Bec’s Birthday Bird

Sous vide Pheasant with Mushroom/Quince/Chestnut Puree

Ingredients:

1 Cup water
1/4 cup salt, kosher
2 pheasant breasts
2 oz pancetta
1 t thyme leaves
2 T duck fat
Mushroom/quince/chestnut sauce (see below)
Sweet Potato rounds with Asparagus(see below)
Delicata squash (see below)
Ravioli(spinach ricotta), precooked
Parsley, flat leaf

Bird Directions:

Dissolve salt in water then cool to room temperature.
Place pheasant in brine & refrigerate overnight.
Remove from brine & pat dry.
Sprinkle with thyme and add to vacuum bags.
Add pancetta and duck fat.
Sous vide at 62 C for 40 minutes.
Discard cooking liquid & pancetta.
Slice pheasant into strips.

Mushroom/quince/chestnut puree:

10 T butter, unsalted
4 shallots, medium, diced
1 quince, peeled, cored, diced
5oz shitake mushrooms, sliced
7 oz chestnuts, precooked
1/4 c cognac
1 t thyme, ground
black pepper, pinch
1 c heavy cream
salt

Heat butter in a large skillet and sauté shallots and quince until soft (4 min)
Add the mushrooms and sauté until almost dry.
Add chestnuts to heat through.
Add cognac and flame off.
Add thyme and pepper.
Add butter until melted.
Pour all into a blender and puree adding cream as necessary.
Continue adding cream until desired consistency reached. This should be thick.
Salt to taste.

Sweet Potato rounds with Asparagus:

12 asparagus spears, small
1 sweet potato, large
1 T butter
1 t lemon juice
salt

Cut sweet potato into 1/2 inch thick rounds and steam until easily pierced by a fork.
Steam asparagus until bright green & still crisp.
Melt butter and add lemon juice.
Cut a 1/2 inch hole in the center of 4 sweet potato rounds and set aside.
Cut the remaining sweet potato into 1/2 rounds.
Brush asparagus & sweet potato with butter/lemon mixture and salt lightly.

Delicata squash:

1 delicata squash, small
2 T butter
2 T honey

Cut squash in half lengthwise.
Scoop out seeds.
Place 1 T of butter and 1 T of honey in each half.
Bake at 350 F for 30 min.

To Plate:

On warmed plates, spoon 1/4 cup of Mushroom/quince/chestnut puree.
Top with ravioli & pheasant.
Place 3 asparagus spears in each of the 4 sweet potato sounds.
Add small sweet potato rounds and squash.
Garnish with parsley.

Salmon Sous Vide with Rhubarb Sauce

One salmon fillet was poached in ghee and the other in a rhubarb reduction, then served with a rhubarb sauce.

Poached Salmon

2 salmon steaks
1 T ghee
salt, pinch
1 T rhubarb sauce juice (see below)
rhubarb sauce (see below)
black pepper

Place one piece of salmon in a bag with ghee and a pinch of salt then vacuum seal gently…only enough to get most of the air out, but not compress the fish.
Place the second piece of salmon in a bag with rhubarb sauce juice and a pinch of salt then seal as above.
Sous vide at 118 F for 30 minutes.
Crack a little black pepper over fish and serve with rhubarb sauce.

Rhubarb Sauce

5 strands saffron
4 cubeb berries
pinch of sugar
150 g rhubarb
30 g honey
1 T ghee
1/4 C water

Grind the spices with the sugar with a mortar & pestle.
Add all, except water, to a small pot and simmer  until rhubarb turns to mush.
Add water and force a small amount of the sauce through a chinois to yield 1 T of juice.

 

The fish poached with the sauce was a little bit firmer, but both were perfection…

I had some of the leftovers for breakfast with scrambled eggs and an english muffin and was rather pleased with the combination.

 

 

Lobster Sous Vide Test

Lobster poached, sous vide, in two different fats:

1 lobster tail, removed from shell
100 g ghee
salt, pinch
1/2 t chervil, dried
lemon juice

1 lobster tail, removed from shell
100g coconut oil
salt, pinch
1/2 t chervil, dried
lemon juice

Place tail in bag with fat & chervil and vaccume seal.
Sous vide at 126 F for 20 minutes
Drizzle with a little lemon juice

I would like the lobster to be a bit more firm, so next time I will bump the temp to 130 F.
I would also like to try tarragon in place of the chervil.
The coconut oil imparted a slight coconut flavor to the meat and should go well with a lime/chili sauce…

Mushrooms & Short Ribs

6 boneless short ribs
4 T butter, unsalted
8 oz baby bella mushrooms, minced
2 lg shallot, minced
100ml mushroom stock
2 T Bal Soy
1 T honey
1 T cubeb vinegar
1 T tarragon

Sous vide ribs at 144 F for 72 hours.
Melt butter and sauté mushrooms until almost dry.
Add shallot and sauté until translucent.
Add stock, BalSoy, honey and tarragon.
Simmer until liquid is mostly evaporated.
Remove meat from bags & pat dry
Season with salt & pepper then sear on all sides.
Top with mushroom mixture and serve.

Pineapple with Cilantro Cream

My photograph does not do this justice, it really is a lovely plating.  The soft green of the cilantro cream plays nicely with the translucent amber pieces of pineapple.

Pineapple with Cilantro Cream

Total Time = 110 min

Ingredients:

1 pineapple, whole

1 vanilla bean, split

2 c sugar

1 c white wine

1 c heavy cream

1 bunch cilantro

4 oz mascarpone, room temp

2 T butter, salted

1/4 c macadamia nuts, fine chop

Equipment: sous vide circulator, vacuum sealer & bags, food processor.

Directions:

Dissolve 1 cup of sugar in wine over medium heat.

Set aside to cool.

Skin pineapple then core it by cutting a large slab off of each side and then two thin slabs from the remaining sides.

Place 1 cup of sugar and the vanilla bean in a large sauce pan over medium heat until the sugar caramelizes.

Add 1/4 of the wine syrup and the pineapple.

Add the remaining wine syrup and simmer for 5 minutes.

Remove the pineapple, cover and cool in refrigerator.

Stir the syrup until all of the caramel dissolves then pour through a chinois.

Once the pineapple is cool, place it in vacuum bags and divide the syrup evenly.

Place in a sous vide bath at 167 F for 1 hour.

Cool to room temp.

Coarsely chop the cilantro and pulse in a food processor with 1/2 cup of cream until well blended.

Allow to sit for 10 minutes then press through a chinois.

Whip with remaining cream to stiff peak.

Add mascarpone and whip until well combined.

Remove the pineapple from bags and reserving syrup.

Place syrup in a small sauce pot over med-hi heat to around 235 F (softball.)

Remove from heat and add, butter and macadamia nuts.

Cool to room temp.

To Plate, pipe a nest of cilantro cream and spoon the macadamia nut syrup into the middle. Cut the pineapple into 1 inch cubes and arrange around the cream.