Anonymous Modernist 210

ngaudi said: If the bag seals and is tight your VacMaster is probably running fine. When you start heating up a sealed item any water turns to vapor expanding the bag. This is unavoidable as far as I know.

Has anyone had issues scaling the pasta portion of this recipe? If I follow the 100 grams pasta/300 grams water/160 grams cheese mixture scaling I have no problems, but if I double those numbers it takes far too long for the liquid to be absorbed resulting in a watery mac and cheese or overcooked pasta.

Are you looking for a crackling or pork rind texture? The tapioca puffs are more like a pork rind. The gelatinzed starch needs to act as the structure if you want the puffing action in the tapioca starch cracker on 6-343, so I don't think using impregnated pieces of dehydrated pumpkin will work well puffing up. If you want pumpkin flavor with the tapioca puff, you could either powder the dehydrate pumpkin and incorporate that with the starch and use pumpkin puree as the liquid, or just use a pumpkin puree/juice. The latter will probably result in a less intensely flavored product. I prefer tapioca starch because it is more neutral and puffs better than cornstarch in my experience.

I am pretty sure it is the water content of the carrots more than the butter that makes extra liquid unnecessary during the pressure cooking process. Either way, no extra liquid is needed. The caramelized onion puree can be found here: http://www.consumedgourmet.com/2011/06/caramelized-onion-puree.html

I think you cooked your pork too high. Try to show off the benefit of long time, low temp cooking. It won't be the same as more conventional approaches, but can still be delicious. I finally had time to write up my method. http://www.consumedgourmet.com/2011/09/pork-belly-char-siu.html

Caramel rulers are just extruded aluminum square bars. In the states they are extremely expensive. It is much cheaper to find a metals dealer and have them cut you aluminum bars to size. I got a full set for about $20, they just needed a quick cleaning in lightly acidified water. You might have better luck and save some money finding a metal dealer rather than caramel rulers.

Just last week I made some sous vide pork belly char siu. I don't have my notes in front of me, but I took a few pieces of skin on belly, and made a marinade. Sealed the bellies with some of the marinade and refrigerated 12 hours. Into the immersion circulator for 40 hours at 62C. Then I chilled with the belly between two sheet pans to flatten the top. Before service, I opened the bags and cut off the skin then and glazed the bellies with the reserved marinade. A blow torch and a few coats of the marinade to glaze and crisp, then the bellies were put in a warm oven to finish heating through. Served with some bao.

Glycerine is the same thing as glycerol and is sold at baking shops and some cookware stores. I purchased a small bottle from Sur La Table, I think it was $2-3.

This is perhaps one of my favorite techniques in the book. I'm a sucker for a confit and love the fact that I don't need massive quantities of stored fat to make them now. I don't even add the little fat that MC calls for, enough renders when the leg cooks. Tonight I will be trying a similar technique with pork belly.

I've made this dish twice now and both time loved it. Everyone who has had it comments on how it is the juiciest and most crisp quail they have ever had. It also helps that the flavors really work well together and balance nicely.

lachyg said: My mistake, I misread the original. The latest version I made had no Gouda and I glanced at those notes instead.

lachyg said: The original recipe doesn't call for a gouda. I've used a variety of different cheeses with great success, but have had to change the mixtures consistency depending on how dry some of the cheeses I use are. For example, if you use a more aged Parm you might need to compensate with a slight increase in whatever liquids you use when emulsifying the cheeses. Alternatively, you could add more water when cooking the pasta to change the viscosity on the fly.

I found the tomato confit a fairly simple, but time consuming recipe that makes an intensely flavored dried tomato. I used a majority of my output to make veal stock, but also used some to make a veal Parmesan with mozzarella spheres.

I recently made the bacon jam to pair with a smoked french toast I made. I didn't bother adding coloring to the jam, but it turned out great. Very different from a more traditional bacon jam, but it worked well. Nice and sweet/savory combo in a rich creamy egg base. A hit overall.

I've had good luck with this recipe following it as written (although I don't core the carrots) in the first edition. I have found that the carrots at the bottom of the pot in the butter and baking soda do caramelize better. I have also worked the technique into a recipe for caramelized onion puree.