Opera Cake '2008'

A few months ago now we picked up a function for the Sydney Operatic Society. It was to be an outside event for approximately 250 pax, 3 courses and the dessert had to be a modern version of the classic opera cake. We looked at different recipes for the classic and came up with a few different versions. We decided on this one and the dish is now on the menu in the restaurant. For those of you who may not be familiar with the Opera cake it is a multi layered cake with only 3 flavours; Coffee, Almond and Chocolate and quite often would have 'Opera' written on the glaze in gold. So that was the brief. On our version we have a chocolate gel (set with pectin), a coffee and vanilla cream (set brulee mix), almond soil, chocolate soil, roast almond ice-cream ('Paco-Jet') and chocolate caramel to finish of the dish.
We kept all the flavours and kind of warped the different layers. The same 3 flavours all with a different texture. Later

Beetroot and Chocolate Coulant, Blood Orange and Walnut, Candied Baby Fennel and Beetroot; The Evolution of a Dish

The following dish started as an idea about a year ago. I had this idea of making a savoury fondant in the style of Michel Bra's Chocolate coulant. The flavour I wanted to use was Beetroot. As I thought about it more the natural thing to use for the liquid centre seemed to be goats cheese. I tried a few different types and finally decided on a lovely fresh goats cheese from the Caparis farm in central New South Wales. I added a little cream and finally came up with a lovely runny centre when hot. At the time we were making a beautiful beetroot puree for another dish. I took some of this puree and reduced it a little more to thicken it up. I used this puree to replace the chocolate from Bras original recipe and reduced the sugar slightly. The result was a really nice biscuit for the fondant. I did a few trials but the dish never made it on to the menu and went back to the drawing board. The idea didn't return to me until recently when I started to play with beetroot as a dessert item. (see my post for Beetroot, Walnut, Blood Orange a dessert?) After a while the idea of mixing the beetroot biscuit with a chocolate liquid centre seemed like a good idea and mixing it with the blood orange element and the walnuts, from the previous dessert all seemed to make good sense. So the flavours we're all there all I needed was a dish to bring them all together. I thought I would add an element of caramel to the dish and decided to make a caramel gel which had caramelized walnuts scattered through it. on top of this I started to assemble the other elements of the dish. I took another element from the other desert in the shape of the candied baby fennel, and baby beetroots. I dressed the sweet salad with some fresh walnuts and a little walnut oil. I then added a some leaves of Bulls Blood micro cress.

I was really happy with the look of the dish but when we ate it the caramel gel just didn't fit in with the other flavours, especially the beautiful blood orange sorbet. So I scrapped that idea and cut the dish back to the key flavours I started with. Everything ate so well together that the only thing to decide on now was the presentation.

We tried a few different plates as you can see but decided on a flat rectangle. Every element separate but brought together as soon as the customer breaks the biscuit and the liquid ganache comes flooding out.

For me this is one of the highlights of being a chef. You start with an idea, or two, or even three and through trial and error you fashion it into the final dish. Sometimes you come up with nothing , or it seems that way at the time, but sometimes you end with something your really happy with. A year from conception right up to the finished dish today. The dish is now very balanced. I used a 66% chocolate and this goes very well with the beetroot which is earthy but very luxurious at the same time. the candied vegetable salad with the walnuts adds a different nuance with each bite and the sorbet balances all the rich oils and fats. Today I'm happy with this dish but who knows how it will look this time next year.