IDEAS IN FOOD

In Theory

It has been awhile since we have visited the category just before the bin.Today I was working on a whole glazed eggplant to be served in the style of roasted foie gras.  I grilled the eggplant to cook it and make the skin easy to peel.  I then soaked the eggplant in litchi juice to add some sweetness and balance the eggplant.  I then used the litchi juice to glaze the eggplant as I roasted it in the oven.  I then presented the whole eggplant sprinkled with ginger granules, shiso leaves and black pepper.  After I presented the eggplant I sliced it.  It was firm on the outside and tender on the inside.  Man was I happy.  I took a bite.  I tasted and chewed and took another bite.  Boy I am either stupid or dumb.  The eggplant may have been the absolute worst thing I have ever eaten.  The amount of bitterness I experienced is truly not measurable.  What is even better is as I stepped out of the kitchen Aki tried a bite because I mentioned it was not bad, just a bit bitter.  Yeah, misery seems to love company.  In theory the idea, concept and application of the dish is great.  In reality it has been retired to the bin.

Size Does Matter

What is great with one or two bites can certainly become a disastrous wreck with any more than that.  I am not talking about a palate getting bored and tired.  I am simply noting that a dish can be excellent on a micro scale and just lousy on a macro scale.  A case for my insight is a dish from our own repertoire.  I made a litchi jelly candy and set in small molds.  The taste and texture was smooth, silky and melting reminiscent of a true litchi though with less chew.  I felt the litchi jelly would pair nicely with marinated tomatoes and olive oil.  I prepared small spoonfuls of peeled tomatoes, miso tea, olive oil and the litchi jelly and took a bite.  Absolutely delicious.  I felt we needed to serve this dish.  I took a great many peeled tomatoes and covered them in melted litchi jelly.  I set this base mixture in small ramekins, eagerly waiting for the jelly to set so we could try the complete dish.  When the tomato and litchi jelly molds were solidified we turned them out onto a plate and dressed them with olive oil, miso tea, sorrel and marjoram.  We then began eating the dish.  One bite was tasty, two was good, three just OK.  I looked at Aki and she and me and we both nodded.  We cannot serve this.  It literally tells you to stop eating it and that is not good.  While the initial tastes and textures of the litchi jelly and tomato seemed promising as a whole dish we need to rethink its uses.  For now, we can serve the refreshing bite as an element of a dish.

Getting a Bigger Bin

fToday has been an up and down day.  It began with the preparation of Sugar & Spice.  (more to come on that subject in a few days.)  Aki made an incredible white miso and clabbard cottage cheese cavetelli dough for me.  The dough is a flavor bomb with great texture, something I wish I could have put together.  Sometimes when your mind wanders down alleys you forget to open the doors.  Anyway, I began rolling out the dough and my cavetelli maker broke.  And guess what?  No one has any.  They are back ordered until who knows when meets not going to arrive.  @$%^!!!  So now I have to figure out a way to hand roll cavetelli and give the dough a fair show at the derby.

I decided to mellow my mind by smoking something--preserved tomatoes.  My goal was to make a firm tomato conserve which could be used for multiple applications.  I will see how it turned out tomorrow.

I returned to the stove top with the ambition of making zucchini crisps.  I succeeded and was eager to integrate the crisp into a dish.  Well, I had braised white asparagus on hand and a zucchini cake as well.  I figured lets start combining ingredients.  Sometimes my method works, sometimes I need to get a bigger bin.  The dish was warmed white asparagus which had a unique almost molten interior crusted in zucchini cake crumbs topped with creamed morels and a zucchini crisp.  The dish tastes good.  The dish looks good.  But, something is off.  Aki mentioned some petite  herbs would punctuate the dish.  I was not so sure.  Anyway, the elements were all tasty, kind of like yesterdays  asparagus dish, yet not harmonious.  And thus I need a bigger bin.

Calamari

Cooking for myself is not a skill that comes easily. In my professional life I cook for others and take great joy in preparing delicious, well thought out meals. At home I am happy to prepare meals to be shared with Alex or other friends and family. But on the rare occasions when I’m on my own, cooking becomes an awesome task. Somehow the amount of effort that goes into preparing anything other than the simplest of dishes seems like entirely too much trouble. Even when I put some effort into creating a more elaborate meal for myself it almost always falls flat. I’m sure there are some deep-seated psychological reasons for this tendency to ruin my own supper, but the end result is that pasta with butter and cheese is the standard meal when I eat on my own.

Last week while Alex was away we received a gorgeous shipment of fish. I wrote about the way that I took great pleasure in cleaning the specimens and smoking some for future use. I kept aside some impeccably fresh calamari for myself. My thought was to grill it since we had some amazing grilled seafood at Demetris in Astoria while back east. I had a craving for curry so I briefly marinated the bodies in curry powder and olive oil.

There was some rhubarb in the walk-in that needed some love and I thought its bright flavors and crunchy acidity would make a nice contrast to the tender sweetness of the calamari. I cut it into a delicate rectangles and let it macerate with a pinch of sugar and salt. I had some green onions as well so they were finely sliced and added to the rhubarb for a bit of astringency and earthiness.

The tentacles have always fascinated me because they awaken such visceral reactions when they appear on a plate. People either love them or hate them and the members of the latter camp tend to be quite vocal in their prejudice. I believe that it is the look of the tentacles more than the flavor that provokes such virulent antipathy. When cooked whole they are awkward to eat because of their size and shape. With that in mind I separated the tentacles into individual members so that they would look less like distorted sea spiders. Then I briefly sautéed them over extremely high heat and then rolled them in chopped, toasted almonds to add some complexity and crunch.

The last element on the plate was some compressed melon. I thought that its sweet juicy flavors would be a nice addition to the dish. Besides, Alex had asked me to use it up while he was gone and eating it with a squeeze of lime and a sprinkle of salt seemed like cheating somehow.

I grilled the bodies and sliced one into rings, which I dressed with the rhubarb and green onions. I squeezed a judicious amount of fresh lemon juice over the remaining body and paired it with the marinated calamari, the warm almond dusted tentacles and slices of melon. The dish had all of the flavors and all of the elements but still it somehow fell flat. Each component was good on its own and perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if I had someone to share it with.  There would have been some distraction for my inner critic. Although some of the elements may reappear, such as the tentacles which were succulent and nutty, the dish as whole was definitely one destined for the bin.

A Greek Salad?

We have begun a new series of posts which will be filed under the category "Just Before the Bin."  What are we doing?  Well, we are sharing our greatest failures as well.  Sometimes you need to look, taste, feel and live a dish or an element of such to see that it just does not work, or perhaps it sparks a new train of thought.  And my choice this week is a Greek Salad dessert.  WTF was I thinking?  Actually, the elements of the dish are quite useful on their own but I certainly do not need to combine them.  The dish is over complicated and over the edge.  The elements are: minted cucumber confit, piquillo pepper pudding, feta ice cream, tomato cake, ground olives, aged balsamic vinegar and olive oil.  I guess I missed the actual lettuce component. 

And how was the dish?  Interesting.  Yes, I enjoyed the tastes but in the end I would not want to eat it again and again.  Thus, it--the dish-- goes into the bin.