Friday 10 August 2007

Organic Milk fed Veal, Green Barley Cous-Cous, Sweatbread, Baby Garlic and Puree of Caramelized Shallots

I've been Getting the most beautiful Veal from Northern N.S.W. just behind Coff's Harbour. It comes form Angus Bulls on Milk Cows and has the most fantastic flavour. The calf's are milk and grain fed and graze on the lush hills of an old volcano. The farm is completely Bio dynamic.The leanness of the loin appreciated cooking sous-vide in the Roner. I served it with some Green Pearl Barley which we cook with a Bay stock and finish with preserved lemon and white onion. It tastes really clean like a spring meadow and goes great with the veal. The plate is finished with some braised young garlic that we cook until they melt in your mouth. A lovely subtle sweet flavour. The dish is sauced at the table with a light Madeira Jus that is split with Argan Oil, the nuttiness makes sense of the whole dish. This is what would be called Rose Veal in Europe and it has a fantastic pale pink colour as you can see. A really fantastic product.

Monday 6 August 2007

Parmesan Curds & Whey

So after a little thought I decided it might be nice to use the curd from the parmesan serum to stuff a possin. I got some beautiful free range, cornfed birds and proceeded to put the curd between the skin and the flesh of the birds. The first time I only used a thin layer as the flavour was so intense, however a lot of the power is lost in cooking so a good amount was used in the end.
Next we cooked the birds Sous-vide for around 30 mins at 65 degrees. Before icing it ready to colour in a pan. Id tasted the cooked bird last week so knew the flavour was that of lightly toasted parmesan. It struck me as a very light spring preparation and even though we're still officialy in winter here, I'm already getting the first broad beans form one of my suppliers. The marriage was made, then I had some beautiful glazed spring onions which just seemed the natural partner for the beans.
So once the bird was coloured in the pan I played about with a few presentations as you can see (this isn't all of them) and came upmwith some promising dishes for the new spring menu in a couple of weeks. Its so simple and the flavours all go really well. I warmed up the beans in a little of the whey and finished it with some really fruity EVO. All that was left was to dot a few drops of pousin jus around and enjoy the flavours.