Day 3 of Light and Natural Cooking

Day 3 of Light and Natural Cooking leads us to Meats and Their Garnishes.

The good news is that, I had a one to one lesson with the Chef!! The Spanish called in sick, and since it's no point having 3 hrs of demo for 1 person, and then 3 hrs of practical, we passed directly to a 'workshop', where basically, I did together whatever the chef was doing! I got to complete all the dishes here!

You may guess the above escalopes to be chicken or veal, but they are actually flattened pieces of quail breasts! They call it 'picata'. Served with pea capuccino (again, using the siphon).

Next is Rabbit Saddle stuffed a la Grecque. Yummy!! Potatoes are cooked in chicken stock.

Next is Duck Breast cooked 'En Papillote', Citrus Jus, Three Savory Vegetable Custards.

The magret duck breasts are seared quickly, escaloper, and placed in a baking paper and wrapped tightly. As it cooks, the steam created puffs up the package and when presented to the customer, the package bursts open with whiff of fragrance.

The close up pics.....

The 3 savory custards are Beetroot, Carrot, and Peas. No, they're not chinese steam buns! No, they're not Raspberry, Mango and Pistachio ice cream! They were nicely 'souffle'd' when it was out of oven. By the time I took the photo, it deflated a little.

Day 1 of Light and Natural Cooking

In Light and Natural Cooking, (if it was even conceivable for butter and cream laden dishes typical of French cuisine), we aim to reduce the use or use reduced fat butter/cream, or use yoghurt in place.

Today, in Day 1, we learnt mainly Entrées. This is unusual cos' most of the time, Chef demo's 1 starter, 1 or 2 mains, 1 dessert. Well, this Chef decided to break up to day 1: Entrees, day 2, fish, day 3, meat, day 4, desserts. Which is a good break from usual as well.

First dish is a soup: Leek and Potato Soup, or Fr: Vichyssoise, which can be eaten hot or cold, according to the season. We placed some poached haddock in the middle, some diced Spanish piquillos in the bottom and on top. Some flaked almonds, and a sprinkling of Espelette pepper.

Chef liked it, though I would have placed more leeks in it. This photo is what I've made. (I thought for a change, I'll put my own creation in place of Chef's, but if you wanna see Chef's pics, lemme know, I'll post them up as well.)

Next are 2 dishes which we didn't make, but were Chefs demo's. The first is Cured Salmon with Ginger and Air-dried Beef (as the red crinkly juliennes in photo).

The second is Poached Tuna with Piperade garnish. Piperade is a delicious blend of blend of bell peppers, tomatoes, garlic. Some onion chips on the sides.

The next dish we made in practical was a toast of tomatoes confits (over dried tomatoes), and marinated young mackerel fish (marinate: garlic, olive oil, espelette pepper, cider, cider vinegar). At the end, the marinate is strained, and whisked into a vinaigrette. This was the dish I presented.

Next dish I presented, was Smoked Tuna on a Galette de Pommes de Terre (actually, a giant blini!). The tuna was first cured in coarse salt for abt an hour, and then washed. It's placed in a improvised smoking device (woodchip on the base of saute pan, fish on top of a round grill, covered and smoked slowly).

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.

Countdown for last Cuisine entries

Yes, it's all coming to an end soon, and this is my last week for Cuisine lessons. Next week are all exams, both Pastry (Sugar work and your own cake creation), and Cuisine (mise en place as well as the actual exam), not to mention written exams for both. On top of it, I was chosen to give a speech for the graduation. So I have to prepare a draft for chef. Busy busy busy.

I will update this entry with more dishes along the week.

Starters:

1) Tatin of endives with goat cheese, sweet sour jus

2) Crispy tart with tomato, langoustines and pistou

3) Taboule with fresh shrimp and vanilla oil

Main:

1) Beef Wellington with turned vegetables. Bouquetier-style means to fan out the turned vegetables in ordered alternatives for presentation. The beef is roasted, brought down to colder temperature, stuffed with foie gras mousse in the centre, wrapped in mushroom and crepe, and again in puff pastry, and baked till crispy. Note: the beef should still be à point, and not overcooked! Served with truffle sauce.

Over several dishes in Superior, they want to test how you can perceive the doneness of your food, when it is covered, in crust, in cabbage, etc. It's simple to roast or to pan-fry and know when to take them out. But when you have to cook the crust and yet not overcook (or undercook) your meat, is a different challenge!

This was what I served to Mel, Kev, Soogee and Kenneth who were visiting from SG.

2) Noisettes of venison with "grand veneur" sauce

3) Red mullet fillets with crispy potato scales

Desserts:

1) Figs roasted in rosemary, cinnamon mascarpone. You can also see some edible crystallised rose petals and borage flowers.

2) Caramelised coconut cake with roasted mini bananas

3) Soft macaroon, candied fennel ice cream, wild berry coulis. The flame-like toppings are fennel chips. Fennel sliced thinly and dried in oven to a crisp.

2nd last week of Superior Cusine

It's been almost 9 months since I'm in Bangkok, and coming to an end to my 3rd and last term in Le Cordon Bleu Dusit. Time flies... well, onto more photos!

Starters:

1) Line Caught Whiting fish (Fr: merlan de ligne) grilled with warm salad and condiments from Nice.

2) Lightly pan-fried Scallops with Scallop Parmentier and Carrot butter. Incidentally, this was our 2nd dish of the week to prepare for our practical. I guess the chef wanted us to work with live scallops. Yeah, live, not just in the shells, but their shells are clamped tight! We have to shuckle them as we would to live oyster, remove the 'beards' for the parmentier. They are very delicate and you have to be careful in handling them. I love scallops, as raw as possible!

3) Duck bavarois, mesclun salad and tomatoes confits. Bavarois is a term usually reserved for a type of cream based dessert mousse. However, over the years we have seen the lines of terms becoming blur between pastry and cusine, and I guess how this term was coined. It is in fact lightly cooked foie gras and magrets of ducks sifted and lightened with whipped cream and chilled to a paté consistency. Yummy! Served with smoked magret sliced thinly that taste like jamon.

Mains:

1) Thick Tuna steak with burgundy style garnishes and potatoes fondants.

It's your regular pan seared tuna, still rosé in the middle, but we added a bacon wrap. Served with red wine sauce, and potatoes slow-cooked in chix broth till melt in your mouth consistency.

2) Squab (Pigeon) wrapped in cabbage, legs stuffed, tartlets of wild mushroom.

3) Sole stuffed with mushrooms and glazed, with surprise crêpes parcels

We just finished with this dish today, it's quite interesting, the sole is split in carefully cut in the middle, fileted, but still attached to the body, and carefully, you have to remove the skeleton and keep the fish whole! So there is absolutely no bones at all when you cut into this dish.

Desserts:

1) French toasts (!) with berries and rhubarb compote.

I know traditionally we know french toasts as sandwich loaf dipped in sweetened beaten eggs and pan fried. Well, not the case in LCB! We make a crème anglaise to soak the bread, and sure it has to go with some healthy fruits!

2) Chocolate tart with marmelade filling. Marmelade is very easy to make, easier than jam. Prick some oranges, half submerged in water, boil till soft, take out, slice them (if you like, in traditional thick slices). Then cook them again peel, pith, and juice (except seeds) and all until a jam like consistency. Adjust to taste with sugar.

Chocolate sweet dough (pate sucree) half baked, fill with marmelade and cover with ganache lightened with whipped cream, and bake.

3) Cherries pan-fried in port wine and caramel ice cream

Beef cheeks, Duck breasts, and "Hello Kitty!" sugar

In Cuisine this week:

a)  Starters:  1)  White fish ceviche guacamole.  b) Marinated herring mixed with cream and caviar, served in little cucumber cups.

b)  Mains:  1) Duck breasts baked in salt crust dough, vegetable "tagliatelle" and crispy potatoes.  2)  Beef cheeks "Miroton" style with cumin carrots and stuffed turnip

The duck breasts came out nice and rosé, perfumed and flavoured by coarse sea salt dough studded with chopped herbs.  It was also a delight to crunch into the wafer thin potatoes!

The beef cheek stew is a rather traditional dish, the meat was so tender by the end of our 3 hr class, nicely gelatinous in the middle, flavoured with red wine and herbs, sliced and breaded with light herb seasoning.  Very heart warming when you bite into a piece.  Also, an ingenious way to serve turnip in cups filled with mushroom duxelles and ham.

C)  Dessert:  Warm strawberry soup flavoured with ginger, served with yoghurt sorbert (made during class, of cos')  2) Light tiramisu-style mousse and sugared raspberries.

Cuisine - more exotic!

Last week, we made quails.  We deboned the whole bird through the opening of the neck and back, so that the bird still looked 'whole' - just 'deflated', and we pumped it up with foie gras laced stuffing.  Man, for so small a bird, it has a lot of blood!!  I felt like a midwife.

Live crayfish, they were crawling around and trying to escape, their claws snapping away.  We have to 'castrate' them by pulling out the mid portion of the tail fin first before dumping them into boiling water briefly.  They are served with Nantua sauce and fish quenelles (French fishballs?)

The last noteworthy dish is the rösti looking potato pancake, which has a mushroom filling.  It entails flipping it in midair!  We all managed quited well.