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 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.

Continuation of Last Week's Cuisine

Ok guys and girls, sorry for the delay!  Here's part of cuisine last week.  

Starters:  1)  Fresh peas tartare flavored with Peppermint.  2)  Eggs stuffed with truffles, port wine glaze.

3)  Crab and tomato with Avocado cream and orange powder.

Mains:  1)  Puff pastry 'pie' of quails and lamb sweetbread with shiitake mushrooms

2)  Lamb rolls filled with vegetables and parmesan crisps.   (the plate with the 'sail' of parmesan crisp is mine)

3)  Sea bass in a crust Coulibiac style, stuffed eggplants

Desserts:

1)  Chocolate Nougat glace with cherry coulis.

2)  Sago with fresh pineapple, jasmine tea ice cream.  What we call sago in SG, it's apparently more commonly known as tapioca or Japanese pearls.  

3)  Lemon grass cream, strawberry jelly and rhubarb crisps.

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.