Watermelon and Fennel Salad

Shaved fennel dressed with a 'Thai style' (a terminology I resent using, due to an over use in out of context mass media, but this is actually Thai) green chilli and ginger dressing, joining fresh shards of watermelon, delightfuly floral purple basil, nutty fried shallots and savoury prawn floss.

This is about as close as I've come to creating something of my own that resembles a true Thai salad, without actually being Thai....the assortment of textures, flavours, colours and aromas present in this dish caught me off gaurd when I came to actually eat it! The fish sauce and lime juice in the dressing on the fennel caused it to drop some juices, which in turn took the watermelons juice with it on a ride to the bottom of the bowl, intermingling and comming to a conclusion that they were suited to on another, and creating wonderful flavours that were more than excited to meet my tastebuds.

People such as David Thompson may shudder at the reference to this being Thai, but I'm confident that the proof is in the eating. Sometimes things far exceed your expectations when they're brought to fruition. Words on paper will always be just that, but to create something is a wonderful experience.

Sand Crab

Crab meat, very desirable, sometimes difficult to acquire enough for decent portions, and quite frequently bastardised to the point that the flavour and texture of the poor crab has been lost! Hidden behind a million and one ingredients, wrappings and sauces, this delicate gem from the sea deserves more in the form of less.

To attempt to add dimension and enhance the flavour of the meat I took something old and made it new again. Mignonette dressing is a very common accompaniment to fresh seafood, made from red wine vinegar, diced shallots and black pepper. This Mignonette was made in the same way, but with smoked tomato water that was seasoned with some cab sav vinegar. This gave some acid to the dish while complementing the sweet flavours of the crab and the smoke gave depth without over powering. A few diamonds of smoked tomato flesh reinforced this also.

To bring in some nice textures, colours and further assist with the fresh theme, diced cucumber seemed a no brainer, but when I started dicing it I noticed a lot of wastage, prompting me to make jelly. Purple basil having such a wonderful floral, perfumed flavour, teamed with it's amazing colour couldn't be left out.

The garnish is from a Restaurant in London called Hakkasan and called 'Golden Sand' due to it's texture and appearance. Quite simply it is milk curds that have been fried in burre noisette then drained. It has a wonderful characteristic of holding a crumbly texture on the dish, but being dairy, it melts on your tongue, leaving a creamy sensation!

Scallops and Brioche

Scallops Marinated under vacum with garlic oil and bay leaf. Red onion jam, smoked tomato salsa on toasted Brioche, this is brunch food.

Compressed Fruit

In a previous post I expressed my love of compressed melon. textures, colours and flavours go nuts with this process. Here is a fruit salad, once again a very simple dish that everyone recognises and feels comfortable eating. The twist here, apart from the obvious compression of fruits, is that each has been flavoured in the bag. Honeydew melon was teamed with boxwood honey, Cantaloupe got treated to a green cardamon infusion and Watermelon enjoyed playing with rosewater at Christmas that I thought they might like to hang out again. I also compressed apples with a little lemon juice, vanilla and icing sugar, and threw in a few fresh blackberries just because they were nice.

Smoked Tomato On Toast

In an age where

so much attention is being given to converting foods from their natural state into something different by way of technology or that of additives, it's nice to come back to earth and have something basic and simple that is equally as impressive, if not more so than bubbles or gels. Garlic toast, well made tapenade with pine nuts, and confit garlic, a basil leaf and a smoked tomato. Understated excellence.

Yogurt Mousse

I love yogurt. I destroy any that presents it's self to me before anyone else gets a chance to touch it! It's got a natural sweet savoury balance that I can't get enough of, and it's so welcoming to other flavours of all kinds, it's right up there with butter in my top dairy applications.

I saw yogurt mousse in a book by a Spanish chef named Oriol Balaguar. What a fantastic texture to eat yogurt as! It was made with natural yogurt, so quite plain, but after being teamed with a 'dressing' of black sesames pounded into a paste and mixed with leather wood honey, lemon juice and salt, and the sour strawberries macerated with raspberry vinegar and lemon oil, the savoury sweet balance was recreated and amplified my original emotions of yogurt it's self. the plating could do with more work but the flavours were pretty good to me.

Water Melon 'Turkish Delight'

This came from one of those 'random thoughts combine' moments the day before Xmas. Walking past the supermarket on my way back to work I suddenly found myself thinking about eating watermelon on Xmas day, and thinking about how much my mum loves Turkish delight. For some reason I decided I would combine the two into a nice fresh pre dessert canape, to help wake everyone up again to hit the desserts.

I compressed water melon slices with rose water over night under vacum. Compressed melons are something I quite enjoy, mainly due to the fact that you transform the fruit into a wonderful glossy, semi translucent creature, while still keeping the fresh essence of the fruit its self. The added bonus of being able to press flavours into it at the same time is just to good an opportunity to pass up.

In this application I essentially changed the texture of the watermelon closer to that of a turkish delight while still keeping a slight fresh crunch, and at the same time the rosewater being the key ingredient in the sweet takes us there. A few baby mint leaves and you now have a dessert canape which is quite simply fruit, but different ;)

Sourdough and Chorizo Bread Salad

The idea behind this dish comes from Italian 'Panzanella', the moreish bread salad that first drew me into 'real' Italian food, outside of 'Spaghetti Bolangnese'. Being quite a staunch lover of all things Spanish food, I took it upon myself to introduce Spain and Italy to each other through classical food. This is chunks of torn up sourdough that has been tossed in a dressing made by frying chorizo to render out it's oils, and adding a little more olive oil to extend. I drop a clove of crushed garlic into the oil and allow to gently warm through before throwing in some good Spanish smoked paprika. caramelised apple dice, lemon juice, sliced raw shallots, parsley and mint turn this into some what a symphony of textures, aromas, flavours and colours. I am possibly the most proud of this, approachable yet decadent at the same time. I can imagine chilling out with a nice bottle of Rosita and eating this while hanging out watching the water in Barcelona. This makes me happy when I eat it and make it every chance I get.

Grilled Peaches, Blue Cheese and Hazelnut

The idea behind this entire meal was to have a choice of things people could just pick and add to their plate, a buffet in a way I guess. Being such a typical hot day on this side of the planet, salads seemed more appropriate a choice. I however do not like eating the same shit year after year and thought it a perfect time to shake up what people had on their plates, if only for one day :) the first being this salad of Grilled white and gold peaches tossed with toasted crushed hazelnuts and hazelnut oil, and laid out on rocket puree along with some Roquefort and basil. I personally love this one and could eat it every Christmas :)

Ultimate Potato chips

Having already covered the centerpiece of a Xmas meal, now I feel it important to start from the beginning. Any time there is a large group of people gathering in one place for the purpose of a meal, there is ALWAYS that period where everyone is standing around making chit chat and(from a chefs point of view) waiting to attack the spread before them. I personally hate this part. So canapes are something I think is essential in situations like this and always try to make something happen here.

These chips are something I thought would be a playful and unintimidating way to serve my family a very indulgent canape. Everyone loves potato chips, and I can assure you these were no exception, these finger sized bad boys were designed to appear simple and then twist your mind while you ate! They were triple cooked, first in chicken stock with alot of fresh bay leaves, then dried in front of a fan for 2 hours to create a crusty skin. Then fried in garlic oil at around 140C to make rich and golden, and finally finished in the oven to transform them into that crunchy chip with fluffy center that everyone dreams about secretly. On top I've piped a mixture of caramelised onion puree, finely diced Jamon Iberico, chopped parsley and Truffle oil. 16 people, 96 chips, 4:20 seconds.....proof........

Christmas Ham

When you think about Christmas lunch/dinner in Australia, one of the first things that springs to mind for most people is Ham. To have a glazed ham as the center piece of your Christmas day feast is wonderful and glorious thing, and having the whole family coming to my house I couldn't skimp on quality. I went straight for a leg of ham made from Kurabuta pork, a Japanese variety of black pig, Kura meaning 'black' and Buta being 'pork'. The meat of this animal is deliciously rich, slightly gamey and overall FUCKING delicious :)

After being glazed with a painfully 'Aussie' mix of macadamias, brown sugar, sweet chili and mustard that my grand mother had her heart set on, all that was left to do was consume....

White Truffles are AWSOME!

what can one say......when white truffles appear before you all sorts of evocative, arousing thoughts rush through your head. I always get a shiver when I smell the aroma they give off

Midnight Steak

When my lovely neighbours gave me a
pack of pre portioned beef fillet I instantly told myself I would say thank you by cooking something wonderful with it. Such a generous gift should be shown some respect after all! My plans were somewhat accelerated however when I returned home at midnight after a 16 hour day in the kitchen to hear my mother and brother talking about having some steak and asking if I would like some.....not realising exactly what meat they had in mind I said I might have a little bit. I was then asked if I would mind cooking said steak, which I had no problem with until I saw the meat in question!

With such little time and produce at hand(it was after 12 at night after all) to honour my commitment to this meat I decided simplicity was key. the meat was treated to a pan roasting and allowed to rest while I knocked up some saute potatoes with onions and confit garlic, but keeping in mind my feelings as to what this gift deserved the potatoes were finished with some truffle oil to transform our midnight snack into something quite indulgent. A pan Jus was quickly assembled with a little help from my friend mustard and finished with a monte of butter and E VOILA! midnight steak.......

Greek Flavours

Sometimes wanting to eat some vegetables can lead you down some wonderful paths. Alot of attention is shown to proteins, and the poor little veggies always seem to be sat beside like an after thought. I love the flavours, colours and textures that vegetables present. Treated with a little bit of respect and with a little bit of attention they can create a terrific dish all of their own. In this case I chose to make the protein play second fiddle and be the underlying flavour for the veg to shine. The flavours in this dish are largely Greek in nature, making it a great refreshing meal for a hot Australian night. Cauliflower florets, celery batons and diced onions were sweated in some garlic oil with ground coriander seed and finished with a touch of lemon juice. then tossed with spinach basil and mint. Cumin and confit garlic polenta helped to give body and richness and finally a few pieces of pan fried confit pork belly gave a nice crunch.

After such a wonderfully light but satisfying plate, I found myself wanting for something along the same path, so I decided to stay close to the Med and bring out a Zabaglione flavoured with cinnamon and lemon. Mango, apricots and blueberries were telling me they wanted to be under this blanket of Italian flavours, and who am I to argue with such knowledgeable fruits? So I happily obliged........

Wonderfully French

Sometimes simple French food gets bastardised so much that we tend to overlook certain dishes for fear of appearing 'common' and 'boring'. For me this has been the case with pepper steak for a long time. My reunion with this wonderfully simple french dish came about strangely enough due to a wanting for something to go with my accompaniments, a little backwards I know, but such is life sometimes.

A yearning for Aligot potatoes, the traditional elastic textured mash potato of the Lagioule region in France made with Cantele cheese, butter and garlic was the instigator on this occasion. Cantele being a little hard to obtain in Aus, I went for the closest resembling cheese I knew, Gruyere! I threw in my own little spin by using a bit of confit garlic and some of it's oil(as well as Lescure butter of course). Having some home made bacon on hand prompted me towards another french classic of pettit pois ala francais.

With all these classic french components in a main, how could I even consider moving away from that theme for dessert!

Being fortunate enough to have some white chocolate mousse begging to be used in my fridge, and some chocolate macaroons in the freezer, it was just a matter of finding something to tie them together. Vanilla braised blueberries with a touch of salt is one of my favourite things to eat with creamy desserts because they are sharp and cleansing while being completely at home with cream. After this meal, all I needed was a nap.......

sunday lunch continued

to complement the underlying simplicity of flavours in the pork dish, and continue with the theme of fresh flavours and textures, I thought it only fitting to have a sorbet course to cleanse our palates of pork fat with a lychee and a longon sorbet. After a few years as a pastry chef I tend to steer away from making desserts too sweet, Longons being a relative of Lychee with a wonderful savoury edge I managed to keep this course reasonably savoury.

To finish we had a white chocolate mousse with strawberries and pistachios macerated with a little icing sugar, a touch of lemon juice and raspberry vinegar. the crumbs on top are actually a by product(scraps) from making walnuts candied with cinnamon, which once again has a delightful savoury sweet dimension while being fantastically crunchy.