Archive for the ‘Recipes’ Category
Firstly, let me wish everyone a very happy 2010!
Now that all the hotel Gala Dinners throughout the festive season are finally over, I can spend a week or so relaxing! 
This past month has been busy, however with careful planning ahead, it was relatively easy. Once all the Gala Dinner menus were confirmed, it was all a case of getting things ready on time. The only obstacle that we faced were the deliveries of the ingredients. The working week is cut short when Christmas and New Years Eve fall on weekdays.
Talking about “planning ahead”, I have been making lots of Cured beef.
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For some bizarre reason I decided to cure some beef in Orange Juice and Brandy.
I think that the idea came about one day after I had prepared a few plates of Bresaola (Italian air-dried salted beef) and later that week, one night at home I enjoyed a glass of Macallan Whisky, (a Single Malt that is matured in Sherry Casks from nearby Jerez de la Frontera). I had obviously written down this idea at some point during that evening, (okay, perhaps I had more than one glass! 
), and found the slip of paper a few days later.
Bresaola is salt cured before being hung for 2-3 months. I am not really (that much of a) patient person, so that idea was out of the window even before I begun. I knew that I wanted a sweetish flavour, so I chose a nice Brandy from Jerez, which is also matured in Sherry Casks.
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The Tenderloin (Fillet) is packed in to a bag with Orange Juice, Brandy, Spices, Salt and Sugar and left for 4 days.
On my first attempt I cured the meat for only 24 hours, but found that the resulting meat was still too raw and soft inside. After a few more tries, I worked out that the best texture to my liking appeared after 96 hours.
The meat is removed from the bag and washed before being pat dry. During its time in the bag, the meat has shrunk and become more compact and darker.
I would like to share with you the recipe for one of my Signature Dishes. 
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This dish has been on my menu since the beginning of my culinary adventure in Spain, and remains our most ordered Starter.
The translation of “Goong Che Nam Pa” would be “Fish Sauce Soaked Prawns”, which doesn’t sound so inviting to the palate! In fact the prawns are not marinated in purely Fish Sauce!, that would be far too salty, instead they are soused in a special salty-sweet-sour dressing.
The traditional version of this dish has the prawns butterflied, briefly marinated and served with various condiments. To make it more adaptable to our diners palates I decided to have the prawns served paper thin, similar to a Carpaccio and added new condiments that would complement the interesting and natural sweetness of the prawns.
There are various stages of preparation and method required for this dish, but do not be put off by the long list of ingredients and instructions. Once everything has been made, it only takes a few minutes to get the dish ready for serving. Every component can be made in advance and kept frozen or chilled until needed.
The recipe is for five servings, though the recipes for the Dressing and Crystal Shallots will produce far more than what is needed, however these can be stored in the fridge, the Sauce for ten days and the Crystal Shallots for up to three weeks.
I have often posted about (and get emails about) our chilled Clear Tomato Soup which we use as an “amuse bouche”.
When the dish is first presented on the table as “Chilled Tomato Soup”, there are glances of bewilderment on our guests faces, these glances of confusion soon turn to surprised acknowledgment when the summery taste of garden tomatoes hits the palate.
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INGREDIENTS:
This is really a simple, yet flavour packed recipe.
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Ripe Tomatoes. We often use Cherry Tomatoes too, which results is a clearer finished product. The type of tomatoes is up to you, (Tomatoes on Vine are a good choice) 3kg´s will normally give you just under 1½ litres of soup.
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A bunch of fresh Basil. You could also use Coriander, but the flavour of Basil and Tomatoes is one of the oldest culinary partnerships.
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One of my favourite food memories involves Chinese restaurants. When I was younger, a trip to London Chinatown was an event. The sight of roasted ducks, chickens and pork hanging in the restaurant windows and the aroma of spices and wok cooking were very inviting.
A weekend visit to a Dim Sum restaurant was a reward for a hard week´s work, or a impromptu family get together.
During the week, if I was in the area, I would treat myself to a take-away Roast Duck and Rice and always ask for a small pot of Chilli Oil (or Chilli in Oil).
Good Chilli Oil is wonderful, the slight sweetness that accompanies the roasted hotness is something remarkable. A good Chilli Oil has “body”.
Sadly, most restaurants no longer serve the Chilli Oil that I grew to love. They have replaced it instead with Chilli Infused Oils.
These oils are just hot, without a hint of roasted flavour or a balance of sweetness. Sometimes they just provide you with a small bowl of reddish oil that has been seeped in chilli and pass that off as Chilli Oil.
Over that past few months I have been trying to create a new Chilli Oil. I wanted something that would give me the roasted hotness, sweetness and saltiness that I tasted in my younger days, yet be a bit more daring and refined.
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Because I had no base recipe of ingredients to work from, I had to start from scratch. I knew that it would obviously contain Chillies and Oil.
The first step was to make an acceptable Chilli Infused Oil, later I would look at the other ingredients that would give my Chilli Oil its character.
I knew that the chillies had to be dried ones, these would give the oil its wonderful colour and aroma.
Various test ensued with different dried chillies. “Bird Eyes” chillies were far too hot to do anything with, they would only overpower the finished product. Dried Thai Chillies were also too hot and none of the mentioned chillies had any roasted aroma.
On one test to get the “roasted aroma”, I dry pan roasted a selection of chillies, then infused them with hot oil.
The result was a bitter tasting oil. Not only had I dry roasted the chillies, I had also further cooked them by adding the hot oil, making them bitter.
I would need to watch the temperature of the oil that I was adding, too hot and it would “deep fry” the chillies further, making them black and brittle.
Further tests continued with different chillies and oils at different temperatures.
Finally after many trials I found a dried chilli that wasn’t too hot, yet had a roasted flavour that was obtained by the heat from the hot oil. Dried Cayenne Chilli, or Cayenne Pepper.
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There was no need to dry fry them at all! In fact, these chillies are actually semi dried, meaning that they still have a tiny amount of moisture inside, the membranes remain slightly chewy. I had found my chillies at last!. All I had to do was blitz them and add oil.
There was really no question regarding the oil. Olive Oil proved too overpowering, so I chose Sunflower Oil for its neutral flavour.
To infuse anything, the liquid ingredient, in our case the oil, has to be hot. (Just like making tea, which is basically an infusion of hot water and tea leaves).
As with making tea, the temperature of the water is very important. The ideal temperature should be between 75º and 83ºC depending on the tea leaves used, and not boiling water.
In order to get the oil to infuse with the dried chillies and also “cook them” and give them that “roastiness”, trials proved that 130ºC was an ideal temperature, any higher and the chilli flakes would become bitter, any much lower and they would become “soggy” and retain too much moisture and hence remain chewy.
Finally I had the infused oil worked out, the hardest part was yet to come.
Body and Sweetness. The later I knew would be provided by sugar, but what amount? I didn’t want the sweetness to play the lead role, it had to be a co-star in my Chilli Oil play.
For the “body” I needed something that had its own unique flavour and charm. I tried a host of dried Chinese shrimps, Japanese scallops, and French mushrooms. They were good, all high in concentrated flavour, but the best was something that I would find surprising and closer to home.. Ham.
Not any Ham, but the best ham in the world. Jámon Ibérico de Bellota. Spanish dry cured and aged acorn fed ham.
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