Nobu Style Chili Steak Sauce

Ingredients:

1. Aji panca or red chili paste
2. Fourth tsp dried oregano
3. 5 tbsp sake
4. 3 tbsp rice vin
5. 25 gr minced garlic
6. 1 tsp cumin
7. 1 tsp black pepper
8. 2 tsp sea salt
9. 3 tblsp grapeseed oil

Combine everything ex oil and mix well

Add oil gradually in mixer or while whisking the sauce hard enough to emulsify the oil.

Ragu (Bolognese Sauce)

Reading this food blog inspired me to make ragu following my own recipe. I started originally with a recipe from Anna Del Conte’s book Gastronomy of Italy. Being 85 years old she does not have a website as far as I can tell but Amazon will happily sell anyone who’s interested a copy. This was for a long time my favorite Italian cookbook it is however very traditional and once you have mastered the basics not very inspiring. The ragu recipe however, is like all the traditional recipes in her book, absolutely fabulous.

I’m afraid that as with much of my cooking Mrs. Del Conte would not necessarily endorse the recipe as it has evolved in my hands. In any case the basic principle here, as with any ragu, is reduction of liquids and concentration of taste. I use veal as the bulk of the meat as it is very light but I find that its taste is not strong enough so I add about 50% beef mince to the veal. If veal is not available this recipe works just as well with only beef but obviously it will be a bit different and heavier.

Ingredients:

(When I make ragu I make enough to freeze at least three portions use later. If you used this recipe in one go this would be enough for 10 servings as Primi)

1. 500 grams veal mince (try to get fairly rough mince as you do not want the meat to fall apart in the cooking);
2. 250 grams beef mince (best quality in this case is not lean meat but something that has at least 15% fat content);
3. 100 grams chicken liver, minced really fine. You can do this with a knife;
4. 100 – 150 grams pork belly with the skin removed and cut up fine. If you can’t get pork belly use streaky bacon. Although the pork belly’s primary function is as provider of fat (and taste) I do not like to mince it like the other meats rather I cut it up as fine as I can with a sharp knife. This yields a little bit of texture in the sauce that is not at all traditional but I find very satisfying;
5. 1 large red onion cut fine;
6. 4 roughly cut garlic cloves;
7. 200 ml red vine;
8. 1 litre good quality chicken stock;
9. 150 grams tomato paste;
10. 1 tablespoon strong soy sauce;
11. Two large carrots pealed and cut in half;
12. A large celery stick cut in three (the idea is to discard both the carrot and the celery at the end);
13. A bunch each of roughly chopped Basil and Parsley;
14. Rind of Parmesan cheese. Letting the rind of Parmesan cheese simmer with the ragu yields a very nice creamy consistency in the sauce. I keep all the rinds from the parmesan I use in my freezer so that I can use it in my ragu. As I do not make ragu very often I usually have about three sizeable rinds that I let simmer for the whole coking time before discarding them at the end. If you do not have parmesan rinds you will need to use either full cream milk or cream to thicken the sauce at the very last moment;
15. Salt and pepper to taste.

Fry the pork in a very hot heavy bottomed stewing pan until a bit crisp, lower heat and add the onion and garlic and sweat it a bit. When the onion in soft add the chicken liver and fry until done (it will brown). Raise the heat and add the veal and beef mince and brown the meat.

Add red vine and boil off most of the alcohol. Meanwhile dissolve the tomato past in the stock and add to the pan along with the soy sauce and 80% of the herbs. Add the vegetables and Parmesan rind and season to taste. Bring to boil then lower the heat to a simmer and let the sauce simmer covered for about 3 – 3 ½ hours. At the end you should have a meat sauce that is not liquid but leaves “legs” on a metal spoon if you stir the sauce. If you reduce the sauce too much keep back some of the pasta boiling liquid to add to the sauce at the last moment.

Check regularly if the sauce has the desired taste and try to adjust the seasoning as you go along. You do not want to be adding large quantities of salt or pepper at the very end as that somewhat negates the effort in simmering the sauce for 3 hours.

If you are using milk or cream add it at least 10 minutes before the end to allow it to reduce. Serve with either penne or spaghetti, with a generous shaving of parmesan and a sprinkling of the remaining herbs.

Menu Sunday 29 April 2007

1. Caviar Versailles
2. Portobello Truffle Soup
3. Brandade aux Mojo Rojo
4. Red Deer W/Polenta Fontina
5. Chocolate Nemesis;

I used the last of my Russia caviar loot make Caviar Versailles as per menu on 24/02/07. I will have to bribe some of my Russky friends to restock me. This is still the best way of serving caviar. I don’t care if the blini and cream and scrambled egg and charlotte are more traditional this is simply unbeatable. It is also just under a trillion calories per bite so not to be had often.

I skipped the vodka this time served with champagne.

The Portobello Truffle Soup is an invention of mine that I am not too happy with but which my guests liked a lot so it can’t be totally useless. Basically, you make chicken stock by simmering chicken pieces (brown and white meat), garlic, bouquet garni, an onion, carrots and whatever else is going off in your veggie drawer for about 1.5 hours. For six people you will need about a litre of stock.

When the stock is ready, put the liquid through a sieve, throw away the vegetables and all but about 100gr of chicken meat. Put the chicken and stock into a blender and whiz up until the chicken is totally obliterated put aside.

While the stock is simmering chop and fry about one Portobello per person in olive oil. When the mushrooms are done, in about 10 min, put about 80% of them in the blender with a single black truffle. Whiz up until the mushrooms are quite finely chopped but not a mush. Add to the stock with the remaining mushrooms.

Just before serving add about 50 - 100 ml of double cream and if you are feeling generous another black truffle finely sliced.

At this point we changed to Planeta a Sicilian chardonnay that I’m partial to.

I made a basic Brandade, see below, added a couple of tablespoons worth of double cream and filled one ramekin per person. I then covered the Brandade with parmesan cheese and heated in an oven with convection and the grill on at about 200 degrees. When the olive oil starts to bubble the Brandade is ready. Cover with Mojo Rojo… This really is a fantastic combination that will reappear on other menus.

The Polenta I made from about 200 grams of polenta as per instructions on the packet but instead of adding butter at the last moment I melted about 50 grams of Fontina cheese into the polenta. I then poured the polenta into a square oven proof form and let it set for 30 minutes. 15 minutes before serving the meat I put the polenta into the oven under the grill at 200 degrees.

To make the sauce I first made stock from the bones of the red deer. Essentially, I make it like any other stock. You start by grilling the bones with a bit of oil and then boil the hell out of it with veggies and herbs. I thickened the sauce with a bit of maisana before working about 50 grams of Fontina into about 300 ml of sauce.

The Red Deer was shot by my friend James somewhere near the Scottish border a few months ago and froze it after aging it a bit. What I was serving was the back fillet cut into about 1.5 cm steaks. I seasoned the meat with salt and pepper and flash fried in a very hot pan for just one minute per side. This is just about as good as red meat gets. It is extremely tender, gamey in a very delicate manner and just fantastic. I would compare this to any of the speciality beef types such as Kobe.

Served with Frans Haaz 2004, a pinot noir from Alte Aldige that is excellent with game.

The Chocolate Nemesis is taken straight from the River Café cookbook and consists solely of chocolate, butter, sugar and eggs. The recipe goes as follows:

Ingredients:

1. 675g dark chocolate (70% cocoa);
2. 450g unsalted butter;
3. 10 eggs;
4. 675g caster sugar;
5. Crème fraiche or mascarpone, to serve. It is also quite good to whip up some yogurt with honey as a somewhat healthy alternative.

Preparations:

• Beat the eggs with 1/3 of the sugar, until the quantity quadruples;
• Dissolve the remaining sugar into a syrup with hot water. You really need to make sure that enough of the water has evaporated so that you have syrup. Too much water and the cake won’t settle;
• Place the chocolate and butter into the syrup, and combine over heat;
• Allow to cool slightly before adding the chocolate syrup to the eggs;
• Pour into a cake tin, and bake for 40-60 minutes in a bainmarie;
• Allow to set completely before turning out. Serves 10-12;

The cake is astonishing. It has no redeeming features other than being just incredibly good.

Sent from my Blackberry Mobile

Mojo Rojo

My mother and her sisters, well two of her five sisters, spend most of March in the geriatric capital of Europe Gran Canaria. Specifically in the holiday town of Maspalomas. I decided to go over and spend last weekend with them and drive the old ladies around the Island as I suspected three octogenarians would not be terribly mobile on their own.

My memories of Gran Canaria are all from annual visits to Playa del Ingles made with my parents when I was a kid. I think I stopped going with them when I was eleven on the basis that hanging with my parents for a month even if the weather was good was not that much fun. I remember the place being touristic but as a kid I really did not appreciate that the only reason there even where towns where we were staying was so that Northen European tourist would have somewhere to stay. The place is simply horrific and completely artificial with not a vestige of local culture visible anywhere. And the food is indescribable.

Normally I know I am in the wrong restaurant when the menu is in German or even worse in one of the Scandinavian languages. This usually means the restaurant has decided to focus on fleecing tourists and not on food. As a matter of fact I generally do not go into restaurants that display anything other than local language menus out front. If is says tourist menu then I actually switch sides on the street to avoid contagion. Imagine what I felt like on discovering that having the menu in Icelandic is the norm in Gran Canary.

I had one all right meal of baccalo or salt cod in a hotel restaurant in Playa del Ingles but the rest of the culinary experience was pretty depressing. I will never go back other than to play driver for my mum. The only good food experience came in a little town called Tejeda in the centre of the island.

This town looked different and more prosperous than any other I have seen on the island and the restaurant on the town square looked authentic. It looked authentic in a worn way that suggests its been there a long time and been used up by the locals. Upon sitting down on an outside table (the weather did not disappoint even if the island did) the owner came and told us in surprisingly good English about a seven course menu that they where serving that lunch time. It contained all sorts of goodies but what caught my attention was what he said was local speciality of lamb and potatoes.

Basically, what it is is various pieces of lamb quickly grilled at high heat with just salt as spice served with local potatoes covered in a sauce called mojo rojo - literally red gravy. The effect of grilling the lamb at high heat means it closes up quickly and becomes very nice and caramelized on the outside. What really makes this dish however is the mojo rojo and the wonderful canary potato. They are very proud of that potato and rightly so because it really is amongst the best potatoes I've ever had. The mojo rojo is the real find. According to the towns own website (they have a website!) it is made by maciating the following ingredients in a mortar:

• Garlic;
• A small amount of sea salt;
• Cumin seeds;
• 2 tomates;
• Hard bread (they call it pan duro I have not really worked out what that is);
• Olive oil;
• Vinegar;
• Sweet paprika;
• Water.

Simply magnificent, almost turned my opinion of Gran Canary.

On the website they also have a recipe for mojo verde or green gravy. In that case they replace the sweet paprika with parsley (cilantro) and then claim it is great sauce for fish, which I don't doubt.

BEURRE BLANC

Beurre blanc is a hot butter sauce made from a vinegar and shallot reduction to which butter is added. Apparently, the origin is that a chef in the Loire Valley forgot to use eggs and Tarragon when making a Béarnaise sauce for a fish dish he was serving at a dinner held by the Marquis de Goulaine. The sauce was an instant hit and was named beurre blanc on the spot!

Ingredients for a Basic Beurre Blanc:

• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar (can be replaced by the juice of one lemon)
• 2 tablespoons dry white wine
• 1 tablespoon minced shallots
• 1 to 2 sticks unsalted butter, cold
• Salt and pepper to taste

In a saucepan combine vinegar, wine and shallots. Over low to medium heat reduce mixture to about 1 tablespoon of a jam like substance. Over low heat add cold butter in a spoon size at a time while whisking continually. Continue to add, butter quickly, barely allowing for previously added butter to melt. Whatever you do, work quickly and pay attention to the temperature. Overheat the sauce and it will separate, leave it too long and it settles and instead of frothy you get flat.

If you are looking for a fine sauce strain the beurre blanc but I quite like getting the shallot with the sauce. You can at this point serve the sauce over asparagus or almost any fish. There are however, loads of methods of making beurre blanc more interesting. Dijon mustard is a classic recipe as is truffle and cream. Muscadet instead of white wine is an Anjou version and in Nantes it is made with fish stock.

Beurre Blanc Genovaise is this rather interesting version:

• 4 shallots, very finely chopped
• 2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 250 ml water
• 250 ml dry red wine
• 2 Tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh tarragon
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh basil
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh chervil
• 1-1/2 teaspoons anchovy paste
• freshly ground pepper, to taste
• 2 sticks unsalted butter

You make this exactly in the same way as the basic sauce but obviously with a lot more ingredients. I had this in the Hotel President Wilson in Geneva over Salmon and it was excellent.

Lunch Sunday 4 February 2007

Menu

• Stracciatella Soup
• Smoked Wild Icelandic Salmon on Potato Latkes and Crème Fraise
• Roasted Fennel with Lemmon Oil Dressing
• Braised Phesant with Forest Mushroom Sauce, Stir Fried Savoy Cabbage and Vacherin over Fresh Potatoes
• Lemmon Tart with Rosemary Mascarpone and Green Tomato Jam

Stracciatella Soup for me is nothing but a method for making plain chicken broth more interesting. By the same token I only ever have it when I happen to have particularly good chicken broth. To make chicken broth into Stracciatella mix an egg, parmesan cheese, breadcrumbs and a pinch of nutmeg together and blend into the broth after whirling the broth quite fast. Whirling the broth is supposed to ensure the egg mixture breaks up and does not clump together. I actually think it is fun to put a dollop of the mixture on the bottom of a bowl before pouring in the broth leaving it to the diner to break up. Salt and pepper to taste.

Alternatives, to this recipe are to add finely chopped parsley, coarsely chopped spinach (then apparently it is called an Italian Wedding Soup), semolina (instead of the bread) and you can skip the nutmeg. Actually I prefer skipping the nutmeg.

For the Salmon recipe it really helps to have a brother who is an enthusiastic salmon fisherman, who catches more than he consumes of Icelandic Salmon and is generous with his catch. If this is lacking in your family I highly recommend getting one as they are really handy. Alternatively, use high quality farmed salmon. Try to find salmon that has very little fat marbling. Wild salmon is basically nature’s tri athlete and has no fat other than what is in its muscles. Farmed salmon in contrast are really sloppy city cousins who feed on junk food and have completely unnecessary fat deposits. There is no similarity in taste but farmed salmon has been getting better at the top end of the market.

I would normally serve this dish with blinis but I am very bored with those mainly because of certain friends who keep asking for them. The potato latkes are something I learned to make in cookery school about 15 years ago and have never made since. I was reminded of them when I came across a recipe for them in a women’s magazine. Sadly I did not rip the recipe out of the magazine because I’ve forgotten the recipe and my Cordon Blue book is somewhere at the bottom of a moving box.

From a very hazy memory I grated together about 400 grams potatoes (half coarsely and half fine), two shallots and a handful of finely cut chives. I then squeezed as much liquid out of the potato mixture as possible before adding 1 egg, 1 egg white and a tablespoon of flour and a pinch of salt. I then formed pancakes from about a tablespoon of the mixture and fried them in Olive oil. I actually fried the latkes twice, first with very little oil, because I was afraid that doing them in one go would leave them very oily. I don’t know if this is really a part of the recipe but it worked as I the latkes where not oily at all. I got 14 latkes out of this recipe.

To serve I put the crème fraise on top of the latkes, some more chives on top of the crème before adding salmon on top. I served the latkes with cold champagne although white wine would be the obvious choice.

The Roasted Fennel recipe is from my newest favourite cookbook the River Café Cookbook. You cut up the fennel into ½ cm slices in such a way that the stalks remain whole and then roast the slices until cooked but “al dente”. I did this in my sandwich maker which worked just fine. After roasting toss the fennels in a dressing made by beating five parts olive oil into one part lemon juice, drizzle with sea salt and serve. The Rive Café recipe is a little different but not that much.

I got the Phesant from my friend James, who was invited for lunch, and I must say having friends that are enthusiastic hunters is quite cool as well. I had four guests and three Phesant which was a lot but not ridiculously so as basically we had ½ bird left over. The birds where fresh and had not been hanged which my guest preferred but I think is a shame as game really needs to hang to get the full taste.

To make this dish you need to start by reconstituting about 50 grams of dried mushrooms, I used mixed forest mushrooms. You do this by pouring about 400 ml of warm water over the mushroom in a bowl and covering the bowl. After about 10 minutes remove the mushrooms and rinse any remaining grit under running water. Pour the mushroom water through a very fine sieve or paper to get any grit out and set a third of the liquid aside. Mix the remaining liquid with about equal amount of white wine.

To prepare the Phesant clean it of any bits and pieces such as stray feathers and fat. In a braising pan that is large enough to cover with all the birds inside, fry all sides of the birds until brown and remove from the pan. Soften one large onion and two cloves of garlic in the pan before adding back the Phesant. At this point there are two options you can either add all the mushroom and wine liquid, cover and leave to simmer in a 160 degrees Centigrade hot oven for about 40 minutes or you can do the difficult method. The difficult method involves pouring in about a fifth of the liquid covering, letting the liquid reduce to almost nothing, adding more liquid etc for about 20 – 25 minutes at high heat. You then remove the birds and add any remaining liquid to make the sauce. I had other things to do so I selected the easy method. I also added three sprigs each of rosemary and thyme, a dozen or so black pepper corns, three bay leaves and salt to taste.

The lazy method is also good if you like me underestimate the time it will take to get through to main course because by turning the birds and lowering the heat you can prevent them from drying out. This way, even if you leave the birds in there for more than 90 minutes, they will still be moist when served.

While the Phesant is cooking fry the mushrooms in butter and when they have absorbed the butter start to slowly add in the remaining mushroom liquid. The objective here is to reconstitute the mushrooms in such a way that they regain some volume. Do too much though, and the mushrooms become soggy and unattractive, so pay attention.

For the Savoy Cabbage you need a sliced clove of garlic, 50 grams cubed pancetta, ¼ cup each red vine and stock and naturally enough Savoy Cabbage. Prepare the cabbage by removing the thick white central stalk and tearing each blade in half. Fry the pancetta in a large pan until brown, add the garlic and fry until soft. Add the cabbage to the pan and heat through. Add the liquid and simmer until it is completely gone.

For the sauce remove the Partridge and pour the remaining liquid through a sieve into a sauce pot. Add about a teaspoon of sauce thickener (maisana or flour or even roux if you can be bothered) and the mushrooms and reduce until you have achieved the desired thickness.

For the potatoes add them to the pan with the Phesant for the last twenty minutes or so. You heat the cheese in the oven with the Phesant inside its box for about 10 – 15 minutes. When you remove the Phesant you also remove the potatoes and put them into individual small bowls, crush them and drizzle with sea salt. When it is time to serve the birds you pour about a tablespoons worth of cheese over 4 – 5 potatoes per person.

To serve cover a plate with the Savoy Cabbage and place the Phesant on top. I carved the partridge in such a way that each guest had two medium slices of breast cut along the whole breast with half a leg placed over. Pour over the sauce and serve with the potatoes.

Served with: Chataux Montrose 2001, (Pessac-Leognan)

The Tart is a classic Italian Torta di Limone although I took the recipe from the River Café cookbook. It is made from butter, sugar, almond flour (in equal measures), ½ measure polenta, eggs (about 1 egg per 300 grams of the other stuff) and vanilla extract plus the juice and rind of lemon. My innovation is to serve it with the Rosemary flavoured Mascarpone and green tomato jam. To make Rosemary Mascarpone you need Rosemary flavoured honey and mascarpone cheese which you whisk together until you have the desired flavour. I like the flavour of the Rosemary to be very much in the background but you can add more of the honey if you actually like a stronger taste. The green tomato jam I buy in the South of France from a particular farm but I’m sure you can find it everywhere these days. The combination of these three somewhat diverse flavors really works.

Served with: d'Arenberg Riesling, The Noble (a very fine Aussie dessert wine)

Hey presto one Sunday lunch!

Game Sauce (to go with the Reindeer below)

Ingredients:

1. Reserve some (100 – 150 gr) of the meat;
2. 3 Shallots roughly cut;
3. 2 Caroots cut into wheels;
4. 1 Celery stick cut into dice;
5. 500 ml Meat Broth (preferably strong tasting game broth but any meat broth will do but the stronger the better);
6. 150 ml Porto or Madeira (definitely Porto rather than Madeira);
7. Box of Button Mushrooms (any type of mushroom will do and so if you want fancy use Portobello or some wild variety);
8. Salt & Pepper;
9. 2 tbls butter;

Brown the meat until quite dark, add the vegetables and caramelize before adding and completely boiling off the Porto. To strengthen the taste you can add more vine and boil it off again. Add the broth and bring to a boil before simmering for half an hour. Pour through a sieve and add salt and pepper to taste. Fry the mushrooms in butter on separate pan and add before reheating the sauce.

Just before serving reheat the sauce and add any additional ingredients such as the brandy from the foie gras below or strong heavy tasting red vine. At the last moment add butter to taste and to get the really rather nice sheen that comes from freshly melted butter.

Gravlax Sauces

My family’s gravlax sauces are all mayonnaise based and for the most part we just buy commercial mayo. I however, do not like the commercial variety very much and in any case prefer my mayonnaise to be olive oil based not your basic vegetable oil used in most commercial varieties. In addition to the mayonnaise these sauces all contain a mustard, something sweet and an herb usually dill. I’ve recently started using the leaves of the celery plant and like that effect a great deal.

Ingredients:

For the Mayonnaise:

1. 1 egg yolk;
2. large dollop of Dijon mustard (I really do mean a dollop as the quantity is actually a matter of taste but somewhere between a teaspoon and a tablespoon)
3. 1 bottle extra virgin olive oil
4. teaspoon white vine vinegar

Mix the egg yolk and mustard in a (preferably) steal bowl that is large enough to whisk in. Slowly poor in the oil while whisking constantly until the desired consistency is achieved which you will recognise if you’ve ever used mayo. One egg should absorb about 100ml of oil. Add the vinegar to taste, basically the mayonnaise should be thick without tasting fatty but as this mayonnaise is being made specifically for a fish sauce it should taste more of the vinegar than a normal commercial one would.

To make the sauce mix the mayo with either a tablespoon of sweet mustard or half a tablespoon each Dijon and honey and your herb of choice. In Iceland we always use rather horrid Danish sweet mustard (which then produces the traditional taste) but I am not a fan. I prefer grainy mustard that’s been sweetened with honey or if I can not find that Dijon and honey. It is best to use fresh herbs finely chopped but dried herbs will do fine.