I love The Great British Menu me. It is hands down the greatest
cooking programme of the moment, attracting some of the best chefs in Britain
cooking some of the best and most exciting food in Britain. It seems to generate
more traffic on twitter than any other show or sporting event (though to be
fair I do follow a lot of chefs) and showcases more talent than anything Simon
Cowell has vomited onto our screens.
In between the cooking they mix in some nonsense about
the Olympics/Queen’s birthday/whatever it is this year and everyone pretends to
give two shits about the theme while cooking their socks off. This year has
lead to a great deal of rubbish talked about parallels between Olympic athletes
and chefs, training, focus, dedication (it’s what you need...) and most
entertainingly chefs ‘testing’ their dish on an athlete to see what they can
learn (I think I missed the gastronomic criticism event at the last Olympics,
is it part of the modern pentathlon or something?)!
Anyway, like GBM I have digressed into talking rubbish
about the Olympics. Let’s not forget the food. The use of modern ingredients
that change the texture or composition of the food is something that has really
come to the fore this year in the programme and been the subject of much debate.
These tools of so called ‘molecular gastronomy’ (a horrible phrase) are
enabling chefs to create effects such as spherification where a flavoured
liquid is suspended in a thin membrane creating caviar like balls and play
about with temperature, creating cold things that ‘should’ be hot and vice
versa. Up until now the use of these ingredients on TV has been part of the
magician’s secret, something that is used behind the scenes, for example in
helping Heston Blumenthal to create some of his spectacular illusions.
This science of food and cooking has been around for some
time; Harold McGee’s excellent On Food and
Cooking, first published in 1984 is a weighty and inspiring tome on the
subject and the pioneering cooking of people such as Ferran Adria was always going
to disseminate in some way to the mainstream. Companies such as MSK and Infusions4Chefs have
enabled chefs without access to laboratories and teams of researchers to start
using the products and techniques in their own creations and we are now starting
to see talented chefs who have worked with them in various kitchens and have
real experience in using them as part of their culinary repertoire to really
‘push the boundaries’ (sorry, slipping into GBM Olympic-speak again there).
So far so good then? Well no, not really. Much like
foraging, the other current hot topic, there is a real danger that these
techniques will be overused or done for the sake of it. As an example - a dish
of steak and chips, done well (though not well done!) is a thing of beauty. You
are not going to improve it by adding spherified tomato caviar, mushroom ice
cream and a Béarnaise foam just to show you can or by garnishing it with a
bushel of Parson’s Spunkflower freshly pulled from a hedgerow just because it’s
edible. If it doesn’t belong, it doesn’t belong however finely crafted or
exciting it may be.
I have to admit to having a fascination with playing with
my food though. I have in the past experimented with spherification and with
hot jellies (though I swear yer honour I did not inhale) and I am really
excited by the possibilities afforded not just by some of the newer ingredients
but by the equipment now available such as water baths and dehydrators. There
is nothing like eating a dish and being surprised and delighted by something
unexpected or a new perspective on a classic flavour. One particular ingredient
that I have fancied playing with ever since I read about it in Under Pressure,
Thomas Keller’s book on sous vide cooking is Transglutiminase or Meat Glue.
Basically it does what it says on the tin, combining meat protein while
remaining tasteless and undetectable. Up until recently I have only seen it for
sale in quantities too big and too expensive for my purposes (ie. messing about
in my own kitchen for the fun of it). Lately I have found a US website called Modernist Pantry that sells it (and
other items) in small, home use packages and ships internationally, so for the
sake of about $14 I could hardly say no! Armed with my sachet of ‘Moo Glue’
(honestly that is the brand name), I set to work on a couple of experiments.
Both of the dishes below worked well and I’d encourage you to have a go if you
fancy the sound of them, whether or not you choose to use the meat glue.
Also, I would love to read your comments below,
particularly your thoughts on the whole ‘molecular’ debate.
2 ways with Meat
Glue
Chicken with
Creamed Corn and Mushrooms
Serves 2
This dish is actually based upon a French Laundry duck
recipe but mushrooms and corn are natural partners for chicken so it works just
as well.
1 whole chicken
3-4 large chard leaves
1 tbsp transglutiminase (meat glue)
500g sweetcorn
200g mixed wild mushrooms
1 clove garlic – finely chopped
Chopped parsley
A splash of truffle oil
For the sauce:
250ml red wine
1 large onion )
2 carrots )
roughly chopped
1 leek )
A few sprigs of thyme
1 litre brown chicken stock
·
Take the breasts off the chicken. Skin them,
keeping the skin in as large pieces as possible. Trim them of the fillets and
any fat or sinew. With the rest of the chicken take off the thighs and legs to
reserve for another purpose, keep the wings and roughly chop the rest of the
carcass for use in the sauce.
·
Lay both chicken breasts, skin side (though
skinless obviously) down on your board and season with salt and pepper. Using a
sieve, dust the cut side with the meat glue as if dusting with icing sugar,
ensure all is covered. Lay the one breast on top, fat end to thin end (top to
tail) so the cut sides are facing each other and the skin sides are facing out.
Roll tightly in cling film to create a cylinder and put in the fridge for at
least 6 hours to set.
·
To make the sauce put the chicken wings and
carcass into a hot pan and brown for at least 10 to 15 minutes or so, ensuring
you achieve a good colour to all of it. When well coloured chuck in a glass of
water and scrape away to get all the good bits off the bottom. Keep the heat
high and stir occasionally until all the water has gone. Now chuck in the red
wine and repeat the process. When the wine has all but gone throw in your
vegetables and thyme. Again, keep cooking to colour them up. When you have a
decent colour on the veg pour in your chicken stock and deglaze again. Reduce
the heat to medium and reduce the liquid. When the liquid is down to the level
of the bones (or roughly equivalent in volume to them) strain through a fine
sieve (and preferably through muslin) into a clean, smaller pan. Reduce on a
medium heat until the sauce is thick, dark and glossy.
·
Lay the chicken skin flat on a baking sheet and
salt generously, leave for a couple of hours. Roast at 190C for about 20-25
minutes until crisp.
·
Blitz about 2/3 of the sweetcorn in a food
processor and squeeze out as much juice as possible. Warm the juice in a pan
until it thickens then add the whole corns and season to taste.
·
Trim the chard leaves then blanch them in a
large pan of boiling salted water for a few seconds, put them straight into
iced water then to refresh them, pat them dry and reserve.
·
Place the chard leaves flat on a sheet of cling
film so they overlay a little and form a rectangle large enough to hold the
chicken and season with salt and pepper. Unwrap the chicken and roll in the
chard to cover. Roll tightly in cling film and tie the ends to ensure sealed.
Chill.
·
Poach the chicken in water that is just below
simmering until it is cooked (about 20 minutes), check by taking it out and
squeezing it to check that it is firm. If you are unsure then use a temperature
probe though if more cooking is required then wrap in another layer of cling
film to cover the hole.
·
Sauté the mushrooms and garlic off, finishing
with some of the sauce, the truffle oil and the parsley.
·
Slice the chicken into cylinders (marvel at this
point at how you have created a perfect cylinder of chicken!), serve on the
creamed corn and sauce the chicken with the mushrooms. Top with the chicken
crisp and add more sauce if required.
Cod and Ham
Sandwich with olive powder and tomato
Serves 2
In the restaurant we had recently served a dish using
Monkfish wrapped in Parma Ham and it got me thinking about another use for meat
glue using the same flavour combination. This actually works quite well if like
me you are a fan of crisp fish skin as it allows you to have crisp skin on both
sides of a fillet!
Cod – 1 piece from the tail end of the fillet large
enough for 2
2 slices Parma Ham
1 tbsp transglutiminase
200g Black olives
1 punnet – small tomatoes (choose something with
reasonable flavour such as the cherry plum tomatoes or pomodoro)
2 sprigs Rosemary
·
Slice the Cod in ½ lengthwise to give 2 pieces
of similar size and shape. Lay them skin side down on your board. Using a sieve
dust both pieces with meat glue as though dusting with icing sugar. Lay the
parma ham on top of one fillet then top with the other, keeping skin sides
facing out. Wrap in cling film and place in fridge with a small weight on for
at least 6 hours.
·
Blitz the olives in a food processor to as fine
a puree as possible. Place in the centre of a clean tea towel. Bring up all 4
corners together and start to twist from the top, creating a ball with the
olives in. Twist to tighten the ball and squeeze out as much moisture as
possible. Cover a plate tightly with cling film to create a drum like skin.
Spread the olive mixture as thinly as possible on the cling film. Microwave on
low power for approx 30-40 minutes until fully dried out (may take longer, keep
putting back on for 5-10 minute bursts until done). Then re-blitz.
·
Place the tomatoes on a baking tray and cover
with a little olive oil and some salt, scatter the rosemary over the top. Bake
at 100C for about 30 mins so slightly shrivelled but still moist. Blitz and
pass through a fine sieve, season.
·
Portion the cod into nice squared off pieces. Pan
fry the cod on one skin side to begin with then the other until cooked through
and with 2 crisp sides.
·
Serve with the olive powder, tomato puree and
chopped basil.
