playing with fire and water

tuna pumpernickel sunchoke yacon

salt cured tuna

pumpernickel pudding

sunchoke nuggets

pickled yacon

honey mustard pearls

white sage

pumpernickel pudding

120g egg yolks

120g sour cream

250g whole milk

150g coarse, dry pumpernickel crumbs

salt to taste

Preheat oven to 350. Butter the insides of individual molds or set them in a large baking dish.

In a large bowl, whisk together the yolks, sour cream, milk, and salt. Fold in the pumpernickel and pour into molds. Fill the baking dish with enough boiling water to come halfway up the sides of the molds. Cover the baking dish with foil. Place in oven and bake until the puddings are no longer wet in the centers.

sunchoke nuggets

250g sunchokes, peeled and cut into brunoise

50g unsalted butter 

salt and pepper to taste

Heat a heavy skillet over medium high heat until hot. Add butter. When butter starts to brown, add sunchokes and toss well. Season with salt and pepper. Continue cooking, constantly tossing in browned butter until sunchokes are crispy on the outside and soft inside.

pickled yacon

150g yacon, peeled and thinly shaved

250g rice wine vinegar

5g salt

5g sugar

Bring the vinegar, sugar and salt to a boil. Allow to cool to room temperature. Pour over the yacon in a nonreactive bowl. Cover and chill for 1 hour.

honey mustard pearls

40g dijon mustard

20g honey

20g water

1g agar

1 quart cold vegetable oil

Whisk together the mustard, honey, water and agar. Bring to a boil. Fill a syringe with the mixture and squeeze out individual drops into cold oil. Let pearls stand in oil for a few minutes to gel. Scoop out pearls with a mesh strainer and rinse with cool water.

tubers

Sunchoke (round) and Yacon (enlongated)

Sunchoke (Helianthus tuberosus) is a tuber native to the United States and first cultivated by Native Americans. Also known as Jerusalem Artichokes, they are a species of sunflower that are easily grown in a sunny spot but can become invasive if left unchecked. To keep the tubers vigorous and viable, they should be dug up in late autumn to harvest, saving some to replant in fertile soil. Their earthy flavor and texture is reminiscent of potatoes and are best lightly steamed or roasted.

Yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolious) is in the same family of plants as sunchokes and sunflowers. Indigenous to the Peruvian Andes where they grow as perennials, the tubers cannot survive harsh New England winters and must be dug up and stored in a protected area, to be replanted in the spring. Their flavor is mildly sweet and fruity with earthy tones. Their texture is crisp; a cross between jicama and water chestnuts and are delicious when eaten raw.

white truffle x4

All told, my little 14 gram tartufo bianco d'Alba gave a lot of bang for the buck. It provided me a day's worth of delicious meals. A truffle-scented omelet for breakfast. For lunch, a bowl of fresh tagliatelle with butter, taleggio, and a scandalous shower of shaved truffle. And this heady quartet for dinner. 

All truffle. All day. 

Life is good.

 

chicken skate corn coconut

Imagine a morsel of tender, sweet, flaky fish. Now imagine it encrusted with a crackly-crisp crust of chicken skin.

chicken-fried skate

silver queen corn

coconut

cocoa nib

sea bean

That was the image that I kept fixed in my mind (and palate) and the inspiration for the chicken skin croquant. 

In the past, I've wrapped and glued raw chicken skin to another protein. The problem with that method is controlling the cooking time and temperature required to produce a crisp skin and a properly cooked filling. Sometimes these are incompatible. 

Then there is the issue of wrapping, which leaves areas of overlapping skin that result in pockets of flabby fat.

The control, I decided, would be to pre-cook the skin. But then how to apply it? Grinding was a logical step, but I wasn't looking for a crumb coating. I was seeking a crispy crust--one that did not require deep frying or prolonged heating. 

I needed something that would cook quickly, fuse the ground skin, and contribute to the texture and flavor. Sugar fit the bill and I liked the ideal of a bruleed coating, but the amount needed would render it too sweet. Mildly sweet isomalt, which behaves like sugar and quickly melts to the hard-crack stage turned out to be the solution. The addition of Tapioca Maltodextrin further improved the texture and helped with the bonding.

 

The last silver queen corn of the season, when put through a juicer and heated, contains natural starch that quickly transforms into a velvety sauce. All that is needed is a burst of lime juice and pinch of salt to balance the sweetness. 

Coconut and corn is a marriage made in heaven. 

Cocoa nibs add complexity and a hint of bitterness.

Salty sea beans + chicken of the sea = delicious. 

what is it?

steak mushroom corn tahoon

vegetable tartine

tiles of roasted zucchini, summer squash and sweet bell peppers, mortar of eggplant skin puree

Why do we peel eggplants and discard the skin? 

Some say that the skin is bitter and tough. This can be true with the large, dark globe varieties. But I enjoy the taste of bitter, either as the focus of a dish, or as a contrast to other flavors. And it can indeed be tough, especially when cooked with dry heat. But when slowly stewed with roasted garlic and Aleppo pepper, it makes a flavorful and silky puree. 

Taste and texture aside, a compelling reason to rescue eggplant skin from the 

bin is nutrition. A phytonutrient, nasunin, is found in eggplant skin. Nasunin is a 

potent antioxidant and free radical scavenger that protects the cell membranes 

in the brain.

Eggplant skin = brain food = greater capacity to think about food. I love closing circles.

Thinking about food is not always an intellectual exercise. Sometimes, it is finding the sublime in the banal.

insalata caprese

peeled heirloom tomatoes, injected with basil oil

mozzarella balloon filled with tomato water foam

olive oil powder

basil gel "leaves"

balinese sea salt

cold peach hot tomato

harvest

What grows together...goes together?

Are the tomatoes more intense this year because 5 years ago, I built raised beds from recycled lumber and filled them with black gold (black gold indeed...that truckload of compost cost me more than some jewelry)? Or is it because of the soft rock phosphate (so finely ground that the wind threatened to blow it away) that promised to raise the mineral content of the soil and increase the cell density of the crops?

Are the peaches extraordinarily sweet because 3 years ago, I took the time to dig a hole much larger and deeper than I needed to? Or can it be attributed to the carefully blended brew of blood meal (nitrogen), bone meal (phosphorous), wood ash (potassium) and compost tea that I apply each spring?

Or is Mother Nature being extra generous with her blessings this year?