Cooking with "Modernist Cuisine" (Part 3)

[TheTInCook]

I'm trying the rice milk recipe on 6-228. It's looking like a loser. Soaked the rice for 3 hrs, then simmered it for 30 minutes. Ended up with a pot of mushy rice. Adding the next installment of water and puree yield a pot of paste. I got it sitting in a sieve with a single layer of muslin (I'm out of cheese cloth), but it looks like it's too thick to drain.

Did I miss some errata?

[slkinsey]

200 grams of rice cooked in 1,000 grams of water gave you a pot of mushy rice? 200 grams is around one cup of rice. 1,000 grams more than four cups of water, which is more than double the amount one might ordinarily use to cook one cup of rice and should result in a thin gruel. Then, after the rice is cooked, an additional 500 grams (more than two cups) of water is added, which should thin the mixture out even more. One cup of rice with more than six cups of water should not result in a thick paste if pureed coarsely (which I take to mean pulsing in an food processor rather than running through a blender).

Is if possible that you either (1) didn't use the correct amount of water, (2) cooked the rice too high or too long and boiled away too much water, (3) didn't use the recommended types of rice, and/or (4) pureed the mixture too finely?

[TheTInCook]

A 6:1 ratio is on the thick side of congee, which is what I ended up with.

I followed the recipe as written, except I left it to drain overnight, and ended up with a tablespoon of filtrate. It might have been too smooth, but it wasn't as if there was lots of free water. The recipe promises a 1.5 kg yield, which in having attempted it, seems unreasonable.

[ScottyBoy]

Wasn't it just a sous vide thread that got him started? It's too bad he sin't contributing more now. I can only imagine how busy he is

[nickrey]

Wasn't it just a sous vide thread that got him started? It's too bad he sin't contributing more now. I can only imagine how busy he is

If you're talking about nathanm, the sous vide thread was only a part of his cooking journey that started when he was very young. He came early into the sous vide thread to seek information on this cooking process. When he realised that there was very little information out there for the home cook, he started experimenting. One thing led to another and his cooking tables morphed in the plan of doing a book on sous vide cooking, which we all looked forward to eagerly. The project scope expanded, somewhat dramatically, and Modernist Cuisine was the result.

[ScottyBoy]

Whoops I would remove the "just" in my post. I've only been here for a little bit so I guess I was just looking at the posts I saw.

Don't get it...I thought there was a post about "where did Nathan go....

Edited March 12, 2012 by ScottyBoy (log)

[Chris Amirault]

I've been making carnitas from SV pork shoulder and butt for quite a while now and thought I'd weight in with some notes. The preferred MC treatment for pork shoulder is 72h at 62C, and that's perfect for the slightly toothy but tender, ropy strands you want in, say, pulled pork or ropa vieja. However, the second cooking for carnitas -- high-temp sautéing in lard to crisp it up -- was leading to something just this side of mush. However, 72h at 60C, meat rubbed with lard and your favorite mix of spices and chiles, produces meat that's perfect for crisping up.

[Rory Hart]

Last night I had the first in a series of dinners I am cooking for the group of friends who gave me MC for my birthday last year. I will do a full write up on my blog and share once I recover, two days of shopping and cooking and not a little bit of stress and now I have a cold

I thought I would share the main MC dish of the evening now though (the others just used the techniques from the books) the Thai Crab Miang (5-189). The main part of the dish (the salad) worked really well. I played with the ratios of the different components (the paste, syrup etc) slightly when mixing the salad just before serving starting with a touch less of all and adding more by taste.

Unfortunately the crackers were unsuccessful for a couple of reasons. Firstly I don't think I got them dry enough, in part because I sliced them by hand so they came out 2mm+ and in part because I was drying them in an oven. This caused them to not puff in the centre and even the edges were a little bit rubbery. Secondly the centre of the cracker roll was not cooked properly, I cooked it for the dictated time but obviously something didn't quite work the same. The centre 3-4mm was still white with another few mm having a gradient of white to the desired red/brown.

Both of this issues are eminently fixable obviously. I will have to make some more shellfish stock and have another crack at it (oh no will have to eat more shellfish *what* shall we do?!).

Plating the dish attractively I found rather difficult, I hadn't planned too much thinking the betel leaves and crackers would be enough. I found once plated the salad was a bit of an homogeneous lump, not the most attractive dish I am afraid. This is likely in part due to my novice level when it comes to plating and I think I over stirred the salad while playing with the flavours. Anyway I took of photo of the most dressed up one (of course) at an attractive angle with the nicest looking of the crackers to share.

Plating really is an art form all to itself!

Oh yes and smashing pomelo segments (in my case ruby grape fruit segments) with LN2 (liquid nitrogen) is *a lot* of fun. I did far more than than was required!

Edited March 12, 2012 by Rory Hart (log)

[Chris Hennes]

Thanks for the comments, Rory: this one is on my short list. For the crackers: did you measure the diameter of your roll, or just eyeball it?

[Rory Hart]

Thanks for the comments, Rory: this one is on my short list. For the crackers: did you measure the diameter of your roll, or just eyeball it?

I measured and it was the requisite diameter on the wide side. The roll had sunk somewhat so it was more oblong but I gave it the same cooking time as specified since the widest part had the same diameter as required.

[TheTInCook]

Unfortunately the crackers were unsuccessful for a couple of reasons. Firstly I don't think I got them dry enough, in part because I sliced them by hand so they came out 2mm+ and in part because I was drying them in an oven. This caused them to not puff in the centre and even the edges were a little bit rubbery. Secondly the centre of the cracker roll was not cooked properly, I cooked it for the dictated time but obviously something didn't quite work the same. The centre 3-4mm was still white with another few mm having a gradient of white to the desired red/brown.

IIRC, the general modes of failure for that kind of thing are 1)The starch wasn't hydrated/cooked enough during the first cooking, 2) it was dried too much/not enough, 3) Oil was too cold.

Good guide here http://www.cookingissues.com/2009/10/27/puffed-snacks-1-wherefore-the-puff/

[Rory Hart]

IIRC, the general modes of failure for that kind of thing are 1)The starch wasn't hydrated/cooked enough during the first cooking, 2) it was dried too much/not enough, 3) Oil was too cold.

Good guide here http://www.cookingissues.com/2009/10/27/puffed-snacks-1-wherefore-the-puff/

Thanks! Yeah I am pretty sure it was a combination of under hydration and under drying. It is a pretty easy recipe all told and I have plenty of flour so I am going to try doing it without the stock so as to not waste effort and good ingredients and see if I can get it right.

[TheTInCook]

Tried making a cheese dip tonight based off of the parametric table.

Water 240g

Sodium Carbonate 1.98g

Citric Acid 7.85g

Non Fat Milk Powder 4g

Cheese 200g (85g med chedder, the remainder low moisture mozzarella)

Green Chiles to taste

I ended up with mixed results. I used the liquid to cheese ratio for fondue from the table, and it seemed to be pretty thin. I added around 100g more mozzarella. It got to a nice thickness for dipping, when it cooled a little.

The main problem was the citrate component. I don't know if the sodium citrate called for in the book was mono- di- or tri-sodium citrate, and I didn't have any sodium citrate laying around. So I the math, and added the chemicals for 8 grams of monosodium citrate. When I weighed the chemicals, I made the assumption that the citric acid I had was monohydrate (according to wikipedia citric acid is either anhydrous or a monohydrate depending on how it's processed). This assumption and the decision to use mono sodium citrate was because egulleters have reported that in their MC cheese attempts, they ended up with a cheese that was too basic. So I erred on the side of acid.

The dip was agressively tangy. Almost overpowering. I didn't measure the ph, but based on taste, I'd say around 4.

The second issue was the texture. It didn't get smooth, and stayed pretty rough, even after hitting it with the immersion blender. Before that, there were little traces of curd. There was no fat seperation, and the liquid it self looked nice and creamy. I think the cause of this fault is either, the ph being too low, use of dry milk instead of whey powder, type of cheese, or too short cooking time. I'm guessing it's the ph.

I agree with the other people here and it seems that the cheese preperations don't need much, if any, table salt for seasoning. The emulsifying salts seem plenty salty enough.

[Ted Blockley]

enassar said:

I am thinking of making it again with half or even less the butter amount. Any thoughts if that would or would not work?

I'm thinking along the same lines. I'm guessing it would work just fine. I'm less confident about cooking the yolks with lemon juice, but also haven't tried that approach.

[ermintrude]

Citric Acid has a molar mass of 192 and has three - ions available.

Sodium Carbonate has a molar mass of 106 and two Na+ ions available.

So 192acid = 3ions, 106base = 2 ions

or 192acid = 3 * (106/2)base

so acid/base = 168/192 = 0.875

So for 7.85g of Citric Acid to convert to Sodium Tri-Citrate you would need 6.68g of Sodium Carbonate or if using bicarbonate (1.312) 10.3g

So no wonder it was acidic

[TheTInCook]

Citric Acid has a molar mass of 192 and has three - ions available.

Sodium Carbonate has a molar mass of 106 and two Na+ ions available.

So 192acid = 3ions, 106base = 2 ions

or 192acid = 3 * (106/2)base

so acid/base = 168/192 = 0.875

So for 7.85g of Citric Acid to convert to Sodium Tri-Citrate you would need 6.68g of Sodium Carbonate or if using bicarbonate (1.312) 10.3g

So no wonder it was acidic

Yes, I know. I purposely made mono-sodium citrate. You also have to account for the water of crystallization in the citric acid. It's only 18 g/mol, but still. I'm pretty sure the sodium carbonate was anhydrous, since I made it and kept it in a plastic bag.

I did some dairy science reading today, and I confirmed that the problem was it was too acidic, and that it's tri-sodium citrate mainly used. Mono- and di- sodium citrate are used sometimes to decrease the pH of the mix.

Also found out how the emulsifying salts work. First, it raises the pH. Secondly, the sodium ions swap with the calcium ions in the protein matrix. Third, the citrate ions sequester the calcium ions. The pH change combined with the ion exchange and sequestration, allows the proteins to hydrate and de-aggregate , allowing you to make smooth cheese with heat and sheer.

[ScottyBoy]

It's been done before but, it was good............very good.

The Moderist Cuisine mac n' cheese.

For this one it was a 90g blue and 190g sharp cheddar cheese. It was everything I wanted it to be. The same texture when heated as the sauce in Stouffer's and when cooled the little jelly block I can have to keep in the fridge when I need. Or my roommate for that mater, it's a little foolproof to boil pasta and scoop some into it.

I have stocked so many of these random ingredients like carrageenan and sodium citrate for this recipe. It's about time I start to work with them because this was super fun!

[Broken English]

I have to make agar based sake caviar at work on Tuesday, can anyone tell me whether alcohol affects the set of agar, and if so by how much? I can't find any reference to the topic in Modernist.

[TheTInCook]

I have to make agar based sake caviar at work on Tuesday, can anyone tell me whether alcohol affects the set of agar, and if so by how much? I can't find any reference to the topic in Modernist.

The khymos book says agar tolerates it.

[mkayahara]

I've found increased syneresis with alcohol, so you may want to raise the concentration slightly, though I was working at higher ABVs than you'd find in sake. I assume you're hydrating the agar in plain water, then mixing in the sake, before forming the caviar?

[TheTInCook]

Khymos also suggests adding some guar gum to control syneresis.

[Broken English]

Thank you both.

Yeah, I'll be hydrating the agar in something other than the alcohol (not sure on a recipe as yet, all I've been given is the dish description along with the instruction of 'make it'), then adding it to the sake which I'm going to hold at around 60C, then use the cold oil trick.

Unfortunately there's no guar in the kitchen.I'll post some photos if it turns out haha.

Edited March 19, 2012 by Broken English (log)

[mkayahara]

Thank you both.

Yeah, I'll be hydrating the agar in something other than the alcohol (not sure on a recipe as yet, all I've been given is the dish description along with the instruction of 'make it'), then adding it to the sake which I'm going to hold at around 60C, then use the cold oil trick.

Unfortunately there's no guar in the kitchen.I'll post some photos if it turns out haha.

Yes, do keep us posted! And if they're on the menu somewhere I can stop by and try them out, let me know. I'm curious.

[Justin Uy]

Has anyone tried making the MC Garlic confit?

I made some on Friday via the SV method, and I came out with a really flavorful result, but I was unsure what the proper storage for it was, so I sealed it in the mason jar and tossed it in the fridge. It looked fine for the first day or two, but when I looked at it this afternoon there were some spots around the garlic where it looked like the olive oil was beginning to cloud, and when I checked the fridge just now, all of the oil appears to have congealed into a solid (but soft) green mass.

This is my first time making/handling any sort of confit, so I'm unsure if I handled something incorrectly or if this is an intended effect? Should I just pitch the batch? Maybe I somehow contaminated the oil when I spooned some out to baste a pork loin, or perhaps the jar wasn't clean enough to start with?

Edited March 20, 2012 by Justin Uy (log)

[TheTInCook]

Olive oil normally clouds and congeals in the fridge.