Hopefully not where they shop...
Yesterday I was meeting a friend to go make a practice schedule for our exam dishes. While I was waiting, I happened to notice one of the ubiquitous sights we all take for granted. However, the noticing ended up in a rather icky place - the street pigeon was just strutting his stuff on the sidewalks of Sloane Square. Which is fine, except I was thinking of the cuisine final, saw this thing walking around and had the horrified hope that this was not where they source our pigeons!Sunday dinner
The main and starter had nothing to do with exam dishes for anywhere. It was freezing today so a nice Sunday roast seemed to be in order. Then because it was a birthday and I wanted to make sure there were some veggies in evidence, I ended up making a starter. Good thing I had a couple of different kinds because one of the people isn't a huge fan of smoked salmon. I've come around gradually to the cold smoked one but I agree with her - the flavor and texture isn't the nicest if you're not a fish person. I am, but I still prefer the smokiness of hot smoked salmon. Luckily I had enough greens to make more salad so everyone got to eat something they liked.
Then it was on to the mains. I bought the beef at the farmer's market this morning from one of the butcher guys there - I think they had 3 or 4 guys. Anyway - this was a nice, dry aged (29 days, I think) beef, still on the bone. They had taken the fat rind off, which was a bit of a shame, but it still turned out ok. I also did roasted vegetables - personally I'd rather have my roast beef with rice but I'm in the UK so I did as they do here. The butcher had given me some meat trimmings because he didn't have any good bones and he couldn't sell the pieces he gave me. Nice jus although it was a bit heavy - I didn't have veal stock so I tried a beef one instead. It came out tasting kind of strong, but still good. The meat was rested while we had our starter so even though it was cooked to about medium, I would describe it in the photo as closer to medium well. Drat, missed the cooking point!
Playing with dessert
Not a happy camper - I couldn't do a joconde for various reasons and the genoise recipe is not meant for this. Even worse, I hadn't thought it through very well and let me tell you, genoise doesn't seem quite appropriate for this dessert. I didn't spread it well and it overcooked so it was hard to make it line up enough when I lined the moulds. Had a bit of a problem with the which chocolate mousse when the chocolate hadn't melted enough by the time I needed to mix it with the angalise for the mousse so I had to warm it carefully so that I wouldn't kill the gelatine.
The end result: white chocolate mousse (needs flavors adjusted), red wine and blackberry jelly and a raspberry sauce which should have been a glaze. Need more jelly for the balance of the dessert and I'll need to rethink the glaze because it currently looks like something is bleeding onto my mousse. So much to do, so little time.
So until next time, happy cooking.
The main and starter had nothing to do with exam dishes for anywhere. It was freezing today so a nice Sunday roast seemed to be in order. Then because it was a birthday and I wanted to make sure there were some veggies in evidence, I ended up making a starter. Good thing I had a couple of different kinds because one of the people isn't a huge fan of smoked salmon. I've come around gradually to the cold smoked one but I agree with her - the flavor and texture isn't the nicest if you're not a fish person. I am, but I still prefer the smokiness of hot smoked salmon. Luckily I had enough greens to make more salad so everyone got to eat something they liked.
Then it was on to the mains. I bought the beef at the farmer's market this morning from one of the butcher guys there - I think they had 3 or 4 guys. Anyway - this was a nice, dry aged (29 days, I think) beef, still on the bone. They had taken the fat rind off, which was a bit of a shame, but it still turned out ok. I also did roasted vegetables - personally I'd rather have my roast beef with rice but I'm in the UK so I did as they do here. The butcher had given me some meat trimmings because he didn't have any good bones and he couldn't sell the pieces he gave me. Nice jus although it was a bit heavy - I didn't have veal stock so I tried a beef one instead. It came out tasting kind of strong, but still good. The meat was rested while we had our starter so even though it was cooked to about medium, I would describe it in the photo as closer to medium well. Drat, missed the cooking point!Playing with dessert
Not a happy camper - I couldn't do a joconde for various reasons and the genoise recipe is not meant for this. Even worse, I hadn't thought it through very well and let me tell you, genoise doesn't seem quite appropriate for this dessert. I didn't spread it well and it overcooked so it was hard to make it line up enough when I lined the moulds. Had a bit of a problem with the which chocolate mousse when the chocolate hadn't melted enough by the time I needed to mix it with the angalise for the mousse so I had to warm it carefully so that I wouldn't kill the gelatine.The end result: white chocolate mousse (needs flavors adjusted), red wine and blackberry jelly and a raspberry sauce which should have been a glaze. Need more jelly for the balance of the dessert and I'll need to rethink the glaze because it currently looks like something is bleeding onto my mousse. So much to do, so little time.
So until next time, happy cooking.
No comments:
Post a Comment