Archives for May 2011
Tentop presents “Supfast” - Part 2 or, Eggs: I Fucking Love ‘Em
31 May 2011 | breakfast, delicious, eggs, faithful readers, nomnomnomnom, recipe, tentop | No Responses
Anyone who has eaten with me, or cooked with me for that matter, has more than likely heard me spout off about my love of eggs, specifically warm egg yolk. Faithful readers know that warm egg yolk is hands down my favorite flavor in the whole culinary world. It adds richness, a silky smooth fattiness to almost any dish. I eat sunny side up eggs almost every morning, I have for years. If I have a late night and wake up at two in the afternoon, I still want to eat eggs before anything else that day. In addition to it’s unparalleled flavor, the egg holds a special place in my heart for it’s many useful properties. Thickening, leavening, emulsifying to name a few. Eggs are also one of those ethereal ingredients that you don’t always realize are there, but would know something was missing if they weren’t. The incredible, edible egg also has the the ability to put one in the hospital, if you happen to be my good friend Eric who is allergic.
Anyway, when we set out to create our SupFast menu for tentop, we took great care not to inundate our menu with eggs, which are an integral part of any breakfast as far as I’m concerned. Our solution was an egg trio, using quail eggs; which contain all the deliciousness at a third of the size. We had what we called Huevos Benedictos, a Spanish version of the classic brunch item. I started with a rich brioche recipe from one of my new favorite cookbooks, The Modern Cafe by Francisco Migoya. This dough has so much butter in it, it took almost 30 minutes beating on it with the dough hook before it started to develop any gluten. We topped these toasted rounds with serrano and a sunny side quail egg, then sauce charon made with Viridian Farms espelette powder. The second egg on the plate was a “scotch.” I use quotes because we skipped the whole packing the soft boiled egg in sausage bit, and just breaded and deep fried it. We did this for two reasons. One, the whole idea came for trying this egg from a bi-product of another dish we did for Satan’s Feast. The angry allium dish had fried pepperoni on it, small rounds which we cut from bigger slices. We fried up the trimmings for a snack and found we had made these perfect little pedestals, ideal for cradling a little egg. Secondly, to “lighten” what was shaping up to be a rich dish, and one with a meaty pedestal to boot, we skipped the sausage. Also, after having soft boiled and peeled 24 quail eggs to get 16, I wasn’t about to risk losing more by smooshing meat around ‘em. A little gremolata (under the egg) helped soak up the warm yolk as well as add a nice vegetal note. Lastly, behold the noble omelet. I originally suggested to my co-chef Michael that we do an egg white version, and before I had finished the sentence he had this look on his face that said “fuck that.” And he was right. Egg white omelets are bullshit. So we went in the opposite direction, and used all yolks for these little babies. Inside was Mt. Townsend New Moon Jack cheese and Viridian Farms asparagus. I created a sauce by browning butter, then adding a little salt and champagne vinegar. In my pastry mind’s eye I felt I could give the sauce a little body with a few sheets of gelatin, which worked, kind of. I had to remove almost all of the fat (clarified butter) from the sauce before I noticed any real thickening. It was a smooth, intense sauce. Garnish was for a little crunch, form of…fricco! For the brunch we did a similar dish, minus the “scotch.”
Sauce Charon
2 egg yolks
Juice from 1 lemon
1 1/2 cups clarified butter
1/4 cup tomato paste, warm
Pimente d’Espilette to taste
salt to taste
warm water to adjust consistency
1. Warm clarified butter to body temperature.
2. Whisk egg yolk, lemon juice, and a little warm water until mixture is light and frothy.
3. Using an immersion blender, blend mixture continuously while drizzling in the warm butter. I do this in a six pan or a small bain marie insert. I like to put these above a stove or oven to warm them before I start the sauce.
4. Adjust consistency with warm water through the butter adding process. The sauce should have a loose mayonnaise look.
5. When all the butter is added, add the warm tomato paste, espilette powder, and season with salt to taste. Serve ASAP, keep warm.
Tentop presents “Supfast” - Part 1.
25 May 2011 | creative presentation of the week, delicious, faithful readers, recipe, tentop | 2 Responses
This rather innocuous looking dish was a showcase in decadence and a personal milestone for me as a Chef. The first course in tentop’s latest dinner “Supfast,” we this called Duck in a Blanket. We rolled foie gras torchon into a thin pancake and served it with a maple gastrique and crushed hazelnut brittle. This dish marked a milepost for me on a long and winding road: making foie torchon from start to finish without a Chef lording over me. And I must say, faithful readers; when all was said and done: Nailed it. I followed the recipe in The French Laundry cookbook, and I had my lovely and talented girlfriend Ingrid help me with the rolling and poaching, and then the re-rolling and hanging. The next step of the process however, I learned from Chef Eric Suniga during his brief stint as Ten-01 Sous. After the torchon was hung for a few days, I brought it up to room temperature passed it through a tamis, then piped the soft and supple liver into an acetate lined mold. This last step is truly the move in foie gras handling. Firstly, any veins that you missed in the initial cleaning of the lobe is removed, and any oxidation or discoloring from blood is mixed in; you get a nice, rosy pink color. Finally, you can mold it really into any shape, I did a variety of log shapes once I had what I needed for service of the skinnys.
The dish was super successful, we wrapped the frozen little foie sticks into a hot thin pancake; which warmed the fatty liver to a perfect temp for eating in a few seconds. The idea was to dip into the gastrique first, then into the hazelnut brittle, and then into your mouth. A great start to what proved to be an amazing meal. We did a similar menu for a brunch over the weekend, the foie in this case a key component of a dish simply called “pancakes.”
Hazelnut Brittle
1 cup white sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup light corn syrup
2 tablespoons butter
2 1/2 cups roasted unsalted hazelnuts, sliced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
Few drops vanilla
Directions
Put a large pot or kettle over a medium heat. Add sugar, water, and corn syrup and bring to a boil.
When mixture comes to a boil, add butter.
Cook to 260 degrees F on a candy thermometer without stirring and add the sliced hazelnuts
Bring mixture to 300 degrees F and stir in salt, baking soda and vanilla.
Pour mixture onto a greased baking sheet and spread out and allow to cool.
