Archives Under "plated dessert" (RSS)
Caramel Mousse Cake.
27 August 2008 | Ten 01, creative presentation of the week, custard, delicious, plated dessert | No Responses
I ran this dessert as a special last weekend and it sold pretty well. With milk chocolate sauce and hazelnut praline, it looked sharp and tasted delicious. The chocolate base is Tony’s truffle sponge, almost a brownie but with egg whites folded in. The central crunchy layer was a caramel candy filling, which I augmented with a little milk chocolate and feuilletine. The mousse was a new recipe, one I found on Cuisine French. The recipe caught my eye because it assumed a certain level of knowledge and technique. For example, step three in the recipe states “prepare a custard with the milk, sugar, constarch, and egg yolks.” That’s my kind of recipe. The praline garnish, I’m embarrassed to say, is isomalt. This synthetic sugar always makes me feel like a cheater, a corner-cutter and a hack. It is a beautiful garnish however, so I guess it’s OK. I learned how to make those over ten years ago now. Hmph….I’m getting old. Meanwhile, it’s business as usual at the restaurant, things have been picking up. The Oregoinian released an excellent review of us last week, and we’ve been seeing increasing numbers. I couldn’t find the review online…even without mention of the desserts-it was a good one. 
The Latest Dessert Menu.
30 July 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 3 Responses
So I took the chocolate flour-less cake recipe that I used for Chocolate Whiskey Cake, and I piped and swirled some NY Cheesecake batter into it and I’m calling it Marble Cheesecake. I discovered this process by mistake at Carlyle, where I had the two batters ready at the same time. Funny how stuff comes together sometimes. I learned one recipe from Tony, and one from Mark, it’s as if I delivered their bastard child. The creaminess of the cheesecake flirts with the fudge-like chocolate, blackberry coulis and delicate horseshoe chocolate garnish sells it. Pretty cool looking I thought, and hell of decadent. I used this cake for a recent off-site event, and it was well received. Some people even want it for their birthday. Right now Bramble-type berries are so good in Oregon, and these blackberries are no exception. Viridian farms delivers, and the berries don’t disappoint. Take for example their blueberries, which are an integral part of the Lemon Blueberry Tart, below. This is an extremely simple dessert, pate sucre, lemon curd, the blueberries and coulis, a bit of chantilly. It’s selling well. I didn’t know how it was going to work until I had it on the plate. Simple and delicious. I’m also using their raspberries for the new Bread Pudding set, with raspberry caramel ice cream, a different but delicious frozen treat. Also new this menu is Funnel Cakes. I wanted to try these again to see if I could actually produce them, instead of just piping a few like I originally did. I can. I can also serve it with roasted banana anglaise and call it a day.
NY Cheesecake…Kind Of.
4 June 2008 | creative presentation of the week, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 1 Response
People go nuts for this dessert. Eyes pop out of people’s heads. It changes worlds. Even Chef cleaned his plate and he rarely does with sweets. So it’s this month’s Creative Presentation of the Week. Just a little New York Style Cheesecake with Balsamic Strawberries and Hazelnut Scone. As I look at the plate now, I marvel at how I put TWO leaves of mint. C’mon dude! It’s a basic cheesecake recipe I learned from Mark Metzger at the Vail Cascade. I used it also at Carlyle for the cheesecake three ways. Thanks Mark!! The balsamic strawberries were Chef’s idea, and after some tinkering we reproduced them. Look at those babies! All glistening and shit. The “crust” on this cheesecake comes form of scone. I always liked scones for strawberry shortcakes and this dish had strawberries so I thought, what the F. Toasted hazelnuts and sugar crust it up. It’s a little weird, sure, but damn yummy. My faithful readers need these recipes. So…here:
Metzger NY Cheesecake
1 1/2 # cream cheese at room temp
6 oz sugar
Pulp of 1 vanilla bean
3 eggs
1. Preheat the oven to 250 (200 for convection.) Place the cream cheese, sugar and vanilla pulp in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a paddle. Beat on low speed for 5 minutes
2. Scrape the bowl thoroughly with a spatula.
3. Add the eggs, one at a time scraping thoroughly between each addition. The more careful you are here, the better your end product. Add and scrape!! Visualize that nipple in the bottom of the mixing bowl, and scrape it well!!
4. Transfer the batter to a square flexible mold.
5. Bake in a water bath for 25 minutes, then rotate the pan, and bake for another 15 minutes.
6. At this point, the cheesecake should be set on the outsides, and slightly jiggly in the middle. Open the oven door for a sec, then close it and turn the oven off. Set a timer for 45 minutes. I finish all of my custards this way, it works really well. Thanks Alton.
7. Chill the cake for at least 3 hrs before attempting to de-mold and slice. I usually flash mine in the freezer for about 25 minutes to get a clean square.
Balsamic Strawberries
3 cups balsamic vinegar
1 cup honey
granulated sugar to taste
2 vanilla beans scraped
2 pods toasted star anise
2 1/2 - 3 cups hulled local strawberries
1. Measure the balsamic and honey into a pot and whisk to combine. Whisk in the the sugar 1/2 cup at a time until you reach the desired sweetness. Remember the strawberries have a good sweetness as well.
2. Scape the vanilla pods into the pot and bring the mix to a boil.
3. Add the berries and kill the heat. Cover and steep for 25-30 minutes until berries are tender but still slightly firm. They will carry over, so…
4. Create an ice bath with water, ice and two vessels. Stop the cooking process.
5. Carefully pour the steeped berries and liquid into the ice bath. Try not to agitate the berries as they cool, they become very fragile.
Scones
I left the scone recipe at work. Eat your fucking cheesecake. Here’s a good scone recipe for you. And here’s a picture of some ice creams.
Here’s a New Dessert.
18 May 2008 | Ten 01, plated dessert, dessert | No Responses
Actually, it’s an one that Tony taught me, I give it a little spin with caramelized banana’s and creme anglaise. It’s a brownie base, peanut butter crunchy layer, and milk chocolate mousse. Peanut florentine cookie garnishes. I’m also doing Bailey’s Creme Brulee with double chocolate cookies. Fucking Fantastic! A weird and interesting dessert was Melon in Lime Syrup with Crispy Phyllo and Black Pepper Ice Cream (below.) It was an adaptation of one of David Lebowitz’s ideas from his book the Perfect Scoop. Damn Tasty. As we roll into summer I’m trying to get more frozen treats on the menu, y’know ice creams and such. I made a Mint Chip the other day that was probably the best ice cream I have ever made. Fresh and minty, I ate it right from the machine. Soon I will unleash it on the public. I also saw some good berries at the farmer’s market this saturday. Hopefully I can get some soon to make short cakes. Hey, check out this web comic I found today: Obscene Cuisine by John McDowell. It’s all about restaurants and written by an actual disgruntled chef. Funny shit.
I Make Dessert V.
26 March 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 4 Responses
Awww…it’s cute!! Well as Tony once said, we’re in the cute business. This is the Sorbet Trio, dreamed up by Jack Yoss, and realized by me. Chef wanted to do this dish for this past New Years Eve, and they we kept it on the menu as the light choice. At first, before I got Gelatoo-D2, we were buying all of our sorbets (and ice creams) from Great Northwest Ice Cream in Vancouver, WA. Now that we make our own, I use the simplest of techniques for sorbet. Mix 2 parts fruit puree to 1 part simple syrup. As a general rule this works for every puree I’ve tried. Pictured above is pear, strawberry, and marionberry. I adjust sweetness to taste by adding water, add a little lemon juice, and spin it. An easy test for proper ingredient porportions in the “egg test.” I don’t know why this works, but it does. I believe it is somehow measuring brix. Anyway, after you mix together all your ingredients, gently place a whole egg in its shell into the sorbet base. If the egg floats so that only a dime-size portion of the shell is above the liquid, he has achieved the right balance of ingredients. If it sinks lower, the mixture requires more sugar. If more of the shell is visible, the recipe needs more water. Like I said, I’m not sure of the science here, but I’m okay with that. So you’ve got your sorbet, how about those adorable little cones? Those are made from a simple tuile cookie recipe that I stole years ago from Charlie Trotter’s Desserts. The batter is spread into a flat cone shape, sprinkled with chopped hazelnuts, baked, then molded while still warm in a pastry tip. In an airtight container, they last forever. I rotate the flavors of “broth” that the sorbet’s sit in, it’s basically a sweetened fruit puree and a complimentary wine that is brought to a simmer and then chilled. This week it’s Raspberry-Rose. I use little stray pieces of pate fruit (gelee) to garnish the soup. Here’s some recipes:
Basic Sorbet Base
2 cups fruit puree
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
juice of half a lemon
1. Combine the sugar and water in a saucepot and bring to a boil. Chill completely.
2. Mix the 2 cups puree with 1 cup of the simple syrup. Add the lemon juice. Taste it. Is it too sweet? Add water.
3. Perform the egg test as described above…go ahead…it works.
Tuile Cookie Batter
6 tblsp (3 oz) butter
pulp from 1 vanilla bean
3 egg whites
1/2 cup plus 1 tblsp sugar
1/2 cup plus 1 tblsp a.p. flour
for chocolate use:
1/4 cup plus 1 tblsp a.p. flour
1/4 cup cocoa
1. Melt butter with vanilla pulp and cool to room temp
2. Whip egg whites and sugar to soft peaks
3. Sift in flour and mix to combine
4. Store or spread thin and bake @ 350 for 5-7 minutes
I Make Dessert IV.
23 March 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 3 Responses
Now, as my faithful readers know, I love Bread Pudding. If I see it on a dessert menu, I order it. Something about soaking brioche or croissants in a rich custard and then baking it (and then frying it,) really appeals to me. In the case of Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding , pictured here, I use brioche. I serve it with caramelized bananas, dark rum sauce, and salted caramel ice cream. It’s starting to beat out the Chocolate Cake as our top selling dessert. The idea for bread pudding, is as old as the hills, and its no wonder. Set the Way Back Machine for the middle ages, at the advent of custard. Dude’s sitting there eating his baked custard, or more likely, swirling his day-old bread in his creme anglaise. Ever the frugal cook and lover of bread (in spite of its short window of delicious,) he swirls and dunks and lifts and chews. POP! The light bulb goes off, bathing everyone in the light of pudding history, bread pudding is born. Seriously, though, a better use for stale bread bread cannot be found. It’s actually better with stale bread, because it’s more absorbent. Old cookbooks have tons of random recipes, but I like to take a slightly different approach. Chef Tony showed me a way to make the custard that makes a lot of sense. Creaming. If you follow the creaming method, you get a nice rich custard where the butter is evenly dispersed in tiny little particles that melt into the bread in the oven. Overnight soaking is key, getting that bread good and permeated with eggy flavor and creamy goodness. Below is a huge recipe, adapted from Chef Tony Martin’s Bourbon Bread Pudding that to this day, is the best I’ve tasted. I added chocolate chips to his base, but you could add almost anything to this, and it would be damn good. This recipe is 1/3 of what I use, it makes one 2″ hotel pan. Want a smaller recipe? Try this one.
Bread Soaking Custard
1 lb 4 oz butter
1 lb sugar
15 eggs1 qt heavy cream
1 qt half & half
vanilla extract to taste
1. Cream the butter and sugar light and fluffy with the paddle attachment in a stand mixer.
2. Add the eggs slowly, in three additions, waiting until the eggs absorb and scraping before each addition.
3. Switch to the whip and add the cream and half and half.
So now that you have your custard, you need to soak some bread in it. You need enough stale bread (brioche, croissants, or other bread-remove crusty crusts) to soak up almost all of the custard right when you mix it in. Then cover it and soak it over night. Next day mix in the desired amount of chocolate chips (or ripe bananas, caramel apples, scales of a sea serpent, eye of newt, or whatever tickles your fancy.) and bake it, covered with foil, in a 325 degree oven for about 45 minutes, until its set. If you like, pull the foil off 10 minutes before its done to brown the top. Try something else delicious: omit the sugar, andbefore baking, add sauteed mushrooms, or chunks of foie gras, or bacon, or something savory. It’s gonna be great.
I Make Dessert III.
20 March 2008 | Ten 01, creative presentation of the week, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 4 Responses
So we’ve all had creme brulee, and we’ve all had peanut butter and jelly, but who out there among my faithful readers has had PB&J Creme Brulee? I love this fucking dessert. I think it deserves Creative Presentation of the Week. Why, you may ask? Well, it’s the culmination of alot of hard work, during which I subsisted on pb&j sandwiches, and also, I’ve known this peanut butter custard recipe was solid since The Velvet Elvis. This idea had been struggling to come out, and it took the influence of Chef Jack Yoss to see it’s realization. I made him the peanut butter brulee to try and he suggested putting marionberry jam into the ramekin first, ’cause he loved the custard…and he loves pb&j, too. We first tried it in our regular brulee molds, but after one day the jam would seep through the custard and create this gnarly looking scar when you tried to brulee it. We went to a deeper dish to avoid that problem, and also started reducing the jam first to remove any excess moisture. House made honey roasted peanuts are sprinkled on after carmelizing the custard. The shot of chocolate milk actually came about because of a guest suggestion: it was good, but needed chocolate. After some experimentaion, I went with good old Hersheys choclolate syrup to make it because let’s face it, that’s what chocolate milk is. A little heavy cream adds some creaminess, as if this dish needed it. This is my favorite item on the current menu…I don’t know why we don’t sell more of them…C’MON PEOPLE!!! The only thing missing is the bread, and you had some with your salad!! Anyway, here’s the recipes:
Peanut Butter & Jelly Brulee
1 1/3 cups whole milk
1 1/3 cups whipping cream
6 tablespoons plus 6 teaspoons sugar
5+ oz creamy peanut butter (do not use old-fashioned style or freshly ground)
8 large egg yolks
marionberry jam as needed (or any other jam that you prefer)
1. Combine milk, cream, sugar and scald
2. Temper in eggs
3. Temper in peanut butter and whisk until smooth
4. Taste the cream. I always end up adding a little more peanut butter, up to 1 cup
5. Strain the cream and chill overnight or at least three hours.
6. Place the jam in a saucepot and reduce it by one-third over low heat, stirring occasionally.
7. Cool the jam slighty and then spread it in an even layer into the bottom of desired (deep) ramekin. Pop them in the freezer to set the jam.
8. When the jam is super cold and won’t be distured by pouring in the custard, pour in the custard
9. Bake the custard in a 300 degree oven, in a water bath for 30 minutes or so, or until set at the edges, and a little loose at the center. Open the oven, turn it off, close the door, and finish them for another 45 minutes.
10. Chill the brulee’s for at least 3 hours before sprinkling some granulated sugar and a blowtorch to carmelize. Sprinkle with loose chopped honey roasted peanuts if desired.
Chocolate Milk
2 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup heavy cream
10 oz Hershey’s Syrup
1. Place all ingredients in a blender and blend. Serve ice cold in a chilled glass.
I Make Dessert.
16 March 2008 | Ten 01, delicious, plated dessert, dessert | 4 Responses
Okay, so I’m no Michael Laiskonis. I am however, a pastry chef, and I’m making some pretty tasty delights at Ten-01. I’m going to use my next few posts to describe my current menu, because I’m pretty proud of it. What better place to start than our best seller, The Chocolate Whiskey Cake. It’s a rich flourless cake that contains all my favorite ingredients: chocolate, butter, sugar, eggs, and booze. The butter is melted and poured over the chocolate. While that cools to room temperature the eggs and sugar are whisked up until they just turn pale and the sugar is dissolved. The to mixtures are then combined, and finished with the booze, which in this case is Maker’s Mark. I pour the batter into a framed half-sheet pan, and bake it in a 250 degree oven in a water bath. The tricky part of this recipe is knowing when it’s done. I pull it when its still loose in the center, and its starting to souffle a little on the edges. It needs to cool and set up before slicing and serving, which I like to do overnite. The cake is covered with ganache and white chocolate lines before slicing. I serve it with a Dulche de Leche ice cream and Brown Butter Caramel. The chocolate flag garnish gives it some height. It’s fucking delicious. To be quite honest, I’m kind of bored with it, and I wish someone else would make it. So here’s the recipe:
1 lb 13 oz chocolate (%68)
1 lb 13 oz butter
13 oz sugar
13 oz whole eggs
3/4 cup liquor (I’ve used whiskey, kaluha, bailey’s, meyer’s…you get the idea)
1. Chop the chocolate into small pieces and place it in a bowl
2. Melt the butter until it just starts to bubble, then pour it over the chocolate-cool to room temp
3. Whisk the eggs and the sugar together in a seperate bowl
4. Whisk the eggs into the chocolate
5. Pour the batter into a prepared pan and bake in a 250 degree oven, in a water bath, for thirty minutes or so.
6. Chill the cake for at least 3 hours before slicing
Bread Pudding SG-1
29 January 2008 | Ten 01, creative presentation of the week, delicious, plated dessert | 2 Responses
Here’s my Brioche Chocolate Chip Bread Pudding, which when alligned correctly, will open a portal to another universe. Okay that’s a lie. You will definitely find it delicious. We’re calling the sauce a blood orange reduction, but it’s really a caramel sauce that uses blood orange puree instead of heavy cream. A quenelle of whipped orange mascarpone cream holds down the orange zest chocolate tuile. That cookie is a sonofabitch to make. I break one in three, so I started baking just two at a time. With a baking time of five minutes, I can get six cookies in about twenty minutes…which sucks. The plate looks bangin’ though, and the bread pudding scraps keep the staff happy. In other news, people are checking out Ten-01 because of this blog. I’ll be damned. I met with a table the other night who’ve read mrjeffmccarthy.com and even mentioned the Irish Car Bomb. They’re mom even blogged about them meeting me! I’ve also started selling some of my desserts at The Armory Cafe, and they are going over well. I’m going to start making them flatbread pizza’s, almond tarts, and maybe some form of high end hot pocket. Still eating well, Mom! Check out this Lamb Chop dinner cooked up for me by our grill cook Richard! Goat Cheese Gnocchi…Yum!!
It’s Not Rocket Scientist.
24 January 2008 | food science, Roux, 503, plated dessert | 2 Responses
Volunteering at the The OMSI Science in the Kitchen Gala was a great time. The appetizer (above) that I helped Chef Sean of Roux with was delicious, and one of the most popular of the bunch. Other hits were Gabriel Rucker of Le Pigeon with his Foie Creamsicle, Woojay Poynter’s Liquid Truffle Ravioli, and also by us Roux volunteers, Tequila Pudding. Also in attendance with a mille feuille appetizer was Johnny Nunn, whom I staged with at 503. Ranking in as weirdest thing that I tried that night was Brussel Sprout Paper, and I cannot recall it’s creator. The night ran thru an interesting spectrum for me. On the one end were literally hundreds of culinary students tripping over themselves to call me “chef” and help me, and then there was me gushing as I met one of my heros Will Goldfarb as he orchestrated the massive plating of his dessert. Random cool moment: Amidst the insanity of the plating area, an unattended huge pile of black truffles. After all the hoo-ha, organizer of the event and owner of Roux Dwayne Beliakoff threw an after party for all the volunteers at Masu sushi restaurant. Arriving to the party first, I found the hugest sushi display I have ever seen in my life. Second in awesomeness to that was the open bar and the elbow rubbing with some of america’s top chefs. Meanwhile, the restaurant was extremely busy, and the suprise I found on my station on monday morning proved the I was dearly missed.
