Cooking with "Modernist Cuisine at Home" (Part 1)

[SJMitch]

I don't know how the MC team got that gorgeous slice they show a photo of, but mine was much too "flow-y" to stand upright.

FWIW, I find your photo more appealing than the one in MC. The one in MC makes the eggplant look under cooked and unappetizing. I'm considering making it now, when based on the book photo I had no interest.

[Chris Hennes]

Bomba Rice with Chorizo and Broccoli-Gruyère Puree (p. 333)

This was pretty bad. Not completely awful, but pretty bad. I think someone mentioned uptopic that they didn't care for the broccoli-gruyère puree: I didn't have a problem with it on its own. It wasn't fabulous (many of the others on that page are) but I liked it fine. Unfortunately, not only did it lend an odd color to this dish, but most of its flavor was overwhelmed by the massive amount of chorizo, and what was left was unpleasant. With that quantity of chorizo it's not clear why we bothered with any other ingredients, in fact; before the puree and olive oil were added it was an OK-tasting dish. I still never would have made it again, but it wasn't overtly bad. Once the broccoli puree was added the taste shifted into the "er, what the hell is this" category. What really pushed it over the edge was the 80mL of olive oil, though. Now, not only was the taste unpleasant, so was the texture and appearance. Don't say I didn't warn you...

[HowardLi]

Bomba Rice with Chorizo and Broccoli-Gruyère Puree (p. 333)

This was pretty bad. Not completely awful, but pretty bad. I think someone mentioned uptopic that they didn't care for the broccoli-gruyère puree: I didn't have a problem with it on its own. It wasn't fabulous (many of the others on that page are) but I liked it fine. Unfortunately, not only did it lend an odd color to this dish, but most of its flavor was overwhelmed by the massive amount of chorizo, and what was left was unpleasant. With that quantity of chorizo it's not clear why we bothered with any other ingredients, in fact; before the puree and olive oil were added it was an OK-tasting dish. I still never would have made it again, but it wasn't overtly bad. Once the broccoli puree was added the taste shifted into the "er, what the hell is this" category. What really pushed it over the edge was the 80mL of olive oil, though. Now, not only was the taste unpleasant, so was the texture and appearance. Don't say I didn't warn you...

Meh, slightly-off corn chowder.

[rotuts]

thats a polite way of describing it. I could mention more accurate ways ...

[Hugh Anderson]

I've been cooking from MCAH a lot these past weeks, so I thought I'd dive into the discussion and report some results. I'd say the winning recipe/technique so far is pressure-caramelization. I had dabbled with the carrot recipe in the past but am now starting to see its wider application. The apple-parsnip soup was a big hit, and last night my family absolutely raved about the butternut squash version. The pressure-caramelized banana puree smells and tastes like spreadable buttered banana bread.

As an experiment I cooked sweet potatoes only using water, baking soda, and salt, completely leaving out the butter. The results weren't nearly as good, naturally, but there was still some good caramelization going on so in the future I might dial back the butter for everyday cooking. This would also be a good technique to make sweet potato or pumpkin puree for pumpkin pie.

I've made three of the cream pies - Apple, Banana, and Coconut. I have very little pastry experience so my crusts haven't looked like much, but they certainly taste good. The apple was my favorite. I didn't have much luck with blowtorch-caramelizing the bananas without them cooking to mush, so I need some practice there. The passionfruit glaze did not work for me (1.5 g xanthan per 20 g juice?) - it turned to rubbery goop and was unspreadable so I left it out. Could be I didn't strain the juice fine enough.

De-boning the boneless yakitori chicken wings required more finesse than I was capable of. I can see this technique being a wow dish for very polite company, but my family is perfectly content nibbling on bones, so I don't plan on trying it again. I did about nine wings, out of a couple dozen, before I threw in the towel. I wasn't a fan of the yakitori sauce either, but I'm withholding final judgment until I hunt down a better quality mirin than the ubiquitous Kikkoman.

Taking a page from the original MC, I made 72 hour short ribs with the Crispy Beef & Shallot salad. Lots of work, and looking at the book I realize my beef strands weren't nearly as thin as theirs, but still it was a homerun dish.

I started to make the pressure-cooked chickpea salad, and for giggles I brined one batch of beans, as is popular these days, and soaked another batch in plain water. Didn't make a difference appearance-wise (YMMV depending on the type of bean), but the brined beans were slightly more flavorful. I never ended up making the salad, instead opting to eat plain chickpeas.

Other things I've made & liked have been the satay sauce, garlic confit, white sandwich bread, ultrafrothy shake, raspberry panna cotta, grilled applesauce, vacuum-infused celery, chaat masala, shiitake marmalade, low-temp oven steak. Impatiently waiting for my sodium citrate to arrive in the mail.

Cheers

Hugh

[rotuts]

Thanks Hugh, nicely thought out presentation. Im with you: PC for me has finally taken off. will look into Sweet Potatoes as I'm trying to replace (some) of my white potatoes with Sweet.

[Chris Hennes]

I've owned my pressure cooker for years, and have used it more in the last three weeks than in the past three years, by a longshot: it's funny, when you think of modernist cooking equipment you usually think of the sous vide rig first, but as far as MCaH is concerned the pressure cooker is even more indispensable.

[rotuts]

Ive sent a copy of MC@H to a friend, and after one week, they too are on the PC bandwagon. Maybe its the baking soda in the carrot soup that did the trick for the 'carmelized' flavor.

[Skyler Tanner]

Funny story about a pressure cooker:

A client of mine let me borrow their pressure cooker because they hadn't used it in years and "never more than a handful" of times in total. I was going to do a take on the caramelized butternut squash but using japanese sweet potatoes instead. Wanted to do a sort of "yaki imo" with the potato caramelization balancing the ginger.

I get the thing home, go through the cook process, go to depressurize it and...nothing, not gonna move. Try everything: reheating to release vacuum, more rinsing, dremeling the lock and could not get the damn thing open. The next day I finally go over to my friend's house to sawzall the thing open. The vacuum created was so strong that it was the last resort

I still used the potatoes, still purchased a pressure cooker, and still love the thing. Older cooked are scared of them exploding; I'm only scared it won't open!

[Chris Hennes]

Pressure-Caramelized Potato Leek Soup

Not actually from the book, but using the pressure-cooked vegetable purees as a jumping off point. I used 500g of potato, 250g of leek, and vegetable stock as the liquid. It turned out really well, the caramelized (OK, "Maillardized"...) leek flavor was an interesting change to a conventional potato leek soup. Garnished with bacon (from the MC recipe, of course) and scallions.

[Phaz]

I made the red wine glaze and the potatoe puree tonight.

The red wine glaze is amazing. I couldn't find nuckle bones so used some normal "soup bones." I also added the browned ground beef back into the pot after reducing the wine, before pressure cooking (not in the recipe but it seems like you are supposed to). The recipe says "lean beef" but I think you can get away with 80/20 chuck (which probably has the most flavor) to get the proper fat quantity. I ended up adding a bit of oil to get enough when cooking the vegetables.

I also ended up not quite reducing it the full amount, as it was getting pretty strong and fairly thick. It made plenty of sauce for probably 8-10 steaks. I served it with some filets and it was really really really good. I'm certainly going to make it again.

One other thing to note, is that it says to spoon off the fat while it is reducing. I was unable to do so. The fat wouldn't settle to the top while it was reducing, so the end sauce had a lot of the fat in it. It still tasted excelent, but separated on the plate and didn't look appetizing. If you are making it I'd recomend putting it in the fridge after pressure cooking and before reducing to let some of the fat solidify so It's easier to remove.

The potatoes were a mixed sucesss. I did 750 grams of potatoes (instead of the 500 the recipe calls for) and still did 200 grams of butter (the normal amount). So I ended up using less butter than the recipe calls for but it was still overly rich for my taste. With the sauce it worked well, but by itself it was too much butter. I'd highly recomend cutting back on the butter and tasting it first before adding more. As far as consistancy goes though, it's some of the best I've made. I'll probably make them again, I'll just use less butter.

Edited October 28, 2012 by Phaz (log)

[Charcuterer]

Today was an exhaustive MCatH day for me. I started with making the roasted corn stock went into the caramelized carrot soup and then went into the corn meal polenta. Nothing I made today was overly difficult but there was a lot of steps.

The corn stock was really easy. Shuck the corn, cut the nibs off the cobs and put it in the oven for a bit then throw the husks and cobs in the pressure cooker with some water. No problem. The result was amazing. I really had no idea what it would be like but it was so aromatic and deep smelling.

Next was the soup. My wife is a carrot freak. It is the one vegetable that she could not do without. Her desert island veggie if you will. Ironically her favorite dessert is caramel. When she first tasted the carrot puree she said that it tasted like caramel and carrot. She finished the whole bowl of soup and has decided to have the rest for lunches this week. It is very rich and while there is a ton of butter in it there is still a purity to it that is hard to describe.

Finally I used the corn stock to make the polenta. This one was not the success I had hoped for. While the texture was incredible I didn't like it better that my regular version. I think in the future I will use their technique to make my recipe. I served it under braised short ribs and it kind of dissappeared under the heavy dish, which may have been the problem. On the plus side there is enough left over to make the corn soup later this week.

I have been reading about the caramelized carrot soup on eGullet and now I see why it gets the raves. Amazing!

[nickrey]

I made the red wine glaze and the potatoe puree tonight.

The red wine glaze is amazing. I couldn't find nuckle bones so used some normal "soup bones." I also added the browned ground beef back into the pot after reducing the wine, before pressure cooking (not in the recipe but it seems like you are supposed to). The recipe says "lean beef" but I think you can get away with 80/20 chuck (which probably has the most flavor) to get the proper fat quantity. I ended up adding a bit of oil to get enough when cooking the vegetables.

... snip ...

One other thing to note, is that it says to spoon off the fat while it is reducing. I was unable to do so. The fat wouldn't settle to the top while it was reducing, so the end sauce had a lot of the fat in it. It still tasted excelent, but separated on the plate and didn't look appetizing. If you are making it I'd recomend putting it in the fridge after pressure cooking and before reducing to let some of the fat solidify so It's easier to remove.

Whenever I need to remove the fat from something, I use a fat separator (jug with the spout coming from the bottom so the stock pours out before the fat, which floats on top). Then reduce.

[Mjx]

I've owned my pressure cooker for years, and have used it more in the last three weeks than in the past three years, by a longshot: it's funny, when you think of modernist cooking equipment you usually think of the sous vide rig first, but as far as MCaH is concerned the pressure cooker is even more indispensable.

Chris, would you elaborate a bit on this?

I'm wondering whether the pressure cooker is being used in MCaH to cook things that are similar to what is cooked sous vide in MC (e.g. meat, custard [bases], as well as soup), or whether the sorts of things being made are simply quite different to the sou-vide cooked ones in MC.

[Chris Hennes]

This is different stuff, Michaela: predominantly vegetable purees and "risotto"s. It does PC some of the same stuff as MC: the carnitas, for example.

[pep.]

Made the red wine glaze yesterday (with venison instead of beef for the bones and two thirds of the meat, I also roasted the bones). I'm not sure if the reduction step is very helpful, flavorwise. I'm not sure if I could detect a difference between the pure beef version from the book and my venison variation. I'm not sure I can detect the red wine very much. Maybe I should have used something heavier? Of course the glaze itself has a lot of body. We'll see how it will do with venison loin on Saturday.

[Okanagancook]

Mushroom Jus p. 90; Barley with wild mushrooms and red wine p. 331; Boneless Yakatori chicken wings p.256

The mushroom jus is outstanding although I think I will try cutting down on the butter used. I used 80% crimini 20% button mushrooms.

The barley with wild mushrooms was very flavourful with deep woodsy overtones. Again, I would cut back on the fat used. Went well with the lamb and Keller's carrot stew. The barley cooked nicely and had great texture but we would have liked a little more moisture. If I had used fresh wild mushrooms instead of rehydrated dried mushrooms it probably would have been better.

The wings have been brined and sous vide. Taking the bones out is difficult and I tore 7 out of the 15 wings so I presume I did not cut the meat away from the bone ends well enough. The sous vide wings are deliciously "chickenie". Have not made the sauce yet. They are in the fridge in hopes they will firm up before frying.

[Mjx]

This is different stuff, Michaela: predominantly vegetable purees and "risotto"s. It does PC some of the same stuff as MC: the carnitas, for example.

Thanks, that's precisely what I wanted to know!

[Twyst]

. I'm not sure I can detect the red wine very much. Maybe I should have used something heavier? Of course the glaze itself has a lot of body. We'll see how it will do with venison loin on Saturday.

I made it yesterday too and I find it a bit heavy on tomato and light on wine flavor as well. I used a great big zinfandel so I dont thin kit was my wine choice, Im just going to cut down on the amount of tomato paste next time. I was sure to really brown my paste, so Im sure thats not the issue.

[HowardLi]

I'd like to make the braised short ribs but I don't want to go to the trouble of making the red wine glaze. How else can I sauce/garnish it?

[OliverB]

I haven't cooked from the book yet, though I received it this week, but it seems like there are a lot of comments here that seem to be rather critical, which is surprising. Too much butter, no wine flavor, not sure I'll do this method again, etc. Not something I usually see in cooking with (....) threads. Did they overdo things here? Complicate things more than necessary?

I'll have to get a pressure cooker first too, it seems. Not bad, wanted one for a while, but noteworthy to those that don't have one and are on a limited budget. I want to make that carrot soup, compare it with the French Laundry version.

[rotuts]

when you shop for your PC, make sure you get one larger than you initially think so that it can hold those canning jars. mine holds the pint jars, about 4-5 at a time.

[HowardLi]

when you shop for your PC, make sure you get one larger than you initially think so that it can hold those canning jars. mine holds the pint jars, about 4-5 at a time.

I got the KR 7.4 qt. Is that enough?

[Chris Hennes]

I haven't cooked from the book yet, though I received it this week, but it seems like there are a lot of comments here that seem to be rather critical, which is surprising. Too much butter, no wine flavor, not sure I'll do this method again, etc. Not something I usually see in cooking with (....) threads. Did they overdo things here? Complicate things more than necessary?

I'll have to get a pressure cooker first too, it seems. Not bad, wanted one for a while, but noteworthy to those that don't have one and are on a limited budget. I want to make that carrot soup, compare it with the French Laundry version.

Well first, bear in mind that opinions vary on some of these things: for example, I personally don't think the pressure cooked purees have too much butter in them. Second, it's a very expensive book, so we are basically demanding perfection of it: when it falls short, you're going to hear about it. Third, those of us cooking from this book probably don't suffer from the "OMG YUM!" syndrome that sometimes plagues other cookbook topics, wherein people only post about the recipes they like, and not those they don't. All that said, yes, I think that in some cases they complicated things more than necessary.

[rotuts]

the pint mason jars are 5 1/4 " tall. measure from the insert base to the top of the pot if you have a little clearance you will be fine. Mine is the 6 QT Fargot and I have 3/4 " clearance. 12 pint MJ's are 9.99 at BB&Beyond, - 20% with those ubiquitous coupons.