It's All About the Garnish!

Molecular Gastronomy for Amateurs -- Or, How to Make a Mess in Your Kitchen

I've recently joined Patch.com as a contributor, so you'll now get to read some shared content; here's an article that ran on Napa.Patch.com this week:

As one who regularly wins recipe contests, throws elaborate dinner parties and dismisses the Food Network as a little pedestrian for her taste, I've been increasingly interested in the new wave of modernist cuisine called Molecular Gastronomy.

The term was coined by French physical chemist Herve This in 1992, as a way to describe new ways of using science to augment and sometimes change traditional cooking ingredients and methods. The chefs that use these practices are known for turning dishes upside down with chemicals and equipment more commonly found in a laboratory than a kitchen. Liquids are turned into spheres, oils are turned to latticework garnish and herbs become suspended in an amber-like gel.

The movement has finally arrived at the point where sample kits are readily available for the intrepid cook, and I was lucky enough to receive one from my brother on my birthday. The kit is called Texturas, sold by Ferran Adria, the chef/owner of El Bulli in Spain. Adria is the present-day wizard of the modernist cuisine realm, concocting spirals of olive oil evoking memories of one's stair-hopping Slinky and caviar-like bits of melon juice. His restaurant is open from April to October, with 8,000 reservations available each season more than 300,000 people attempting to secure a spot. In the off-season, Adria and his team toil in a lab working on new methods with which to surprise his diners.

For my first project, I wanted to start off with something easy and tasty. Quite a few of the chemicals in the kit had been labeled "Spherification," and I was eager to try out the process. All I needed was sodium alginate, calcium chloride, water and my favorite beverage -- wine, of course.

It sounded easy enough in concept, but I stopped short when reading the recipe. Not only did I have to be exact in my measurements, but they had to be accurate to the GRAM. For someone who doesn't bake because teaspoon measurements are too constricting, this was a little scary. However, I borrowed a scale and soldiered on.

I mixed the wine with sodium alginate, then the water bath with calcium chloride. As instructed, I filled a syringe (my meat injector) with the wine and dripped drops of it into the water bath. The drops spread out in the water and … dissolved. No spheres.

Maybe the wine was too watery? I grabbed the can of xanthan gum and shook a bit into the wine, then hit it with my immersion blender. It immediately turned into a thick jam. I had high hopes for this new texture, but it dispersed in the water bath much like the first batch.

(Click here for photos)

As a final effort, I decided to try "Reverse Spherification," where the chemicals are simply switched: sodium alginate in the water, calcium chloride in the wine. Aha! It worked! In the water bath, that is. As soon as I tried to lift out the balls and noodles of wine, they broke apart and made a mess on my counter. The only balls that stayed intact somehow lost much of the wine and looked like malformed jellyfish when plated.

Though disappointed, I'm still excited about the new way to play with my food and am at this moment dreaming up a concoction that will be a success.

Potato Win!

Finally, after weeks of not winning ANYTHING, I emerged victorious from the KSRO Potato Recipe Contest and Cookoff. The full article comes up on Napa.Patch.com later this week, but I can at least share a brief synopsis from the sponsor website and my recipe below. Yay taters!

The KSRO Good Food Hour Potato Recipe Contest & Cookoff recap.

Here's the recipe:

Potato and Prosciutto Rouladen with Red Onions, Radicchio and Roquefort

6 medium red potatoes
1 large red onion, thinly sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 heads radicchio, chopped
6 cloves garlic, crushed
2 tablespoons flat leaf parsley, chopped
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons butter, divided
1/2 cup Greek-style yogurt
8 thin slices prosciutto (4” wide by 6” long)
2/3 cup Roquefort cheese, crumbled
1 cup panko
1 tablespoon rosemary, finely chopped

Boil potatoes in a large pot until fork-tender, about 30-45 minutes. While potatoes boil, saute onion, salt, pepper and olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat until translucent. Sprinkle radicchio with salt and pepper, then add to the skillet, stirring occasionally for about 3 to 5 minutes or until radicchio is wilted. Remove from heat.

When the potatoes are cooked, drain and return to pot. Add the garlic, flat leaf parsley, 1/2 cup butter, yogurt, salt and pepper. Mash well.

Preheat oven to 500 degrees. On a flat surface, place two slices of prosciutto next to each other, small ends toward you, and overlap long edges by about 1 inch. Repeat with remaining slices so you have four large pieces of prosciutto total. Spread the prosciutto with mashed potatoes, leaving 1 inch of prosciutto exposed on all sides. Sprinkle the bottom third (closest to you) with equal amounts of onions, radicchio and Roquefort. Picking up the end of prosciutto closest to you, roll it over the ingredients and tuck under them, continuing to gently roll away from you, sealing the ends.

Place seam-side-down on an ungreased baking sheet. Melt the remaining butter in a medium bowl in the microwave, then toss with salt, pepper, panko and rosemary. Sprinkle on the rolls, then bake for 5-10 minutes or until panko is light golden brown. Serve. (Serves four)