Cooking with "Modernist Cuisine" (Part 2)

[Maxime Bilet]

Greetings! The research chefs and I admit to being very curious as you have all shared your successes and failures, excitedly watching you try out the recipes from Modernist Cuisine yourselves. We can’t help but mention right off the bat how pleased we are to finally share these recipes with you and to witness everyone’s thorough and constructive responses, complete with photos and personal interpretations! We have always been great supporter’s of the eGullet community and the great vehicle it has been for culinary insights on every level.

While NathanM has been able to answer some of your questions, we felt that with the book now in print, it was time to take on some of that burden and share our input with you.

About once a week we will answer a handful of questions on this thread. Eventually we will have our own forum on Modernistcuisine.com, but we thought that this was the perfect place to start. In the next few weeks, you will see answers to questions both old and new as we try to catch up.

1. Several people asked about freezing leftover components, especially those leftover from making the macaroni and cheese and the burger. Particularly, you wanted to know if they could be frozen.

Though we haven’t tried freezing the block of cheese from the macaroni or the emulsified cheese from the burger, we expect that they can be frozen. Since they are made with carageenan, they are freeze-thaw stable. Not all gels have this aspect, however. It is really the use of carageenan that makes the difference. As for the mushroom ketchup, it should keep for a while in the refrigerator or freezer. We can’t give you an exact time as we have not tested it ourselves. We do expect though that you will experience some syneresis, or “weeping,” just as you do with any condiment kept in your fridge. Adding 0.1% to 0.2% xanthan gum when you are ready to use the ketchup again will help this. Most condiments with a high salt and acid content refrigerated well. The chapter on hydrocolloids in volume four will give you more information and help you to decide what will keep in the refrigerator and freezer.

2. During a lengthy, somewhat side-tracked discussion early on in the thread, Nathan was able to answer many of your questions about the sheet of steel or aluminum we recommend for mimicking brick pizza ovens. What a few of you still wanted to know, however, was what other things can be baked this way? What about bread?

Certainly flatbread would benefit from a sheet of aluminum or steel in the oven, as would smaller loaves like baguettes or other non-dense bread. You don’t want to risk drying the bread out too much though, so it might be best to turn the oven down partway through baking. Play around with your oven and find out what works best for your favorite breads!

3. Chris Hennes was the first one to try out the mojito spheres.

So, in a recipe that calls for 40 spheres, I managed to make nine. Still... nine spheres! This is my first spherification attempt, so I'm sort of proud of the things, really. This is unlike any other cooking I've done. I had to play around a bit with the amount of xantham gum to get them to hold together and to sink properly because it clumped up on my when I first added it. Then, it turns out that it takes a bit of practice to get the stuff to scoot into the alginate bath without surface tension holding it to the top. But... nine! They are carbonating now.

Here's a preview of what they look like (basically like greenish egg yolks):

Since then, he, and everyone who makes them, or contemplates making them, has been wondering how best to serve them. Just what is in that glass in the picture in the book?

The truth is, the picture of the sphere in a fizzing glass was meant to illustrate a point in an aesthetically pleasing way. Since we couldn’t show a solid fizzing, we used that photo to capture its bubbliness. Some of you have already considered serving them on spoons. This is our preferred method. Since the cocktail is self contained in the sphere, there is no need for any other liquid, or even a glass. Oh, and we must say, that we love Guy MovingOn’s idea to create a sphere within a sphere for a tequila shot! Let us know if you ever achieve this!

4. More recently, roygon has asked what kind of oil is best for making French fries:

I've gone over the section of deep frying and am now trying to choose a suitable frying oil for french fries cooked using the first method adapted from Heston Blumenthal. What I want is an oil that can be filtered and reused many times, has a smoke point of at least 400F and helps brings out the best french fry flavor / mouth feel.

Would it be correct to have Palm Oil at the very top of the list? High stability, melting point close to body temperature, high smoke point and under notes it says that it minimizes off flavors very quickly. Anyone have experience frying with Palm Oil?

The Ideas in Food team recommends Rice Bran Oil so that seems like another good choice based on their findings.

I know of a few places that use duck fat but it has a low smoke point of 375F and I think that's going to be too low

Any thoughts?

Roy

Several of you piped up with peanut oil, which is our recommendation, too. We like that it is affordable enough to use in large batches and also still neutral. Sure, you could use grapeseed oil, but it is expensive.

roygon noted that peanut oil is a no-go if you want to avoid peanut allergies. In that case, we recommend using good old canola oil. Remember, the more used the oil, the better. Oil that has been used two or three times already will give your fries that nice brown coloring.

5. Borgstromasked what the best wood chips are for smoking pastrami.

Gernally, we like using and stone fruit chips, like cherry or nectarine. Anything dry and hardy will do. The really important thing, more so than type of chips, is how hot they are. This will affect your pastrami more.

6. Guy MovingOn must have gotten his hands on a Thermomix, because he asked what recipes specifically call for, can be made with, or improved by using one.

It’s always fun to try out new toys in the kitchen and we can think of a variety of things that work well with a Thermomix. Have you ever tried scrambled eggs? Anything with eggs, like a custard base, would work well in a Thermomix. Other bases, like ice cream bases, can be made in one, too. Top it off by making some caramel on top. If you are in the mood for something savory, try making fondue or cheese foam.

A Thermomix is great for both dispersing and hydrating hydrocolloids. We discuss this in 4•24-27.

7. KennethT has been wondering about parcooking risotto. He asked:

back to the risotto discussion - when parcooking the rice, how much liquid should you use? In the parametric recipe, it doesn't specify liquid amounts for parcooking, and in the procedure, it says to boil the rice in liquid, then drain (I assume that toasting the rice in fat first is assumed and not specified). Also, do you save the drained liquid (which should have released starches in it) and use it for finishing? Lastly, if making the risotto with broth (I typically use a mild garlic broth for mine) do you use water for the parcook, and then broth for finishing, or broth for the whole thing? Thanks

Though you do bring the pot of water and risotto to a boil, you don’t want a vigorous boil by any means. In general, about two or three parts water to one part risotto will work well. If you use more than that, that is all right, as you do indeed drain the water. On the other hand, you will want to watch out not to use too much water as you do want to keep the risotto starchy. Remember, if you start out with less water, you can always add more.

8. Chris Amirault asked for tips regarding dehydrating in an oven.

The most important thing is to calculate just how low your oven really goes (and not just how low it says it goes). You don’t want your oven to get above 80 °C / 176 °F to 90 °C / 194 °F. In fact, if you have a gas oven, you can just put on the pilot light. In an electric oven, setting the temperature to “warm” usually works. You can read more about calibrating your oven on 1•269-271.

9. Sigma asked about braising under a broiler. Should you leave the lid on the pot the whole time?

I want to try the new, old braising style, or what Myrvhold et al call real braising. They suggest cooking the braise covered under the broiler, but do I read this to be the method for the entire time, or just for finishing. In other words, am I to broil my Staub for an hour and a half for this method of braising? Many thanks and bravo!

You should leave the lid on the whole time when braising. You can take the lid off at the end in order to create a nice glaze on top.

10. We have heard many success stories and many failures when you tried making the caramelized carrot soup, so much so that we actually retested it ourselves.

When we conducted our most recent tests, we noted that if you are following our recipe exactly, it is crucial to melt the butter before adding the carrots. This will lubricate the bottom of the pot enough to prevent burning. Twenty minutes of cooking time is sufficient for small batches of soup. Be sure to turn the heat down once the cooker has reached 15 psi of pressure. Another recommendation is to use a stainless steel pressure cooker if possible. Aluminum pressure cookers, while more economical, have a greater tendency to burn.

Since we only used induction cooking surfaces when writing the book, we have come up with a few adjustments to the recipe that might be useful for home cooks who have an electric or gas range. You can try adding 20% of water to step three, stir together, and cook for the same amount of time. Or, you can add the butter that is folded into the blended soup during step nine during step two instead. You might also like to try mixing the ingredients together and dividing them into mason jars. Set the jars in the pressure cooker on the canning rack, pour water halfway up the sides, and pressure cook at 15 psi for 90 minutes.

[jmolinari]

Can anyone comment on the food safety aspect of MAPP gas vs. propane, or better yet the new Map/Pro (MAPP is discontinued)...any research citing would be good too.

Using it to blowtorch food is a little concerning from what i've read (for MAPP).

[RDaneel]

Maxime -

Thank you so much for sharing input from the MC team! The interaction between the forum members and Nathan has always been one of the best aspects of the MC threads, and I look forward to reading more of the team's reactions and tips.

As for freeze/thaw stability of the processed cheese, my experimentation confirms the lab's theory. I've now made three or four batches of mac and cheese using pre-measured/frozen/thawed cheese, with no ill effects. Any minimal graniness apparent in the defrosted cheese is completely eliminated during cooking. In fact, I haven't noticed any difference whatsoever between frozen and un-frozen cheese. This has turned Modernist Mac into a 15-minute dish. My tip for others considering freezing - use a gallon-size freezer zip bag, and contrary to instinct, spread the cheese into a sheet within the bag before freezing. (I'm going to do this with a rolling pin.) By increasing the surface area of the frozen cheese, it will be much easier to defrost it in the minimal time the pasta takes to cook, meaning you don't have to remember to defrost cheese prior to beginning the pasta. My thicker blocks of cheese take at least 15 minutes to sufficiently defrost in a bowl of slowly circulating water, and I think that a frozen sheet would defrost much more quickly. Yes, I have put too much thought into this.

Also, I've now done the Caramelized Carrot Soup twice, and both times had absolutely no trouble with burning. I did melt the butter first (I believe the recipe instructs that), and used the minimum flame sufficient to keep my Kuhn Rikon at 15psi (the two-ring level). It's a delicious dish - all four guests who have tried it have gone from saying "I've never had (or liked) carrot soup" to being amazed at the purity of flavor and simplicity of the ingredient list.

Now all I need is some kind of smoker so I can make pastrami...

Maxime, Nathan, and team, thanks again for the wonderful books!

Edited May 9, 2011 by RDaneel (log)

[FoodMan]

I am amazed by the picking and choosing of recipes you folks have been doing. I cannot get myself to stop reading...let alone jump around and look for recipes. I skimmed through most of book one (will need to double back and read the safety section though) and now I am reading through volume 2. It is amazing how much information there is to digest and I find it difficult to just go find a recipe to try now. OTOH, I find that I am thinking of things a bit more critically and with more... attention to detail. For examaple, yesterday I made a spit roasted chicken on my charcoal grill's rotisserie and could not help but observe that this is a true roasted chicken as opposed to a baked one EXCEPT for when I close the grill lid. In that case it is both baked and roasted. Is that "broasted"?

Interestingly enough there are so many concepts in there that make sense intuitively, but now it feels good understanding the science behind them (why is boiling water a better/faster cooking medium than 99C water that is still?).

Well, I did make a boar tenderloin inspired by MC recently, specifically the recipe for the Juniper-Brined one Chris made. I used the brine ratios in that recipe, added star anise to it and since the tenderloins are much smaller I bound a couple of them together with Activa to make a properly sized one. I cooked it SV following the tables in volume 2, then seared it quickly in grapeseed oil. It was juicy and delicious served with Puy lentils and an apple sauce made with port and the MC beef stock.

Correction: These were boar loins not tenderloins!

I also forgot to mention that I used Xanthan gum to properly thicken the sauce instead of reducing it and risk loosing the perfect taste and balance. I followed the Best Bets for thickening a hot liquid table to get the ratio for Xanthan. It worked out great.

[Guy MovingOn]

Oh, and we must say, that we love Guy MovingOn’s idea to create a sphere within a sphere for a tequila shot! Let us know if you ever achieve this!

6. Guy MovingOn must have gotten his hands on a Thermomix, because he asked what recipes specifically call for, can be made with, or improved by using one.

It’s always fun to try out new toys in the kitchen and we can think of a variety of things that work well with a Thermomix. Have you ever tried scrambled eggs? Anything with eggs, like a custard base, would work well in a Thermomix. Other bases, like ice cream bases, can be made in one, too. Top it off by making some caramel on top. If you are in the mood for something savory, try making fondue or cheese foam.

A Thermomix is great for both dispersing and hydrating hydrocolloids. We discuss this in 4•24-27.

Thank you, Maxime, for your time taken to answer a lot of these questions that got lost in this thread!

I haven't gotten around to playing with spherification on the tequila shots, but it is something with which I will experiment in a few weeks after my exams have finished.

I don't have a thermomix, but I have been considering getting one. I have also wanted to purchase the Kenwood Chef Titanium for a long time, and they now produce a the Kenwood Cooking Chef withan induction heater built in, so I was just wondering about purchasing one of those instead. However, I think they temperature only increases in increments of 10C, and the accuracy is not that great either, so I may just get the Kenwood Chef Titanium instead.

[rotuts]

re propane vs mapp:

another way to look at the problem is the heat generated at the tip of the propane nozzle:

http://www.supplierofchoice.com/

I was a ware of these for a long time, plumbers use them and they are not available at Home Depot.

they are a little pricey but over all and on the long run well worth it.

you do not have to tip the propane canister. and it you want much higher heat, you can treat yourself to the double or tripple head model.

i only have the single but i love it and use it for everyting in the kitchen.

cheers

[KennethT]

re propane vs mapp:

another way to look at the problem is the heat generated at the tip of the propane nozzle:

http://www.supplierofchoice.com/

I was a ware of these for a long time, plumbers use them and they are not available at Home Depot.

they are a little pricey but over all and on the long run well worth it.

you do not have to tip the propane canister. and it you want much higher heat, you can treat yourself to the double or tripple head model.

i only have the single but i love it and use it for everyting in the kitchen.

cheers

Those double and triple head models are pretty cool... but for the single, I prefer my torch on a 3 foot long hose... again, no tipping of the canister, and the canister can hang from my belt and I have tons of maneuverability!

[jmolinari]

The new torch tips is interesting, but much more expensive than buying MAPP or MAP/Pro gas...i'm just wondering about the food safety of it...

[jmolinari]

I made "modernist" Kung Pao. the only "modernist" thing about it is the addition of baking soda to increase the pH to increase the browning.

I can't say it was any better than just following Fuchsia Dunlop's recipe (on which this is based anyhow). I didn't marinate the meat for 12 hrs as stated i did just 25 minutes. I did have an issue with using garlic and ginger slices instead of mincing it. It wasn't very pleasant eating the pieces.

So, next time i'll just stick to Fuchsia's recipe (forget all the measuring) but add the baking soda for better browning.

[Carlton]

I made "modernist" Kung Pao. the only "modernist" thing about it is the addition of baking soda to increase the pH to increase the browning.

I can't say it was any better than just following Fuchsia Dunlop's recipe (on which this is based anyhow). I didn't marinate the meat for 12 hrs as stated i did just 25 minutes. I did have an issue with using garlic and ginger slices instead of mincing it. It wasn't very pleasant eating the pieces.

So, next time i'll just stick to Fuchsia's recipe (forget all the measuring) but add the baking soda for better browning.

Aw you beat me by a day. I'm making this for dinner tomorrow night, I will be doing the full 12 hour marinade though. Thanks for the heads up on the garlic and ginger, i will try mincing instead.

[Chris Amirault]

Go for it. Perhaps I'm misreading Jason's post, but I'm not sure that he made the recipe, exactly, given that he cut the marinating time by 96%!

What does the book say about the ginger and garlic? I don't have it handy.

[jmolinari]

Correct, i didn't marinate for 12 hrs...the the meat flavor wasn't a problem. It was great. The main issue was with the garlic and ginger which i believe MC states to "slice thinly"

[FoodMan]

Correct, i didn't marinate for 12 hrs...the the meat flavor wasn't a problem. It was great. The main issue was with the garlic and ginger which i believe MC states to "slice thinly"

I think that mincing is probably the way to go with dishes like stirfrys. That being said, it really makes a big difference how fresh something like the ginger is. Young non-fibrous ginger, if sliced paper thin, can be very nice. Fibrous ginger that is not sliced very thin...not so much. I would imagine the garlic should work well though, again if sliced paper thin.

[jmolinari]

Note to self: when scaling pastrami recipe to use 1.58kg of boneless short ribs, realize the water scales too (duh) and this wont fit in a 1 gallon vac bag.

Good thing i had a 2 gallon zip bag and they seem to sink so they should brine cure with no problems....phew! close one.

I guess when i cook them sous vide i should scale the brine i use to cook them in from 1kg to 1.58kg or does it no longer matter? I guess it would since everything (smoke flavor etc.) will dilute differently...

[jzemlin]

Now that I am cooking with the Modernist Cuisine I realize I need a more accurate kitchen scale. Any recommendations?

[jmolinari]

check ebay for scales.

[Chris Hennes]

Now that I am cooking with the Modernist Cuisine I realize I need a more accurate kitchen scale. Any recommendations?

Lots of good advice in the Kitchen Scales topic.

[avaserfi]

I used the pressure cooker technique to make the white chicken stock today. I mostly followed the recipe, but made a couple changes based on what I had on hand. I used just a chicken carcass (no ground dark meat), omitted the leeks adding extra onion instead and I used carrot tops instead of parsley. Cut everything up into small pieces and tossed it into the pressure cooker. About 1.5 hours and no fuss later I had an awesome stock on my hands. Great flavor, tons of body, easy and quick.

The flavor extracted from the chicken and aromatics was much more intense than I am used to getting from using more traditional methods. The stock also had much more body. A lot more fat rendered too. I skimmed that off and will save it for another use. After refrigerating the stock became a nice gel which isn't surprising given how little water is used and the fact that the bones crumbled when removed from the cooker.

I don't think I will make stock any other way after doing it in a pressure cooker.

[Chris Amirault]

What pressure cooker do you have, Andrew?

[Chris Hennes]

I agree, the pressure-cooked stocks are nice: I'm glad Nathan convinced me to try it despite having a pressure cooker that has the jiggler (the Cooking Issues guys don't like the stock they get out of that kind of pressure cooker). I especially appreciate the time savings of a) using the pressure cooker, and b) doing a fine dice on the ingredients. I would really suggest having a go at the white chicken stock recipe as it's written, though: pressure-cookers do marvelous things to leeks in particular.

[avaserfi]

What pressure cooker do you have, Andrew?

Kuhn Rikon 7qt model 3344. I was gifted it about a month ago, so far it has been great and has been getting more use than my stock pot.

[jmolinari]

Can anyone tell me why the recipe for the mac and cheese scales the beer, water, sodium citrate and carrageenan to the weight of the gouda instead of the weight of both cheeses combined?

Seems really strange to do it that way given that rarely will people actually use those exact cheeses, ratios or weights. I had to recalculate all the additives % based on the total weight of cheese i used.

I used 250g of Morbier and 135g of 4yr cheddar. Tastes delicious. It's setting up in the fridge now.

[Carlton]

My Gong Bao Chicken came out good. I sliced the ginger and garlic as thin as I could, couldn't have gotten much thinner even with a razor blade. Didn't bother me at all in the final product. Overall I liked it, I scaled back the pepper a little bit and it was still hot enough for my liking.

[dml]

I've been skipping through the books and preparing a variety of recipes, based mostly on what I have on hand. For the most part these have been simply components of the plated dishes, rather than complete dishes, and usually very simple ones at that.

The first thing I cooked from the book was scallop tartare (6•66). I took the economical, non-modernist approach, using neither obscure ingredients (fresh out of truffles) nor crazy equipment. No freeze drier, so no scallop powder, and no deli slicer, so 2mm bread slices were as close as I could get with a bread knife and a steady hand. Straight up good food, it was.

The Fredy Girardet fish technique for black cod (6•76) is an object lesson in food science, and I can get great local black cod. The combination of a medium-thick filet, a small pan, and minimal raft of aromatics underneath the fish led to a very shallow pool of wine (a California Viognier; my local grocery has no Condrieu). Six minutes in (the short end of the recipe's range for cooking time) the wine was already over temperature. Not tragic, the flesh was still beautiful. Also, I neglected to check that the skin was on the filets when I purchased them, so I missed the whole point of the dish: crispy skin. The results were very promising, so I'll try again with a skin-on filet and cooking to the proper temperature. With luck I can also procure the ingredients for the Condrieu butter which just looks astonishingly good.

Sichuan bok choy (6•158). The core of the microwaved bok choy was still a little crunchy even as the darkest edges of the leaves were starting to get leathery. I hope to improve the texture by modulating the time and power a little more carefully next time. The book probably specifies the power of microwave that was used in the test kitchen (@Maxime, help?), which might help with mastering my microwave-fu. Leftover bok choy, gently reheated in the microwave again the next day, was surprisingly mustardy and sharp and sulfurous, in a way that was not entirely pleasant. This is the least successful dish so far.

I'd heard about the caramelized carrot (6•150) trick on the Cooking Issues podcast. You can indeed cook carrots with no additional liquid for an hour in a pressure cooker without incinerating them, counterintuitive as it seems. They come out deep amber, sugary, and surprisingly aromatic, but also a little greasy. The flavor is fantastic, and as a puree it has innumerable uses. Next I'm thinking parsnips and white chocolate, or squash and bacon fat.

Molasses butter (2•331). Following the directions to blend the butter with the molasses, I threw the mix in a blender, and the result was so well emulsified that after the jar came out of the circulator it was still mostly emulsified. The butter-to-sludge ration was roughly inverse to what's in the photo in the book. The yield of pure flavored butter I could drain off was pretty small. No matter. I've just been using the emulsified phase for its own sake on sweet potatoes, sweetbreads, and corn, where it has worked quite well.

Veal sweetbreads appeared in the local market's butcher case this week, so I used MC as a guide to preparing them. Both sweetbread recipes in the book call for remove the membranes before cooking, which I tried for about 20 min before giving up. The membranes were much easier to remove after they came out of the bath. The approach I'll use next time will be to portion the raw sweetbreads by cutting the membrane along seams, then cook, then peel.

I was very pleased with the texture of sweetbreads cooked 1h at 67C. My saute skills (or my burner) were insufficient to brown them in one minute (as the recipe instructs) and I didn't want to overcook them, so they weren't as crispy as I'd like. Next time maybe I'll try the torch.

[EnriqueB]

It's kind of funny to see pressure-cookers been referred to as "modernist tools", as I remember my mother using them ever since I have memory...

The MC white chicken stock recipe is great. It only has minor differences with the one I've been doing for the last years (same time and meat/bone ratios, but grinding the meat and using slightly different aromatics) but it turns out far better. My only problem was that the ground meat did lump together in something similar to meatballs, which likely prevented full extraction. I read upthread that the ground meat should be sauteed before? I thought that was only done for the brown stock...