Category Archives: recipes

Fried Chicken and Waffles… Ice Cream

10 Thursday Nov 2011

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waffle ice cream in chicken skin cup

Ah, chicken & waffles.  Having grown up in Los Angeles, I’ve made a few late-night pilgrimages to the famed Roscoe’s House of Chicken’n Waffles, and every now and then, I get a craving for crispy fried chicken alongside a lightly toasted waffle.  But other times, my desires are a little more unsavory (pun intended). So, in a recent [epic] Jet City Gastrophysics jam session, we came up with the above: waffle-flavored ice cream served in a crispy chicken skin cup, with maple syrup.
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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Caramelized Carrot Soup with Coconut Chutney Foam

10 Monday Oct 2011

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

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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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Ideas In Food At Home: Popcorn Gelato

29 Thursday Sep 2011

Posted by in foams, liquid nitrogen, pressure cooking, recipes

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Popcorn Gelato

A few months back I bought the cookbook Ideas In Food: Great Recipes And Why They Work, but hadn’t cooked anything out of it yet.  It has two sections: recipes for the home cook and recipes for the professionals.  As I don’t believe in such restrictions (the point of this whole blog, really), I immediately turned to the “professional” section.  What can I make with what I have on hand? I settled on the Popcorn Gelato.  And I’m glad I did – this is a really cool recipe.  Actually it’s really, really cold.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Corn Bread with Bacon Jam

31 Wednesday Aug 2011

Posted by in emulsions, MC at home, recipes, sous vide, vacuum sealing

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Corn Bread with Bacon Jam

I’m beginning to think that the authors of Modernist Cuisine are evil.  No, I’m not talking about the whole patent troll brouhaha.  I’m talking about the recipes.  Surely they are out to kill me.  Why would I say such a thing, you might ask?  Well, let me ask you: have you ever made their corn bread?  No?  And how about their bacon jam?  I see.  Let me try to explain.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Combi Oven-Steamed Broccoli

13 Monday Jun 2011

Posted by in brining, combi oven, MC at home, recipes

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The Cast Of Characters

The Cast Of Characters

The title of this dish is misleading.  I mean, how easy is it to steam broccoli in a combi oven?  Set the settings, put it in, wait a few minutes.  No, that would not be satisfactory in the least.  We’re trying to do something different here.  And certainly, so are the authors of Modernist Cuisine.  Turns out it is better to call it Broccoli Three Ways.  Or The Broccoli Trinity.  Power Broc Triple Threat, perhaps. With our humble plant from the cabbage family, we are going to not just steam it, but fry it and pickle it as well.  And throw some cured fatback on top for good measure.  OK, now we’re talking.

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Variation On The Striped Omelet

14 Saturday May 2011

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When creating the striped omelet recipe from the Modernist Cuisine cookbook, a pastry comb is dragged through the mushroom puree to create the stripes.  I had leftovers, and was making another omelet, when it hit me – why just do stripes? So I put the puree in a squeeze bottle instead.

Mushroom Puree In A Squeeze Bottle

As my cake decorating skills are non-existent, my first attempts were amateur indeed but promising. Another idea would be to use a pastry bag.  Because of the egg powder mixed in, the mushroom puree firms up just like eggs.  You can create spirals, filigrees, quotes and messages (“Good Morning!” would be funny), even roses rising from the omelet. I’m looking forward to seeing what crazy icing designs people come up with.

Jethro

The Fat Duck At Home: Nitro Poached Green Tea and Lime Mousse

06 Friday May 2011

Posted by in foams, gels, liquid nitrogen, recipes, sous vide

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The Cast Of Characters

The Cast Of Characters

So I’ve been going through a lot of Modernist Cuisine recipes and thought I would go back and visit some other cookbooks I have on my shelf. I’ve had my eye on the apertif that opens up The Fat Duck Cookbook and thought I’d give it a shot. It’s a light, sour-sweet flash frozen meringue. It requires the usual things – things like high methoxyl pectin, malic acid, matcha tea powder and liquid nitrogen. Ah, modern cookery. Part science, part cooking, part detective work.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Mushroom Omelet

28 Thursday Apr 2011

Posted by in combi oven, MC at home, pressure cooking, recipes, sous vide, vacuum sealing

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Striped Omelet

After I tackled the ham and cheese omelet last week from Modernist Cuisine, I was ready for the next step: their infamous striped mushroom omelet.  I had to go online and to four grocery stores to collect the ingredients necessary.  About $75 later I was ready to go.  This had better be a good omelet.

The Cast Of Characters

The Cast Of Characters

The recipe calls for several preparations: a brown chicken jus, which goes into a mushroom marmalade, a mushroom puree and the omelet base.  A scrambled egg foam was also made, but I ran out of N2O chargers for my cream whipper.  So the sous vide scrambled eggs sit sealed in my refrigerator until I can go to the store and pick some up.  We’ll skip that step.

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Modernist Cuisine At Home: Ham And Cheese Omelet

22 Friday Apr 2011

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

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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: Combi Oven Rib Eye

21 Monday Mar 2011

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Continuing my awesome ability to find super deals on the Internet, I stumbled across a posting on Craigslist for an unused Gaggenau combi oven for under a grand.  That’s a chunk of change no matter how you slice it, but considering these things go for $3000, it was quite a find.  There had to be something wrong with it.  I went to take a look and heard the story: the guy bought the oven at an auction from an appliance store that went out of business, collecting a wide variety of gadgetry for he and his girlfriend’s dream kitchen.  Then, she left him, and headed back to China.  He was trying to get rid of all of it.  No scratches and everything seemed to look good – so I went for it.   A few days later with the help of my neighbor, and I had it installed and, thankfully, working up above my fridge.

Gaggenau Combi Oven

My New Toy: A Gaggenau Combi Oven

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