrett, the pastry chef at Lola Bistro. He said:

So the idea of browning the powdered butterfat interested me. We’ve been tossing around a carrot cake dessert here at lola and wanted some type of brown butter element on the dish. So we thought why not just add non fat dry milk powder to the butter as we brown it. One pound butter + about a 1/4 of a cup (sorry didn't take the weight down). Browned the butter a little slower than usual, but the results are great. All the powdered browned and was easy to strain out or leave in. Thanks for the inspiration.

Simply brilliant. We tried it and the results are pictured above. Thanks to Michael and Cory, we now have access to a new approach which yields an bounty of brown butter solids which can be integrated into innumerable dishes.

For our brown butter solids we melted 225g of whole butter and added 100g of non-fat milk powder.  We followed Cory's slow browning approach to really develop the nutty flavors.  To further increase the brown butter flavor we actually poured the fat back over the solids and let them marinate overnight.  (This too is Cory's idea, he was kind enough to share the improvement when I spoke with him earlier yesterday to thank him for the inspiration.)

Tomorrow we play.

Kimchee Barley

I did end up making some hot spring eggs to serve nestled in the warm, spiced grains of kimchee flavored barley.  I omitted the sausage and instead topped the egg with a warm sheet of shrimp.  A sprinkling of scallions, cilantro leaves and lemon zest completed the dish.  And while I planned on waiting to serve the eggs for breakfast yesterday they ended up being a mid afternoon snack.  When inspiration comes knocking I always try to open the door and welcome it in.

Home Made Ketchup

It's video five because ketchup is a classic. We love the original Heinz so much that we were inspired to try and make our own. It's a relatively painless process and the results are totally worth the effort.