Roasted Halibut with White Beans and Chervil

In a mad effort to create some "beauty shots" for the upcoming menu, I did something I've never really done before - this photo is somewhat fake. We are opening the restaurant very soon, but not soon enough to have any of the mise en place to make these dishes, or access to the plates for that matter.

We got the word we needed some pictures at about 11:30 yesterday. By 12:30 we were knee deep in Atwater market hunting for truffle oil, quail eggs, and any picture-worthy produce we could get our hands on. We were unfortunately unable to secure proper lighting equipment. It makes me cringe just to think this picture was lit with energy-saver flourescent lights, which accounts for the overall badness of the photo. We now have a picture of a tomato salad that sadly looks like vomit. Since my computer died I no longer have access to photoshop to attempt to fix the green spike from the light.

Without the time to braise the beans properly we hastily resorted to the canned version for the sake of the photo. The "chervil emulsion" is a honest to goodness herb oil (not chervil) folded into egg whites. The rest is real, the fish, the crudite salad, the snap peas. By 1:30am we had about 5 photos...I'm tired.

Whisky-Peach-Tea Sauce

Maybe a few times a year I return to the idea of bbq sauce. This turned out well but lacked the tang needed for a good bbq sauce. The addition of tamarind, malic or ascorbic acid will probably round it out nicely.

Whisky Peach Tea Sauce

630g peach nectar
6g worcestershire
6g sriracha sauce
85g cider vinegar
60g ketchup
50g brown sugar
25g jack daniels whisky (flamed)
20g lipton tea
1/4 tsp allspice
25 grinds black pepper
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground mustard
1/4 tsp ground clove
1 clove garlic

Cold infuse the tea for two hours.

Combine everything in a pot except the whisky. Reduce mixture to 250g. Remove from the heat. Stir in the whisky.

Salmon Tartare

Salmon Tartare, Black Pepper Coulis, Meyer Lemon Curd, Avocado Ice Cream

The black pepper coulis really ties together the crisp acidity of lemon at the same time as it complements the floral qualities. It cuts through the fat of the salmon and avocado. I pressure cooked the peppercorns in water for 2 hours. The result was less tender than I would have liked. The puree was a thick paste but even when passed, contained a lot of solids. Tenderizing a dried peppercorn to the point it can be pureed is an ongoing search.

The ice cream base is made from of 3 parts fat free milk to 1 part heavy cream, and sugar. I added .15% iota carrageenan. The avocado is pureed into the cold base raw with citrus.

The meyer lemon is preserved in salt and sugar, blanched, pureed and set with carrageenan.

Musings

In case anyone has become as distraught as myself searching for a creme anglaise recipe in the CIA Pro Chef textbook - fear not. It is listed under its proper english name, "vanilla sauce."

I am still unable to find a recipe for "freedom fries" however. If anyone has a good recipe please email me immediately.

Salmon with Gazpacho Sorbet and Meyer Lemon Coulis

The salmon was cured via standard gravlax.

Asparagus Soup

If you said "asparagus soup" to me, I would probably yawn and go back to searching for a good recipe for butterstoch-miso or chocolate parmesan gnocchi. At this point I have to realize I've completely lost touch and need to come back to reality. Asparagus is a wonderful spring flavor and a king among vegetables. It deserves to star in its own dish and not just take second stage to beef or chicken.

I was looking at an old recipe I wrote for a chilled green asparagus soup and it got me thinking about how I would make it today. The fact that its a green vegetable is really what drew me back to the idea, because care must be taken to preserve the color. I start to get a little more excited when I think there really is no cooking past the stock and the asparagus destined for puree.

At this point I'm engaged in a brainstorm focusing solely on my methods. It has actually been quite a challenge to completely omit, garnishes, flavor combinations etc from this thought process.

We can break it down and focus on the elements. A vegetable soup is basically a vegetable puree that has been thinned with a water-based liquid to a soup consistency.

So we have 1) the liquid and 2) the puree. So how can we infuse and preserve the flavor of the asparagus, at the same time controlling the heat to preserve the nice emerald green color?

We can infuse the base liquid or stock with the woody end of the vegetable and the peelings that we normally discard. We can steep the liquid with raw asparagus. We can use the raw juice of the vegetable.

Asparagus juice

Juice the stalks in a juicer over an ice bath. We could always juice white aspargus and reduce it down.

Asparagus Stock

vegetable, chicken or bean stock
mirepoix and herbs
parmesan rind
whole coffee bean (3 per liter)
asparagus, woody ends and peelings
thinly sliced raw asparagus

bring the stock, mirepoix, woody ends and peelings up to a boil and cook 10-15 minutes. Strain over the sliced asparagus and allow to steep another 10-15 minutes. Strain again and cool completely. Save the asparagus juice for the finished soup.

Asparagus Puree

Normally we would blanch the asparagus in heavily salted boiling water and shock it in ice water. There are a lot of aromatics and flavors lost in this process. I don't want to completely eliminate the cooked element, but how much do we really need to cook it to make a puree? Can we sous vide it for a very short time and use the pacojet? Pressure cook it? Pressure cook it sous vide? If we can boil the asparagus in a bag, we can save all those nutrients, but it may discolor before its cooked in time.

Use the asparagus stock and juice to thin out the puree to a desirable soup consistency. But we can still add more flavor. Since we are not reheating the soup, we can cold infuse it with more asparagus and herbs.

Cold infusion

thin sliced asparagus
herbs

Add the asparagus and herbs to the finished soup and cold infuse until the soup is ready to be served. Strain and serve.

Is this the best I can do? What about asparagus powder? Can we use a gastrovac to reduce asparagus juice without heating it enough to discolor?

Tokyo Stars

This isn't really news, but looking at Michelin's 2008 rating of Tokyo is pretty crazy - 150 restaurants adorn Michelin stars in this city. More than Paris or London combined? Well London, don't get me started... According to Michelin, Tokyo has around 190,000 restaurants compared to its count for NYC of 18,000 in 2005 and 25,000 in 2008. This makes sense considering most people in Tokyo don't even have kitchens in their apartments, and homecooking is not an option. But what the hell? 150 restaurants? they care less about stars than we do. At least Robuchon can tack on another three and Gordon Ramsay is dicked once again. haha, EAT IT!

New Menus

We started work this week on a spring menu for a restaurant in Montreal. The process of writing a new and seasonal menu is so challenging. We look at the same ingredients every year and try to keep them interesting to both the customer and ourselves. We think dredge up all the recent ideas and things we find interesting and write it all down. At this point I stand back and look at and think, "that's it?" What about the lamb, the morels, the fava beans, the pork belly, the zucchini, the artichokes? Oh my god the artichokes. Oh boy.

There are a few specific reasons for the seasonal defectiveness of some ingredients. However, most of these dishes need some spring-ification. Here is the brainstorm process:

mosaic of lightly-cured salmon and avocado
quail egg, horseradish, gazpacho sorbet

sauteed veal sweetbreads
spring peas, saba, bacon vinaigrette

rabbit terrine
pickled ramps

hot and cold or swirl of asparagus soups
shaved crudites, parma ham (crisped)

ravioli of braised lamb/wild boar and swiss chard
reconstituted raisins, crispy chard, golden raisin puree (cumin, tumeric)

pork cheeks braised in milk and honey
fennel pollen, shaved fennel salad, lavender, lemon vinaigrette

(Soup)
cockles, sauteed garlic scapes, wild mushrooms

hot and cold foie gras

Mains

braised beef cheek/short rib (brined and cooked at 56C for 72 hours)
rhubarb puree, madeira-coffee jus, asparagus, potato fondant

bacon-wrapped monkfish
ragout of white beans, tomato confit, "sauce bordelaise"

butter-poached lobster
golden beet puree, sauteed spinach, chorizo emulsion

tea-smoked duck breast
(or poached in french toast stock)
pain perdue, black olive caramel, pickled daikon

terrine of squab breast
chicken liver, tellicherry-currant coulis

Spice Quiz

I love cooking with spices. You can give any ingredient or recipe an instant sense of regionality as well as a fiery heat or delicate complexity. Spices can breath life into a dish and they can bog it down and remind us why we started using them in the first place, before refrigerators came into fashion.

Do you know (without looking up on google) what what makes up the chinese 5 spice? How about Arabic or Turkish 7 spice (baharat)? French "quatre epices" (4 spice)?
I started thinking about this the other day when I ran across one that I hadn't heard of before; vadouvan. What are characteristic elements of less clearly defined mixes like, cajun, pickling spices, tex-mex? Or older mixes like shichimi togarashi, zaa'tar, garam masala, ras-el hanout, chermoula, harissa, berbere?

A little while back David brought this website to my attention: Gernot Katzer's Spices. Its really an amazing resource.

I was able to find recipes I was happy with:
berbere
vadouvan
pickling spices
tex-mex

Manufacturing Deliciousness

Nowadays we can use gas chromatography and olfactometry techniques to analyze different foods and see why they go together. There are a number of commercial databases that list thousands of popular ingredients and their threshold levels of volatile compounds. For the most part, this information is best used to explain a tasty combination. However, we can look at compounds and try to predict interesting combinations with varied success. This idea is the very heart of what we refer to as "Molecular Gastronomy" - to completely deconstruct something down to its most basic elements. This can mean the physical and chemical process behind heating a dish, flavors and textures of a classical dish or aromatic compounds in a specific combination of ingredients. How we reassemble the data is the interesting part.

I've barely begun to scratch the surface of this topic personally. In the spirit of science, I've decided to post these limited findings. Most combinations are based on similarly high levels of specific compounds. Of course these are not guaranteed to work. I was really excited to find things like lavender and juniper occur so frequently, because I like them both very much and find them really hard to work with. My combinations go from simple and typical like orange, cilantro and cardamom to very strange like, asparagus, coffee and popcorn. Here's what I found.

Combination #1:
orange
lemon
dill seed
fennel
juniper berry
lavender

Combination #2:
lavender
banana
coffee
honey
gin
allspice

Combination #3:
bay leaf
cheddar cheese
gin
allspice

Combination #4:
caviar
cilantro

Combination#5:
asparagus
coffee
popcorn

Combination #6:
orange juice
cilantro
cardamom

More on this topic visit, Khymos.org, TGRWT, Leffingwell.com

Sugar as a Cooking Medium

This is just a thought... We can use syrup to cook things at a high temperature like when we pour it over nuts to make peanut brittle so why not other things? Heat a pot of hot syrup and immerse ingredients in it to cook the same as you would water or oil. You could use it too cook sous vide over 100C. We could poach scallops in honey or glaze root vegetables in hot syrup. A solution of 99% sucrose can be heated up to 154C/310F without breaking down - the temperature of a low oven. But since its considerably more dense than oil it would cook faster than in a fryer. Glucose syrup is 1.5 times more dense than water and can be heated well past the boiling point, making it much more efficient. If you cook a beef roast in syrup at a hard-crack temperature it should form a crust when it cools that will chip off. Something to think about.

Glucose Density (g/cm3) = 1.54
Water Density (g/cm3) = 1
Oils Density (g/cm3) = .91-.93

Lentils

I'm really glad I can post about these because they are a great love of mine and have tremendous sentimental value. My Indian friends would make them with spices in the consistency of a porridge with chopped tomatoes and scrambled eggs. Ruth loves lentils cooked with spices and I made them for her often.

Lentils have a natural delicious and deeply satisfying quality that is extremely easy to bring out. When I graduated culinary school I didn't have the slightest clue how to cook them. I feel they are often neglected. It is a unique quality to both add to and benefit from the liquid in which they are cooked - you can create a stock and an delicious product both at the same time, which is not the case for meat and animal protein. I think a good bean broth rivals chicken stock and is no comparison to vegetable stock for a non-meat alternative.

Because this technique is really economical, its easier to use less efficient techniques like gelatin clarification which can easily yield as little as 50%. A bean/lentil consomme is an amazing medium for poaching and braising. We braised salt cod in curry-lentil consomme which turned out very nice. I've also used lentil stock as a cooking liquid for lentils which yields great results.

At Daniel I was taught a standard way of cooking dried beans and legumes.

Soak overnight, or as needed.
Place in a pot and cover with cold water
Bring to a boil
Skim off any scum and strain liquid
place in a pot again and add cold water, this time with a sachet of standard mirepoix herbs and spices
simmer until tender
remove and discard sachet
strain liquid and discard
allow the beans to cool

This was really the first exposure I had to a proper technique of bean cookery. I'm not quite sure if there is any value to the blanching process. I later learned the value of smoked pork and salt in addition to the mirepoix. The bean/lentil soaks up more water as is comes close to being cooked so the liquid must be well seasoned. If not you have a lentil that tastes like tap water.

At Lucias restaurant in Minneapolis they have a standard preparation for braised white beans.

2-3# dried beans
1 tomato, halved
1/2 bu. thyme
1/4c. olive oil
5 garlic cloves
2-3T salt

the beans are brought to a boil and allowed to rest for 1 hour. Then they are simmered until tender.

The "hot soak" is not desirable and the method is definitely a regression from the aforementioned but it includes the tomato which completely dissolves into the water in the time it takes to cook the beans. It also includes oil which is of questionable value.

At The Fat Duck, the lentils are placed in a vacuum sealed bag with de-ionized water, mirepoix containing leek and garlic and cooked at 90C for 5 hours. This method is perfect. Using filtered water gives you more control over the water. I'm not sure if the process controls the pH, but I know that affects the texture and the way they cook. The vegetables create an acidic environment and probably add to the cooking time.

In his book titled Molecular Gastronomy, Herve This states "...the percentage of lentils that burst open during cooking increases exponentially as a function of time as the temperature rises above 80C...above 86C, the proportion of lentils that fall apart exceeds the proportion of lentils that become soft while retaining their form..lentils should be cooked at a temperature lower than 80C." I suspect my experience with the higher cooking temperature is designed to reduce the cooking time.

Here's how I cook them:

1 1/2 cup lentils
1/4 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic
1 whole tomato, peeled and chopped
1T curry spice blend
1 tsp corriander, ground
dash cinnamon, ground
1/4 tsp cumin, ground
1/8 tsp cayenne, ground
salt and water

cook the onions in oil until golden, add the garlic 5 min. Add spices and cook 1 minute. Add the tomato and cook until it starts to fall apart. Add lentils and cook 30 seconds. Add water - the amount depends on what you want as a finished result. I usually add about 2 cups of water and let most of it cook off. The cooking liquid should taste fairly salty. Simmer until the lentils are tender.

A Quiet Dinner

Most of the time my trips to the heartland are filled with unrestrained indulgence and experimentation in food. Fortunately I've been busy and enterprising this trip which - while unexpectedly lucrative - has left little room for me to play. As much as I would like a full blown 12 course plated dinner I don't have the time. But there is possibility for a more intimate and limited dinner, maybe 3-4 courses for 5-6 people.

This got me thinking about the importance and meanings of a highly complicated meal vs a simple one. You have progressions of textures, intensities and flavors to take into account. Is it harder to make a three course meal vs a 7+? With 5-7 courses, one or two can miss and the meal will still be a success. A three course can only get better with each plate or it will be a dissapointment. On the other hand with each addition it becomes increasingly difficult to create a meaningful succession.

This is all I had in mind so far:

Soup

Fresh Pasta

Braised Meat

Dessert

Catering Event

I survived my first catered event ever. I was to provide 4 appetizers for a Christmas cocktail party for 50 people. The food cost ended up being about 28% which I'm really happy about. The menu was nothing special and the food wasn't my finest, but it was a really good experience. This is the platter I made for the spring rolls to go on.

The Menu

Classic Bruschetta
Mini Vegetarian Spring Rolls
Spinach and Artichoke Dip
Sesame Chicken Skewers with Soy Dipping Sauce


This is the dressing I made for the tomatoes which were tossed right before I built the bruschetta on site. I will probably make it again because it went so nicely with the mushy hot house tomatoes - it is December.


Sherry-Tomato Vinaigrette

1/4 cup sherry vinegar
1T amontillado sherry
3/4 cup good EVOO
1 Tbs tomato paste
2 Tbs chopped garlic
1 Tbs minced shallot
25 grinds black pepper
1/2 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp salt

Heat 1-2T of the olive oil in a pan. Add the tomato paste and cook until both oil and tomato paste are rust colored. Add sherry and reduce au sec. Set aside to cool. Combine all ingredients in a small container with a tight fitting lid and shake vigorously to emulsify right before serving.

Thanksgiving Plated Dinner

A work in progress.

Warm Cauliflower Panna Cotta
Smoked Sablefish, Caviar, Roasted Cauliflower, Persimmon-Lemon-Thyme Sauce

Cream of Watercress
Poached Lobster, Hearts of Palm

Terrine of Duck
Duck Ham, Chanterelles, Foie Gras, Pecans

Butternut Squash Ravioli
Rasin-Brown Butter, Glazed Squash, Sage, Walnuts

Intermezzo of Apple Sorbet
Calvados, Candied-Ginger

Venison Loin with a Chestnut Crust
Juniper Mustard, Braised Red Cabbage, Madeira Jus

Turkey
Leg Braised with Cranberry-Turkey Chorizo, Traditional Stuffing, Glazed Roots
Breast Roasted with Cranberry-Oyster-Cornbread Stuffing, Skin Crisped in Orange Honey

Pear Tart
Pear-Honey, Lavender, Vanilla-Goat Milk Ice Cream, Pink Peppercorn Mignonette

Pumpkin-Spice Egg Nog
Bourbon, Maple Syrup, Crispy Gingerbread

Thanksgiving

I want to create a feast of orgasmic proportions. Something that celebrates the harvest and the end of the season. Fall is the best time of year for food. I don't want to mess with turkey or thanksgiving too much, no one will as happy. This is what comes to mind when I think of fall and thanksgiving.

apples
bourbon
cauliflower
celery
chestnuts
cranberry
cru beaujolais
dessert tart (not pumpkin pie)
duck
fennel
figs
lobster
maple syrup
marjoram
oysters
pears
pumpkin pie spice
sage
spices, star anise, cinnamon stick, clove,
squash
turkey breast, sous vide
turkey sausage
turkey stock
valpolicella
venison
walnuts
wild mushrooms

I really want to make a turkey sausage this year, regardless of how I use it. Maybe something with cranberries and cinnamon for a kind of chorizo. I'll likely adhere closely to traditional favorites based on this list. It would be fun to do a really extravagant 7-10 course plated dinner though

Croton-Harmon to Corton-Charlemagne

I'm going bitches!

"French Kisses"

Eddie Leroux gave this name to a cheese-flavored pate a choux puff (gougere) piped full of truffled goat cheese, or a stiff truffle bechamel. Bechamel works the best because the sauce thins as its heated inside the gougere and comes out creamy and earthy. The flour doesn't dampen the truffle flavor at all. The goat cheese is a lot more acidic and will make the gougere soggy after a short time. Still delicious and you should eat them immediately regardless.

There's really no end to what you could pipe into these little bad boys. I'm particularly fond of smoked salmon mousseline.

Gougeres

700g milk
700g water
750g AP flour
300g butter
200g gruyere
14 eggs
30g salt

1. combine milk, water, butter and salt together in a pot and bring to a boil.
2. Add flour and stir vigorously 15 minutes.
3. Put the appariel in a mixer and add eggs one at a time.
4. add cheese
5. Pipe into tear drop shapes. Smooth out any wrinkles with fingers.
6. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese
7. bake at 350 until puffed and golden. Turn down oven to dry out.

Fish on Sunda(e?)ys

I appreciate all the work of a complicated meal a lot more when I can throw together something like this in ten minutes on a lazy sunday afternoon. This is the striped bass trimmings I had leftover that I sauteed with a watercress salad and sweet pepper vinaigrette. Normally I wouldn't bother putting up something with zero effort and such a crappy photo, but this was so damn good I just had to post about it.

One of the dinner guests friday was allergic to citrus so I made her this same salad with shrimp in place of the regular shrimp dish. The peppers are pureed with the skins on, making it slightly bitter. It worked suprisingly well with the watercress. I think of complementing bitternesses as a kind of culinary russian roulette with slightly worse odds, but this turned out very nice. The dressing is and sweet and greasy with the fish and crispy greens- mmmmmmm. I'm gonna eat some ice cream and take a nap.

Sweet Pepper Vin.

2 sweet peppers, stemmed and seeded
3/4-1 cup off-dry white wine
2 sprigs thyme
1 small fresh bay leaf
1oz chopped sweet onion
3/4 tsp rice vinegar
1-2T olive oil
salt

Puree the pepper and wine in a blender. Strain the liquid into a pot and reduce with onion and thyme to about 1T. Add the vinegar and oil.

I make this a little heavy on the oil and light on the vinegar so it's more like a sweet emulsified sauce than a dressing. I just put the reduction in one of those little brandname plastic 2oz containers and shake it up with the oil and vinegar.

6 Course Summer Dinner

Menu

Serrano Ham, Marinated Olives
Chateau St. Michelle Blancs de Noirs, Columbia Valley NV

Chilled Hierloom Tomato Soup, “Panzanella” Crouton
Thyme, Basil
Honig Vineyard, Sauvignon Blanc, Napa Valley 2005

Shrimp with Chilled Charentais Veloute, Avocado Puree
Meulenhof, Riesling, Erdener Treppchen Auslese, Germany 2003er

Warm Buttermilk-Poached Poularde with Sweet Corn Emulsion
Radish, Smoked Paprika
Domaine Weinbach, Pinot Blanc Reserve, Alsace, France 2005

Grilled Wild Striped Bass with Green Curry, Pickled Mango
Grilled Scallions
Theo Minges, Riesling, Gleisweiler Holle Kabinett, Pfalz, Germany 2004

Braised Oxtail Ravioli, Glazed with Red Wine Jus, Roasted Shallot Puree
Santa Rita, Cabernet Sauvignon, Medalla Real, Chile 2004

Tasting of 4 Cheeses
Roquefort Le Vieux, Cave Aged Tallegio, Raw Milk Manchego, Hook's 10yr Aged Cheddar
Brazil Nuts, Dried Fruit

Vanilla Panna Cotta, Blueberries, Honeyied Macadamia Nuts
Bonny Doon Vineyard, Muscat, Vin De Glaciere, California 2005


9 guests, I cooked, my loyal droog waited the table. This never would have worked without an experienced server. In reality most of this food was mind numbingly simple, almost everything was based on a fruit/vegetable puree. I'd like to think everything was perfectly balanced and delicately nuanced. A few things fell a little short. The sweetness of the ravioli was a little out of control as was the spiciness of the curry sauce. The star anise adds an entirely new dimension to the dish. If I made it again I might simplify the profile and single out spices. The flavor of thai basil is amazing, I would have liked for it to come through a little more. It was a fun meal. More photos here.

My biggest regret of the night is not getting the good pictures I wanted. Clearly the presentations in general needed a little work. The shrimp might have benefited from a green melon sauce, the pink on pink wasn't too nice. The chicken looked great, even though the picture sucks.

The soup was about half raw tomato puree folded into the cooked soup. The tomatoes on the crouton were blanched, peeled and marinated in olive oil with salt and thyme. I spooned some of the delicious oil over the grilled bread.

I have developed a new appreciation for chicken breasts. I marinated it for two days in seasoned buttermilk. Brought it up slowly up to about 145-150F in a ziplock bag, mimicking a sous vide method. Right before service I dipped the portioned meat back into the warm salty buttermilk. The result is incredibly tender and delicate.

I have no idea what happened to the sauce for the fish. I added a green chili puree at the last minute to a mussel based sauce with the idea that it would brighten up once heated. It turned a nasty camo brown when it hit the hot liquid. Maybe pureeing the raw chilis affected this somehow. The flavor was good and it seemed to be one of the favorites of the meal.

Anyone looking at the flickr from the party would find it hard to believe that the brown turd on a plate was the most delicious course of the night. The oxtail was braised in red wine, port and beef stock which was reduced to glaze the finished ravioli that sat atop the roasted shallot puree. The filling was just shredded meat seasoned with salt, pepper and a little of the jus.

Steve started eating the last panna cotta before I got a picture.

Green Curry Sauce for Fish

2 1/2 cups white wine
2 stalks lemongrass, crushed, sliced
1 (2") knob ginger, crushed
1 1/2tsp cumin seed
1 star anise pod
1T corriander seed
1 1/2# mediterranean mussels, cleaned
1 sprig basil
5 stalks cilantro
1 bay leaf
6 white mushrooms, chopped

Add everything except the mussels to a pot and bring to a simmer. Cook 5 minutes. Add the mussels and cook until they open or are apparently dead. Strain and discard solids, reserve mussels for another use. Reduce liquid to about a cup. Thicken as deemed appropriate. At the last minute stir the green puree into the sauce and adjust seasoning.

Green Chili Puree:
5 jalepenos
1 1/2 bu. green onion, green part only
1 lime, zest and juice
salt and pepper

using a vegetable peeler, peel the jalepenos. Remove the seeds. Puree the ingredients in a blender and strain. Chill immediately.

Sweet Corn Emulsion Sauce

5 ears corn, cut off the cob
3T butter
5 saffron threads
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp white vinegar
3T water
3T olive oil
salt, sugar

Brown the butter in a pan and add the corn. Sweat until very soft. Puree with remaining ingredients. Strain. Should be sweet with a smooth velvet mouthfeel.

Roasted Shallot Puree

3# shallots
2 heads of garlic
2T butter
2T grated parmesan
olive oil

Toss the shallots in olive oil and roast at 375F until very soft. Do the same with the garlic. Puree everything together and strain.

Charentais Veloute

1 charentais melon, chopped
2 stalks lemongrass, crushed
1 2" knob ginger, crushed
lemon juice, and zest
1/2 cup white wine
salt

Add the wine, half the melon, lemongrass and ginger to a pot and cover. Cook over low heat until melon is very soft. Remove the ginger and lemongrass and discard. Puree with the remaining raw melon. Strain.