Recent dishes

My apologies for lack of regular posting recently. Due to a number of projects taking up my time at work and out at the moment i will post when i can. Here is a consolidation of some dishes wev'e done recently.

Tenderloin of beef

beef and goose liver spring roll, vegetable galette, caramelised parsnips, sauce Bordelaise

Pan seared sea bream

ricotta gnocchi, citrus and chickpea shoot salad, Jerusalem artichoke, hibiscus foam

Amuse bouche

Razor clam ceviche

Poached lemon sole roularde

steamed mussels, bok choy, morels, sweetcorn veloute

Sous vide Hyden Farm duck breast

confit leg, fresh orange, carrot and spinach, medjool date sauce

Pomme souffle

Pomme souffle takes me back to a time working at Claridges on the banqueting section. We used to fill lilly fold napkins to the brim and serve for 200 people. Not one of my favourite jobs as you could be there for hours sorting through the potatoes that will rise sufficiently and the ones that will not. I was taught to slice them to a certain thickness to know by feel rather than measurement. The potatoes had to be the natural potato shape where the line inside the potato which is a few millimetres inside the border would allow the middle of the potato to souffle up. We did small batches as placing them in water would rinse off the starch. We had a big oval skillet with vegetable oil and had to bring it to approximately 150C - 160C. Once we had dropped them into the oil we had to vigourously swirl the oil around the pan so the oil would blister the potato and suddenly pop up. Once the potato had filled wiith air in the middle, we would take them out and rest on a tray with parchement paper. During service on the main course pick we would drop them into a hot frier and drain on paper towels and seasons and serve.

Recently i wanted to revisit this on one of the tasting menus. What i wanted was a nice shape that looked appealing. Cutting the potatoes in a square or a rectangle just didnt work. My thinking cap went on and i came up with this.

Slice the potato to about 1 mm thick, try two or three types of potato and different starch levels may alter the final result.

Blanch the potato slices in a frier at 155C for about 10seconds to release the starch and make the potato gluey. Press the two potato slices together and iron down to release any air inside. the cut to desired shape. Place into a shallow frier and flip some oil over the top with a ladel. The potato will pop up. The difference with this is that you need to leave it in the frier until golden and crisp and serve immediately.

This weeks tasting menu

Gently fried duck egg

seared foie gras, truffled brioche, truffle madeira jus

Butter poached halibut

potato wrapped tiger prawn, red and golden beet puree, balsamic essence

Sous vide chicken breast rolled in lemon and rosemary crumble(chix skin, panko, malden, rosemary, lemon zest), braised leg tortellini, tinkerbell pepper, warm potato espuma, Basque jus

Barkham blue cheese

roasted grape puree, onion bread

Caramel poached pineapple

Acacia honey jelly, coriander puree