The last couple of weeks in Thorndike Kitchen

As you know, I am going to move out of thorndike st in September, and this blog is going to move too. This kitchen is not big, a small counter space, dining table is not stable, no disposal, no dishwasher..( I can name a bunch of complains), but this is where I am learning and grow,  you can never forget a place like this. These are what happened in the last couple of weeks here

Baked plantain with cheddar cheese and tomato, spicy cilantro sauce

(inspired by plantain tomato pizza from vege planet)

Seared scallop with Champagne grape , red wine sauce, pesto, whipped feta cream

(this is champagne grape season!)

Sweet corn carrot, jalapeño soup with Parmesan scallion popover

( Inspired by Simon Pearce)  

marjoram sauce marinade UFO squash , fingerling potato, purple potato

UFO Squash:

( I like the fact they barely have seeds)

Deal with lean fish-Poached Fish

Oliver oil poached Halibut with pesto

(prosciutto wrapped Turkish fig with stuffed goat cheese)

Milk poached cod, scallion egg rolls with romesco sauce

Poach is a very delicate way to cook fish, and you can taste the original flavor of fish that comes from the ocean, also prevent from ovecooked( if you are really doing poach, but not boiling)

For lean fish, it's good to use oliver oil , butter poach, to make it more moisture and juicy. The point is to season the liquid well, otherwise your fish will be very bland.

Add some herb into your poach liquid, like thyme, bay leaves, peppercorn , season with salt, poach temperature( low heat for my stovetop), 5mins

Egg roll:

the secrete to make tender egg is to add some fat( like heavy or light cream) and some water( I used chicken stock), milk has too much protein. Some chef even discard egg white to reduce the protein.

This is a Japanese style egg roll, but I saw some recipe about romesco with omelette, so I guessed they would work too, and this is so true!

Romesco style red pepper coulis

One of my favorite sauce, needs some work. Roasted pepper, remove skin, boiling pepper and garlic and some shallot in chicken stock, smoke paprika, cayenne pepper , reduce the liquid,  then blend it together with some nuts( usually use bleached  almond and hazelnut, but I am so smart to use macadamia ~~. not sure if they will taste the same) also this is not very authentic remesco, usually it also has tomato. stale bread, vinegar. I would like to try this more authentic one next time:

 http://www.finecooking.com/recipes/romesco_sauce.aspx

the last thing I want to say is ...

it's so expensive to experiment on fish~~

Restaurant week dining rehearsal -ratatouille terrine

This is one of the dishes on the Stanhop's restaurant week menu

they call it as:

GRILLED SUMMER VEGETABLE TERRINE

AUBERGINE**, CHEVRE CREAM*, LEMONY PESTO DRESSING

(**:eggplant, *: whipped goat cheese cream)

So I made it myself first.

Grilled( on my griddle):

eggplant(peeled), golden zucchini, portabella mushroom

Stove top roasted:

red &yellow pepper

(this is an old picture about fire roast tomato and red pepper)

Picked:

Fresh basil

After everything is done, put them in a mode layer by layer, filled in tomato sauce and gelatin mixture( you can alway make over this by adding herbs)

chili for a couple of hours

Whipped goat cheese:

Goat cheese and heave cream  , blended in a food processor, and it will become 'goat mousse'

Super delirious, totally worthy the work

and next time, I will artichoke in it

Let's fry flowers!

This is zucchini flower I got from fresh market and she told me...

I can fry them!

so I decided to make tempura

prepare, I stuffed a piece of goat cheese in it

which proves to be not fit here

Batter: 1cup flour

1 cup buttermilk

1egg

about 1/2 cup cheddar

Italian herbs mix

1Tbs canola oil

salt /pepper

Look like chicken wings-_-'

if you ask me how it taste like

I would say 'savory Italian cheddar crispy batter with a very soft inside'

Battle of beans!

I got a present , home planted, beans! So I started a battle of beans myselft

Beans tomato, basil salad

beans with smoke salmon, oliver cream cheese in pita

prosciutto wrapped beans, pan seared. poached eggs and Hollandaise  sauce, crispy prosciutto crumbles 

( I made the Hollandaise   from scratch!)

Green beans tempura with tempura dipping( mirin, ponzo) 

I think , most of the places where you use asparagus, you can replace with beans, but beans have to be cooked in water until tender.And they come out good

Hollandaise  , first time, not very successful, I think, maybe too much butter, so the color is too yellow.

Hollandaise sauce is to use double boiler cook egg yolks and acid(vinegar) until emulsion formed, then carefully add melted butter as whisked.usually add some cayenne pepper

Mayo is made from egg yolks and oil

Worship Oleana(2)

Goat cheese rice cake ( with golden raisin and pine nuts), champagne grape red wine sauce , champagne grape and baby arugula 

Seared scallop with warm Fig, Fig jam, crispy prosciutto, tomato beurre blanc

The first one was a big success, I am very proud of myself ! In Oleana, it was a grape leaves stuffed with goat cheese rice with champagne grape sauce and champagne grape. I made it over by  adding golden raisin and pine nuts, skipping grape leaves but pan fried it to give it a crispy outside, creamy inside.

As for the sauce, I boiled and reduced red wine with butter champagne grape and shallots, chicken stock, a little bit balsamic vinegar and pomegranate concentration , then blend it and filter to get the silky sauce.

The second one, it was a warm Fig , seared scallop with fig pistachio jam, underneath was tomato kisir. and pistachio cream 

It was too sweet for me, so I added prosciutto , which goes well with fig. I made fig, walnut jam by reducing red wine with dried fig, walnut, and blend to make a jam.

Didn't make pistachio cream , instead make berrue blanc as the fatty/cream part

It was OK, don't think the combination is a keeper.

ps: glad I can get some cooking inspiration back. I was frustrated by dining out more but little progress in cooking, now it seems to start getting paid back!  I appreciate....

Worship Oleana(1)- Grilled Patty-pan squash with spicy cilantro mint sauce with crumbed pine nuts

After a wonderful dinner in Oleana, I think I totally fall into Turkish/middle-east cuisine, they have an amazing way to work on herbs and seems they use hundreds of varieties, For me, one of the most enjoyable things in cooking is to discover the 'lover' relationships between different ingredients. How I can't love them!

I have been reading Oleana and Sofra's menu and thinking about how to make them by myself.

The very first thing is I want to copy the dishes I had and make them over in my way. Because that was an chef tasting menu, not all of them are on the menu.  I asked the waitress about the ingredients of each dish, for the part I can't remember, I just figure it out in my way

The first one is about grilled 'zebra zuchini' ( does it really exist?)with spicy cilantro sauce with crumbed almond.

I found the cuttie patty-pan squash in store, aha, they are good candidates too!

The spicy cilantro sauce, I used cilantro, mint, a little bit parsley and basil, I pan-roasted garlic and jalapeño and blended all of them together. it's like a kind of pesto without nuts and cheese.I don't have almond, use pinenuts instead.

I marinade the sliced squash in the hot sauce and pan-grilled them .

It's very close to the Oleana's,  except I used little jalopano, also I will cut the squash thick next time, which  I believe will taste more meaty

I am going to do this series for a while, so ..Good start, cheers!

white gazpacho with pickled shrimp

white gazpacho with picked shrimp

A bad news, I think I have a procrastination problem. Overwhelmed by my new job, new life, still confused and unsure about the future, . Never stop planning, but really start doing anything. In the aspect of cooking, usually it's like when I do grocery shopping for a particular dish, I will come up with many other plans, some of which sound more exciting than my initial plan, then I buy them all. After I get home, I don't know which to start, then I probably only make one of them, all the other remain as 'planned'. Before, it seems I can cook anytime, but now, it becomes a very big thing, I have to be in a right mood, even need some 'determination', like ' OK, LET ME COOK today! i MUST'

This is not the only thing I cooked since my last blogging, I made some not pretty stuffs, had some failures in experiments, all those frustration are really killing  me , even this dish, I am not 100% satisfactory with it..

Before this, I also made a regular roasted pepper gazpacho, then I discover the white gazpacho, got intrigued, I have no resistant for pretty dish.

white gazpacho usually use grape ,bleached almond and stale white bread, some of them include cucumber too, so does mine, I also add Greek yogurt.But the problem here is I was too lazy to bleach almond , used tahini  and pine nuts instead. so maybe it was an  'wrong' substitution.

Also next time, I would blend all the ingredients expect bread first, then blend the filtered liquid with bread, that will make the soup thicker.

White gazpacho:

cumber: grape: bread:nut=1:1:1:0.5

Pickled shrimp:

Boiling sherry vinegar and water with sugar(1.5:1:1), add cumin, coriander , mint leaves, cilantro leaves, add shrimp, move it away from heat, chill at least 1hr. Or leave them in an airtight jar , can be used within two weeks

Paprika garlic oil:

heat oliver oil , add paprika add garlic , medium -low heat. 5-7mins