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Jet City Gastrophysics

~ Exploring Modernist Cuisine in the Northwest

Jet City Gastrophysics

Category Archives: centrifuge

Sweet Meats and Cheese Infusions

16 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by jethro in centrifuge, infusion, sous vide, vacuum sealing

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

bonito, cheese infusions, cheetos, kimchi, Prosciutto Cannoli, Sweet meats

Scott Approves

Scott approves of experimentation in the kitchen

Scott and myself have been hanging out with “Rotovap Chris” lately to do further food experiments in our kitchens.  We came up with themes for each session so we can focus a bit while having fun.  The last two were “Meat and Sweet” and “Cheese Infusions”.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Hungarian Beef Goulash

06 Thursday Dec 2012

Posted by jethro in brining, centrifuge, combi oven, fermentation, foams, hyrocolloids, MC at home, recipes, sous vide, thickeners, transglutaminase, vacuum sealing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

beef cheeks, goulash, Modernist Cuisine, rye bread

Hungarian Beef Goulash

I haven’t tackled a big recipe in a while, so it was time to consult The Work and give it a shot.  I was having guests over and thought the Hungarian Beef Goulash from Volume Five would do the trick. And as usual, it was a lot of work and all sorts of unseen problems presented themselves.  From procuring ingredients to equipment breakdowns, timing issues and even a poorly focused camera (as you’ll see – sorry about that), this one barely made it through. But made it through it did.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Tomato Basil Spheres

16 Monday Apr 2012

Posted by jethro in centrifuge, emulsions, MC at home, spherification

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

basil, Modernist Cuisine, tomato water

Tomato Basil Sphere

It’s been a long time since I’ve tried my hand at spherification, and I thought it was time to revisit the technique.  I’ve done it three times before: the first meeting of Jet City Gastrophysics, my cooking session with Chef Ian Kleinman, and another time when I made some coffee caviar. One of the iconic photos from Modernist Cuisine is their Tomato Basil Spheres, so that seemed like a perfect place to give it another go around.  It’s basically an Insalata Caprese that’s been liquified. Welcome to the future.

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Pumpkin Cotton Candy Jack-O-Lantern

31 Monday Oct 2011

Posted by sheimend in centrifuge, uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

cotton candy, halloween, pumpkin

pumpkin cotton candy jack-o-lantern

This is effin cool.  We centrifuged a can of pumpkin to yield a few tablespoons of a clear, orange pumpkin-flavored liquid.  We saturated it with sugar and spiked it with pumpkin pie spice, then heated the mixture to 300F and cast it into hard caramel molds.  Then, we spun the hard caramel in a cotton candy machine to make 2” puffs of pumpkin-flavored cotton candy.  Then, we squeezed the puffs into the shape of a skull and cut out triangles for the eyes and nose.  Finally, we put it on a stand with a candle behind it.  Presenting the pumpkin cotton candy jack-o-lantern, as interpreted by Jet City Gastrophysics. 

Happy Halloween!

Modernist Cuisine At Home: Caramelized Carrot Soup with Coconut Chutney Foam

10 Monday Oct 2011

Posted by jethro in centrifuge, foams, gels, hyrocolloids, MC at home, pressure cooking, recipes, thickeners

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

carotene butter, carrot, coconut, Modernist Cuisine, soup

Caramelized Carrot Soup with Coconut Chutney Foam

This one is always touted as an easy introduction to Modernist Cuisine. It has two main ingredients: carrots and butter. It has two steps as well: pressure cook carrots in butter for 2o minutes.  Then add carrot juice, puree, and season.  Voila.

Strange thing is, well, my version, it took me most of the day.

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The Price Of Cooking Modernist Cuisine, Part I: Tools And Gadgets

19 Thursday May 2011

Posted by jethro in blow shit up, centrifuge, combi oven, dehydration, liquid nitrogen, pressure cooking, sous vide, vacuum sealing

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

dewar, digital scale, immersion blender, immersion circulator, induction cooktop, ISI ThermoWhip, Modernist Cuisine, pH meter, pressure cooker

“Modernist Cuisine” is not for most home cooks.
– Michael Ruhlman

“[Modernist Cuisine] looks cool and would be fun to flip through,” he said. “But I don’t need to spend six hundred dollars on a cookbook — I already know how to cook.” This led to my next question — in his opinion, were these techniques even appropriate for the home cook? “Sous vide is great for cooking vegetables and meat,” he replied. “But home-cooked meals are home-cooked for a reason. They’re meant for the home.”
– Domestic Divas

The truth is that this stuff is for the pros.
– New Yorker

Man, do these people bore me.  How uninspired. How defeatist.  How sad, pathetic, and totally lame.

0 To 60 in 90 Days

I started to cook in December 2009 – about 18 months ago.  I had no knife skills, didn’t know anything about Anthony Bourdain or Iron Chef, much less Mugaritz.  My refrigerator was empty save for old condiments.  I didn’t even notice the front right burner on my stove was larger than the others because I had never used it.

But once I started, I got way into it.  Within weeks, I had discovered avant-garde food.  By February 2010, I had ordered my first ‘molecular gastronomy’ kit and contacted Scott and Eric to form Jet City Gastrophysics. By March, I spherified my first liquids.  By August, I made the red cabbage gazpacho from The Fat Duck. And in October, just 10 months later, I began cooking from Modernist Cuisine, which wasn’t to be published for another five months.  I used their PDF excerpt.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Ham And Cheese Omelet

22 Friday Apr 2011

Posted by jethro in centrifuge, combi oven, emulsions, gels, MC at home, recipes

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

brown butter, constructed cheese, eggs, gruyere, ham, Modernist Cuisine, omelet

Ham and Cheese Omelet

Now, brethren, let us turn to Book Four, Chapter Fourteen, Page Ninety-Five of The Work, and construct ourselves a tasty little omelet. Three components need to be prepared in particular: the eggs, the cheese, and the butter.  Ah, the wonderful world of dairy gels.  We shall go in reverse order.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Pea Butter

28 Monday Feb 2011

Posted by jethro in centrifuge, MC at home, recipes

≈ 22 Comments

Tags

Anjana Shanker, Maxime Bilet, Modernist Cuisine, pea butter

Pea Butter

Recently, in a laboratory outside Seattle, I ate a piece of buttered toast that I will remember for the rest of my life. The bread itself was not extraordinary, but it was spread thickly with the brightest-green butter I’ve ever seen. It was not true butter, but rather an extract of pure green peas. Fresh peas are blended to a puree, then spun in a centrifuge at 13 times the force of gravity. The force separates the puree into three discrete layers: on the bottom, a bland puck of starch; on the top, vibrant-colored, seductively sweet pea juice; and separating the two, a thin layer of the pea’s natural fat, pea-green and unctuous.

– Paul Adams, Future of food: Drinkable bagels and beyond

As the first reviews began coming out from the 30 course dinners held by the Modernist Cuisine team, everyone mentioned the pea butter in particular.  A pretty simple recipe, you take pureed peas and spin them in a centrifuge to extract the pea fat.  I gave it a shot at my house, taking a can of peas, blending them, and spinning them for 30 minutes.  Nothing good came of it and the layers did not seem to separate.  I was stumped.

Luckily, I was able to talk with chefs Maxime Bilet and Anjana Shanker at the Modernist Cuisine book launch and they were able to clarify a few things for me:

  1. Use frozen peas
  2. Blend them with nothing else
  3. Spin for 90 minutes

That seems simple enough.  So I went home and went at it.

Visualize Whirled Peas

Peas, Unspun

Peas, Unspun

The chefs recommended a bag of high quality organic peas.  My local store had Kroger brand.  Well, hey, I gotta start somewhere.  I brought home a bag and threw them in the Vita-Mix for their first spin of the day.  It ended up being a very bright green frozen powder.  I put the pea dust into one of my centrifuge containers and filled the rest of the containers with water as counterweights.

Frozen Pea Dust
Peas Ready For A Whirl

When talking with Chef Shanker, I asked how powerful their centrifuge was that she used for the pea butter, and she said it was 10,000 g’s.  So I had to calculate how long mine would spin at, since my centrifuge only goes to 1520 g’s.  Since the relationship is linear it’s straightforward to figure out:

10000/1520 = 6.58
6.58 x 90 = 592 min.
592/60 = 9.9 hours

Ten hours in the centrifuge?  Mm.  I started around 3pm and didn’t feel like waiting until 1am to see the results.  So I decided 5 hours was plenty.

Pea-Minus Countdown To Launch
'Fuge RPM

She also mentioned that it was good that I had a refrigeration unit attached. The reason is two fold: 1) so the food doesn’t cook; and 2) it keeps the pellet together, providing better separation.  I checked my centrifuge temperature with and without the refrigeration unit.  Without, the chamber got to 124F. With the unit turned on, it was at about 70F.  So a significant difference to be sure.

Pea Parts

And after five hours, I pulled out the peas and saw the results.  Three separate layers: a pellet of pea meat, a thin layer of pea fat and a supernate of pea water.

Pea Parts

One thing to note is look at the bottom of the container as compared to the photo of it prior to spinning.  Five hours in the centrifuge completely distended and reshaped it.  Luckily, it didn’t crack open.

I scraped off the fat and put it on a piece of bread.  Pure bright pea flavor.  It’s really, really good.  The pea pellet and pea water were also striking in their own way as well.

Pea Putty
Pea Water

I’m a little concerned about the wear and tear on the centrifuge since I will be needing to be spinning it for long periods of time to get their results, but it performed great for a five hour run.  Cooking of all types teaches you patience, and in this case as in others, the wait is well worth it.

Jethro

Gazpacho

27 Sunday Feb 2011

Posted by ericriveracooks in centrifuge, gels

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Blog, Centrifuge, Cooknig Blog, Dinner, Food, Iota Carrageenan, Recipe

Starting to work with iota carrageenan, which is pretty fun.  Also, a bit of work with Jeth’s centrifuge.  We’ll see what happens.

Eric

Soy Glazed Mackerel, Honey Roasted Root Vegetable Puree, Macadamia Extraction, Herb Salad.

20 Thursday Jan 2011

Posted by ericriveracooks in centrifuge, sous vide, vacuum sealing

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Blog, Cooking Blog, Dinner, Fish, Food, immersion circulator, Mackerel, Recipe, Sous Vide

Equipment:

Centrifuge
Homogenizer
Chamber Vacuum Sealer
Immersion Circulator

Our first main course dish. Good things are coming…..stay tuned.

Eric

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