Smoked Ham Broth

A delicious dish can sometimes be created from the scraps of another. After Making a terrine with smoked ham hocks that had been braised until they could be broken into small pieces off the bone, I decided to keep the skin and bones. Using these as a flavour base it was just a short step to making a deeply rich and what some might call 'unctuous' broth, full of wonderfully comforting hammy goodness. Some small tweaks in flavour, seasoning and the addition of some parsley, peas and spring onion were capped off with an egg that had been poached in a tea made from fresh lemon verbena. Having a lemony fresh egg with a creamy runny yolk meant that you could have a little fun smashing it into bite size pieces, but in doing so the soup was thickened and enriched even further with its meaty whites. The end result being a seemingly simple clear soup with vegetables that evolved into an extremely satisfying meal.

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.