El Bulli savory croquant recipe?

[chefadamg]

Havnt had a chance to purchase any of the coobooks. Can anyone inform as to whether he includes recipes for any of his savory croquants in the books? If so I'd be delighted to learn the recipe.

[Vadouvan]

You mean like the Nori croquant with the glucose and isomalt ?

[chefadamg]

You mean like the Nori croquant with the glucose and isomalt ?

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Ive found that recipe on the Internet somewhere. That was a "true" croquant. He does a few others; artichoke, corn. I was curious to know a little more on the savory versions...but he may use a Isomalt glucose base for those as well...not sure.

[chefadamg]

You mean like the Nori croquant with the glucose and isomalt ?

←

Ive found that recipe on the Internet somewhere. That was a "true" croquant. He does a few others; artichoke, corn. I was curious to know a little more on the savory versions...but he may use a Isomalt glucose base for those as well...not sure.

[Baggy]

If you can face going through lots of photographs, you might be able to find something on the El Bulli website (www.elbulli.com). If you head for the catalog, they have a gallery of photos taken from the books.

If there’s something more specific I can look up the books (I only the English versions).

[chefadamg]

If you can face going through lots of photographs, you might be able to find something on the El Bulli website (www.elbulli.com).  If you head for the catalog, they have a gallery of photos taken from the books.

If there’s something more specific I can look up the books (I only the English versions).

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I have looked through all the pics..Are there any recipes in the books for savory croquants of any fasion? Im not sure if the index would list them? And I dont know which dishes include them. I saw an artichoke croquant and a corn croquant in the pics..so maybe you could find his recipe for them??

[Baggy]

Sure - give a few days & I'll take a look.

[geekything]

Havnt had a chance to purchase any of the coobooks. Can anyone inform as to whether he includes recipes for any of his savory croquants in the books? If so I'd be delighted to learn the recipe.

←

Do you mean like this:

http://hungryinhogtown.typepad.com/hungry_...llis_dorit.html

-marc

[Baggy]

I went through a few of the recipes in the ElBulli books covering 1994 – 2004. The peak for croquant seems to be in the earlier periods with fewer in 2003/4. I don’t have the latest volumes (yet).

I had to give some thought on how best to represent the recipes, given the large number and wide range of ingredients (there are probably 50 or more savoury and sweet recipes). Also sometimes the ratios change, so I hope this works for you:

Originally up to 1998 the ratio of fondant:glucose was typically 53:47 by weight (no isomalt).

In 1998, isomalt is added to give a ratio of fondant:glucose:isomalt of 50:25:25 (said to less affected by humidity).

From around 2003, the croquant mix omitted fondant and changed to glucose:isomalt 75:25, but the ratio sometimes varied a few points towards isomalt.

The most recent recipe in 2004, goes back to fondant:glucose:isomalt 50:25:25

The target temperature for making up almost all croquants is 165C.

The amount of ‘taste’ ingredient, bacon, corn, beetroot chips, dried artichoke, ceps, black olives etc, typically is around 60% of the total weight of croquant, although this varied from 6% in the case of dried nori seaweed to 114% for Doritos. In each case the ingredient was added dry. The timing/temperature of when to add the ‘taste’ ingredient depends on what’s being added to the croquant.

Forming the final shape is in an oven set at either 160C or 170C, and seems to depend on season rather than anything to do with the recipe (perhaps they had the thermostat fixed? -joke-).

Other ingredients are added on top/around the croquant or used to fill the rolled croquant (but not mixed in) and varies between recipe and type of ingredient. I imagine this is more to do with how much is needed to cover/fill the croquant.

I’m not sure if you have enough pointers from my description. It seems that the technique is pretty standard but with a creative use of ingredients and style of presentation. From the ElBulli website, you should be able to get a good idea of the different ingredients used.

Shout if there is something more that could be helpful.

[chefadamg]

I went through a few of the recipes in the ElBulli books covering 1994 – 2004.  The peak for croquant seems to be in the earlier periods with fewer in 2003/4.  I don’t have the latest volumes (yet).

I had to give some thought on how best to represent the recipes, given the large number and wide range of ingredients (there are probably 50 or more savoury and sweet recipes).  Also sometimes the ratios change, so I hope this works for you:

Originally up to 1998 the ratio of fondant:glucose was typically 53:47 by weight (no isomalt).

In 1998, isomalt is added to give a ratio of fondant:glucose:isomalt of 50:25:25 (said to less affected by humidity).

From around 2003, the croquant mix omitted fondant and changed to glucose:isomalt 75:25, but the ratio sometimes varied a few points towards isomalt.

The most recent recipe in 2004, goes back to fondant:glucose:isomalt 50:25:25

The target temperature for making up almost all croquants is 165C.

The amount of ‘taste’ ingredient, bacon, corn, beetroot chips, dried artichoke, ceps, black olives etc, typically is around 60% of the total weight of croquant, although this varied from 6% in the case of dried nori seaweed to 114% for Doritos.  In each case the ingredient was added dry.  The timing/temperature of when to add the ‘taste’ ingredient depends on what’s being added to the croquant.

Forming the final shape is in an oven set at either 160C or 170C, and seems to depend on season rather than anything to do with the recipe (perhaps they had the thermostat fixed? -joke-).

Other ingredients are added on top/around the croquant or used to fill the rolled croquant (but not mixed in) and varies between recipe and type of ingredient.  I imagine this is more to do with how much is needed to cover/fill the croquant.

I’m not sure if you have enough pointers from my description.  It seems that the technique is pretty standard but with a creative use of ingredients and style of presentation.  From the ElBulli website, you should be able to get a good idea of the different ingredients used.

Shout if there is something more that could be helpful.

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Hey..thanks alot. Thats just what I was looking for. I was curious to know if he used a "sweet" base for his savory croquants...ie isomalt and glucose. So I assume he uses the same base and flavors them accordingly. I do have a question..do you have an exact recipe for the bacon or the corn croquant? That would be great.

[Baggy]

I tried some of the croquant recipes last weekend with some great results. Here’s what I made (elBulli recipe number in parentheses):

1. Bacon croquant flute with pine nut ice cream/ petit four version (453)

2. Frozen lime, coffee and juniper tart with banana sponge (791) – includes spicy cinnamon caramel (croquant wafer)

3. Fizzy lolly (820)

I used the 50% fondant, 25% glucose and 25% isomalt recipe heated to reach 165C. I also made the fondant. The resulting croquant was transparent, slightly brownish and had a mild, not too sweet toffee taste.

Some observations:

Using an all-copper sugar warming pan I had no problems with hot spots or controlling the heat. However, the process took almost 45 minutes – perhaps I was being too cautious. The croquant also took almost 2 hours to cool before I could grind it.

For the spicy cinnamon and fizzy lolly the recipe uses powdered croquant. A Thermomix handled the grinding process without any problems. However, the powder is extremely fine meaning that (a) it drifts in the atmosphere making all the surfaces sticky and (b) the powder absorbs water very rapidly.

Using the powder, I made stencils for the fizzy lollies cutting the bottom out of the cups in a cardboard egg box. Worked OK for the first few, but generally the croquant powder quickly stuck to the stencil and made it difficult to use without cleaning the stencil after each application of dust. And it takes a lot more dust than expected to make each shape. If possible, I would avoid using powder and stencils.

The heating and moulding was straightforward, only I found that the hot croquant tended to roll up like mercury on the Silpat making it tricky to maintain the stencilled shape. It also ran downhill if not kept absolutely flat.

Cutting the croquant into shapes was easy with a pizza wheel, and rolling the bacon flutes was not a problem. The croquant seems to maintain just enough flexibility and can be handled directly (?around 50-60C) before it cools sufficiently to set.

As for the results, the bacon flutes were really crisp with an interesting flavour. The pine nut ice cream recipe is not too sweet and the texture came out more like stiff confectioner’s custard. Overall, there was no obvious flavour of pancetta, but I gave it an 8/10 score.

The spicy cinnamon caramel (basically a thin sheet of croquant with sansho powder and cinnamon flavouring) was really good. Very thin and crispy with an interesting flavour. I would definitely try the flavour combination again (9/10), although the dish as a whole didn’t really come together (7/10).

The fizzy lollies were fun, but the flavour of the croquant overwhelmed the lemon sherbet filling. Solved this one by putting out extra sherbet for dipping, with a good result. The result was improved still further by a small bowl of popping candy for dipping. Transformed the whole experience and the four of us sat in silence grinning like Cheshire cats – makes it a 9.5/10. I might see if it’s possible to substitute popping candy for the sherbet in the centre.

The recipes recommend storing the made up croquant in a desiccator with silica gel. I put them in containers under vacuum, which worked well and resulted in excellent crispiness.

However, the process is messy with fly-away bits of croquant which stuck to worktops, floor and clothing, and it took ages of soaking to soften the croquant on the saucepan and tools.

Overall, I was happy with the result and, for a first time experience, the whole process was more straightforward than I had expected.

[pimptenshi]

I tried some of the croquant recipes last weekend with some great results.  Here’s what I made (elBulli recipe number in parentheses):

1. Bacon croquant flute with pine nut ice cream/ petit four version (453)

2. Frozen lime, coffee and juniper tart with banana sponge (791) – includes spicy cinnamon caramel (croquant wafer)

3. Fizzy lolly (820)

I used the 50% fondant, 25% glucose and 25% isomalt recipe heated to reach 165C.  I also made the fondant.  The resulting croquant was transparent, slightly brownish and had a mild, not too sweet toffee taste.

Some observations:

Using an all-copper sugar warming pan I had no problems with hot spots or controlling the heat.  However, the process took almost 45 minutes – perhaps I was being too cautious.  The croquant also took almost 2 hours to cool before I could grind it.

Do you know if there are different kinds of fondant/glucose? Once I got the books I rushed to get some fondant (which looks like a white block with pulled sugar, but softer consistency) and glucose, in my case a translucent syrup extracted from corn.

Well, once the mixture reached 130° C it started to burn and it was too late =/

Anyway I have the books in CDs, if anyone is really interested I can email the recipes with photos or post/link them here, if it's legal to do so.^^

[Baggy]

If I have understood correctly then, yes, ‘fondant’ can be used in at least two different ways. True fondant (sometimes known as poured fondant) and rolled fondant.

If you bought the fondant (especially from a retail outlet), it’s possible that what you have is rolled fondant. Typically this contains icing sugar with gelatine and sometimes gum. The gelatine helps to set the fondant when icing cakes etc. I’m not sure if this could explain the ‘burnt at 130C’, but proteins burn much more easily than sugars. Did it have a bad, burning meat smell? If the ingredients list shows anything other than sugar and glucose then this is probably the explanation.

When making croquant, I don’t think it should make much difference using corn syrup rather than isomalt – but I’ve never tried this. The isomalt slows the absorption of water in the finished croquant so it keeps longer without going soft. Maybe it’s worth trying with just (poured) fondant and glucose (100:50 ratio) and see if this stops the burning?

I found that the measured temperature could be quite variable when making the croquant, but I don’t remember having more than a 10C difference between bottom of pan and top of liquid. It’s possible that if the temperature was too far over the target of 165C, then the sugar starts to burn. It can happen if there’s a hot spot in the pan (another big advantage of using an all copper pan, as hot spots are less of a problem).