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Here is another dessert that I serve at Ten-01.  It’s called Olive Oil Beignets with Lemon Sage Anglaise.  I did this dessert at my tasting for the job here because we have these really sweet bowls.  The sauce rides in a little caddy up front, and the dougnuts in back.  I think these were what got me the job.  Oh yeah, and a little magazine called Bon Appetit is running them in thier June 08 issue.  The pastry is a basic pate choux, where most of butter is replaced with olive oil.  Typically, choux paste uses water, but I like using good ‘ol whole milk.  The batter is basically an enriched roux that eggs are added to while its still warm.  I’m not sure what science is going on here, but according to Harold McGee in On Food And Cooking,  cooking the flour with the liquid and fat tenderizes the gluten protiens, preventing them from develpoing elasticity, and the addition of eggs adds flavor from the yolks and structure from the whites.  This basic recipe dates back to 1540, and was fine tuned much later by none other than Antoine Careme. After making the batter I pipe it into little dougnut shapes and freeze them rock hard.  They go from the freezer straight into a 325 degree fryer for about eight minutes, until golden brown.  While they’re still a little greasy and pipng hot, I toss them in granulated sugar.  Half the point of this dish is the sauce, and with the infusion of sage and lemon zest, it nails that whole sweet/savory thing.  Another ancient recipe, creme anglaise, is about as easy as it gets.  Bring the cream, sugar, zest and herbs to just boiling, kill the heat and cover it for 30 minutes.  Strain out the cream and temper in the yolks and cook it, stirring constantly, to a thick custard, around 165 degrees.  Once cool, its perfect for dipping doughnuts or spinning into ice cream.  Pastry Chef Heidi Kaufmann at Fenouil gave me this sauce recipe, it’s really quite good.

Olive Oil Beignet

2 cups milk
2 oz butter
6 oz olive oil
2 tblsp sugar
1/2 tblsp salt

2 cups A.P. flour

8 eggs

1. Bring first 5 ingredients to a boil
2. Sift flour and add to pot, cooking until it forms a ball
3. Transfer the mix to the bowl of a stand mixer, and add the eggs slowly, one or two at a time
4. Pipe and freeze

Lemon Sage Crème Anglaise
by Heidi Kaufmann
3 cups heavy cream
6 oz sugar
pinch of salt
Pulp of ½ vanilla bean
1 handful of loose chopped Sage (stems as well)
Zest of 2 lemons

3/4 of a cup egg yolk

1.Combine first six ingredients and bring to a simmer
2.Turn off the heat and cover, steep for 30 minutes
3.Strain the resulting liquid and return to heat, scald.
4.Temper in egg yolk and cook to nape