Day 2 of International Influence

a) Quails 'Yakitori' marinated with Lemongrass, Port Wine Glaze, Lime Sauce - served with potato fondant on a bed of baby spinach.

The quails are marinated and grilled yakitori style, and there's a dollop of miso/cream in the hole of the potato.

Chef liked it, but warned that because of the sugar in the mirin, it could burn easily, mine was still ok, but not more than that.

b) Shortbread with Crab, Lime and Lemon Balm, Green Mango and Lemongrass Sauce.

The white rounds you see are Japanese yam. Topped with some crisp serrano ham.

This is an extra, since we were using foie gras in a later dish, Chef showed us another way of using it - Pan Fried Foie Gras with Balsamic and Cocoa Sauce, and some warm apples.

c) Scorpion Fish with Foie Gras, Bouillabaisse-style Vermicelli, Turmeric and Chorizo.

The vermicelli isn't the kind we get in SG, it's actually a pasta, angel hair, broken in smaller strands.

The fish and foie gras are lightly pan-fried, sandwiched, and steamed. Personally, I didn't like too much turmeric, so I added less in mine.

Chef liked it too, though my cut of the fish was a little thick, so the middle was still a liiiiiitttlllleeeee raw.

d) Sweet 'sushi'!! It's actually Thailands' mango sticky rice, but fashioned to look like sushi! Served with some pineapple/coconut sauce, and a ball of red pepper sorbet!! It was good, Chef approved. My sauce was nicely thick, cut of the fruits were good too.

Cuisine this week...

Cuisine this week:

Starters:

a) Buckwheat crisps with crab meat and crab 'mustard' - I must explain more about this mustard, it's basically the cream at the back of the brains of crustaceans that gives a rich creamy seafoody sweet taste when mixed into sauce or soups.

b) Terrine of duo salmon and leeks, shallot vinaigrette

c) Sauteed green asparagus spears and langoustines, beetroot vinaigrette. The pink quenelles you see on the left are whipped cream colored with beetroot juice. First time I had a salty whipped cream! As you notice, this cuisine chef of mine likes pink and hello Kitty!

Mains:

a) Crusted Seabass, Lemon and capers, and Chicken Jus, with Maple almonds

b) Filet de boeuf a la ficelle (Tenderloin in bouillon), celeriac "bone" with beef marrow, horseradish sauce.

It's cute, we cut the celeriac and dug a hole in centre to make it look like a bone with a hollow, and stuff some real beef marrow in the edible 'bone'.

c) Lamb rib roast in bread crust, artichoke puree with hazelnut oil. We made a country bread dough, flatten it out, and rolled a lamb noisette (chops without the bones) in it. When it bakes, it looks like a large loaf of bread, but when you cut it open, surprise! lamb and vegetable trimmings!

Desserts

a) Apple crisps with pineapple sorbet, lemon balm-lemongrass syrup

b) White and wild rice with vanilla milk, pan-fried mangoes and honey milk granita

It's essentially Thailand's famous Sticky rice with Mangoes! Sorry, didn't capture the photo well. The crisps covered a bed of rice pudding with sauteed caramelised mangoes on it. I was too mesmerised by the hello Kitty! cut outs..... I told you my chef is crazy about pink (pink icing sugar) and hello Kitty!

c) Seasonal fruit clafoutis and streusel with mango-passion fruit sorbet. Gotta be one of the best mango sorbet I tasted!!

Soufflés!

One of my earliest memories of pastry was at the old Paragon shopping centre.  When I say old, I mean really old, like about 20 years ago, where the sleepy old building had a spiral walkway-staircase that goes all the way up to to the 4th (5th?) level (there was Pierre Balmain!).  On the ground floor, there's a little path that leads to the back to the one of the first Body Shop in Singapore (I used to spend hours reading their labels and memorising all the said-attributes of each herb and natural extract used in their lotions.  I digress....)  Behind the Body Shop was Temptations (I think that was what the pastry shop was called.)  And one of the heavenly sweets I (rarely) treated myself to, was the Chocolate Soufflé.  Actually, come to think of it now, I don't think it was much of a soufflé.  Sure it was oblong looking, and a raised choc mousse that looked 'soufflé' (for non-French speakers, soufflé means to be blown up, expanded, thus describing the effect of the hot air rising from the pastry base and meringue, giving us the much beloved light and airy texture.)    So, I think what I had was actually a choc mousse cake given the appearance and name of a soufflé.  I used to think to myself, wow, so exotic!  This new language and food.  Maybe it started, sub-conscientiously, my journey into things French.  

What you see here is the classic Chocolate Soufflé, and a Calvados Soufflé - we carved a receptacle into an apple and baked a souffle out of it, it's quite pretty.  Next we prepared a plated Crêpe Soufflé.  Making crêpes is quite easy once you  get the hang of it.   

Have you ever munched on a hot crêpe on a cold wintry Parisian day, its citrus-y Grand Marnier filling up your nose, and your fingers getting sticky from the sugar?  If you had, in the midst of her alluring monuments, you'll soon realise that life indeed can be quite beautiful.

Getting exotic (relatively speaking)

Cos' it happens that this week, we received our very first truffle to work with!!

It was for a truffle sauce to be served with grilled steak, celery flan and potatoes confit in goose fat, as you can see from the above.  The 'sua koo' me, took a photo of the black diamond on my cutting board in class.  Well, I always knew where to buy some in SG, but I guess I'm not doing it any justice if I don't learn how to use it well, but now I know...... Definitely not content to tiny bits that you (don't!) see on your plates when you dine out, I had mine in tasty slivers, and yes, the chef liked my sauce.


Another exotic food item is the foie gras, we'll get to cook some next term, but chef made a demonstration and when we had the tasting... it was so good!
In class this week, we also made some monkfish encrusted in fresh herbs, rolled in bacon, served with braised artichokes.  The other, a hearty meal, called Cassoulet (comme fait à Toulouse) - white bean stew with lamb and sausages, with duck confit, Toulouse-style.

For demo, we had langoustine, and a warm starter salted cod dish called brandade de morue.  Salt cod, once used to be the food of the poor (cos' they could not afford fresh cod) of European countries along the Atlantic ocean, are now a treat for all classes, as cods are now a dying breed.  This salted cod soaked overnight, cooked and flaked, mashed with some olive oil, potatoes and cream, and served with parsley garlic cream.

Pastry and Desserts- Week 2

Check out the labels for this post and guess which is which....

2nd half of Week 1 in Intermediate

To finish up the first week, we made sauteed guinea fowl with caramelised apples (man, it's such an ugly bird, check it out here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guineafowl .)  Starters was a cassoulette of shellfish.  Typically it could be served in a baking dish, but this version was a savory tart.  Easier to portion and cleaner dishes!

Pastry-wise, we made Galette Bretonne, a shortbread actually, and Pain d'Epice a l'Orange, spiced bread/cake with candied orange.  On demonstration was Far Bretonne, a typical baked fruit dessert, not unlike clafoutis.  Another (rather simple) dessert was fine apple tart on puff pastry with caramel ice-cream.

Hope these wet your appetites.  

Have a good weekend! 

Let's go again!!

Welcome back.  I hope you did not miss the weekly features .  Well, school started 

on Monday.  Your eyes (at least) will be in for a treat.  

In intermediate cuisine, we will be following different regions of France and their regional specialties.  In intermediate pastry, we are using the basic building blocks of basic pastry, with more creativity, piecing different bases with different mousses, creams, tastes, colors, etc.  These usually takes more time, so organisation and planning is key.

To start off, here are some 'dryer' cakes that keeps well, aka 'travelling' cakes - which you can bring with you on a journey and need no refridgeration.  (Hint hint:  One of them will travel with PG to SG over this CNY.)  These basic cakes can be embellished with choc glazing, fresh cream and fruits like the photo above.  These will definitely sell in a pastry shop window.  Some other plated desserts, snow eggs in creme anglaise with blackcurrant, apple charlotte.

In cuisine, we had tomatoes stuffed with goat cheese and aromatics, shellfish soup with garlic glaze.  For our practicals, we made spring chicken with spring vegetables (notice the herb butter under the skin, like how I showed Idah how to make before?).  Stuffed salmon rolled in cabbage leaves with red wine sauce.

Good thing this term we finish all our cuisine practicals at 7pm; perfect timing to bring them back home for dinner!