Blog 5 - Innovation

Massimo Bottura

   I've known about Massimo Bottura for a while however when he was coming to George Brown I knew I needed to meet him and I researched him and watched every video related to him. I was incredibly inspired on his childlike mentality on Italian cuisine and going back to the origins and basics of Italian dishes like Bologna sandwich and other concoctions but taking them to a whole new level and reinventing them.  He is definitely an innovator in the sense that he is not recreating anything new he is just reinventing and reimaging the dish. For example he does a dish called memory of a bologna sandwich in which a bologna sandwich is in a siphon and aerated onto a piece of bread and supposedly tastes exactly like a bologna sandwich and brings people back to their childhood if for just a moment. Similar to that which the Chef Remy in Ratatouille did for the critic Anton Ego with Ratatouille. I also am inspired by him and the fact that he gives back to the community. He talks about the earthquake that happened in Emilia Romagna and how hundreds of wheels of parmagiano reggiano were destroyed and could not be sold and if they were to be sold it would ruin the reputation of the cheese and an entire economy in Italy. To remedy this issue the parmagiano reggiano was sold at a ridiculously low price so everyone could afford to buy some and bandage the problem. 

     They had a webcasted dinner for "Parmagiano Reggiano Night" in which Bottura created a recipe everyone could make at home purely using the parmaggiano reggiano. It was a cacio e peppe parmagiano reggiano which instead of using pecorino it uses the parmagiano. It also shows the humility and humbleness Bottura has compared to a lot of the celebrity chefs shown in the public eye today. It is important because he also knows he has a reputation but he decided to help out his community instead of turning away from it. I was inspired by how humble he was when I met him. For someone who is considered the third best chef in the world and the best chef in Italy he was incredibly humble and for me to witness that it humbled me as well. He is someone who I would love to work for one day in Italy or even to roam the streets with in Modena! In his cooking he does a lot of sous vide and using siphons to create a specific texture to add to a dish. In my own cooking I am not the biggest fan of sous vide or using molecular gastronomy because I feel Italian food should be kept simple and cooked simply by letting ingredients shine however I do feel at times it could be appropriate to be using sous vide and different chemicals to dissects foods even if it is far from what I would consider cooking. 

K.M.W.

Blog Assignment #4 - Diets and Dietary Restrictions

I chose to try to be a vegan during the week. The First day was fine as I had an apple for breakfast, then for lunch decided to have Eggplant Parmesan. I thought the cripness of the eggplant and creaminess of the cheese would be good with some basic bucatini with pomodoro sauce. Then for dinner I would change it up and have a vegetable stir fry with rice. That had lasted a day. I could not finish the day without any meat. I like the textures and flavours meat adds to a dish. Personally for me I know I wouldn't be able to satisfy and completely comply with this diet as I wouldn’t be able to eat something like a tofu burger or tofu hot dog; to me its imitating something that it shouldn't be trying to imitate. The thing that made me want to finish the day was knowing that I'd be able to have meat again soon. 

If someone was to become a vegan for health reasons or to lose weight that is completely understandable. It limits the amount of meat you are able to intake however if I was in that situation I'd still need to eat some sort of fish to satisfy the meat craving. If I was able to do the diet over again I would go for the Mediterranean diet. It involves using a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables and limits the amount of fish and poultry intake which I would be fine with. Things such as nuts, seeds, fruits, and olive oil added in a meal definitely fills you up a lot more than fillers such as rice and bread. In life you should enjoy the good things in life however everything in moderation is necessary in order to maintain a  balanced lifestyle. 

 Part of the Mediterranean diet is balancing everything and limiting just the protein intakes like red meats, poultry, and fish. If someone asked me what diet I'd suggest I'd most likely recommend the Mediterranean as it has many different options available and you are just eating in moderation. You could poach, steam, grill, or even sear the fish in olive oil, serve it with a quinoa salad or even a multigrain pasta salad with kalamata olives and feta cheese. To finish off the meal you could have some fresh strawberries with cherries, blueberries, and blackberries with a dollop of yogurt with fresh gratedlemon zest, and a quick drizzle of honey on top. For a chef, the Meditteranean diet would allow you to have a wider margin of being able to cook different things using a variety of different methods. Contrarily if you were to become vegan as a chef it would force you to be creativein a very confined list of ingredients.

Seared Salmon with Quinoa Salad

1 loin of salmon

0.5 cup of fresh green peas

1 cup of quinoa

1 tablespoon of olive oil

0.5 cup of deseeded kalamata olives

1/2 red onion thinly sliced

1/2 green pepper diced

1/2 cup of feta cheese

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Maldon Salt and fresh cracked black pepper

1. Get a nonstick frying pan hot. AS soon as it gets hot add your olive oil and wait for 5 seconds. After 5 seconds add your salmon to the pan skin side down first. Leave it to cook on the skin for about 8 minutes. The salmon will cook 90% on the skin then 10% on the flesh flipped over.

2. Get a pot of water and add your quinoa to it. The water should be 2 thumbs covering the quinoa. Leave it on medium heat for about 10 minutes. Check on the quinoa after 8 minutes and after the quinoa is finished cooking, fork it into a bowl and let it cool down in the fridge for 15 minutes.

3. Flip the salmon over and cook it until you poke it and has alittle bit of resistance. After it becomes pinnk take it out of the pan and let it sit for a bit, the heat inside the fish will continually warm it and probably cook it a bit more. 

4. Take out the quinoa and add the rest of the ingredients, add the juice of 1 lemon and add some olive oil and toss it around. Serve on a plate with the seared salmon.

Done! 

Hug a Farmer - The French Laundry Garden

 

Although I didn't get a chance to meet a farmer in Toronto or up north I have visited a phenomenal world renown garden in the small town of Yountville, California.

 It was the garden for the 3 michelin starred restaurant, The French Laundry. Placed right across the street from the restaurant, the garden is about 3 acres and is tended to daily by a gardening staff lead by a farmer named Tucker Taylor. 

 

 

Unfortunately Tucker Taylor wasn't working the day I visited the garden but before my trip to California I knew I was going to visit the French Laundry and knew of Tucker Taylor. Farming is not just a job for him, he's really incredibly passionate about it. 

The French Laundry garden is something he is definitely proud of. It is incredibly neat and organized to a tee; even the chicken coop is incredibly clean I think it's even cleaner than my bedroom.

The garden across the street from the restaurant was thought of by Thomas Keller to provide local sustainable produce to his restaurants in Yountville which is Bouchon, Bouchon Bakery, Ad Hoc, and of course the famed French Laundry. 

It provides microgreens, seasonal vegetables, fresh eggs, herbs, any produce you could possibly think of. Taylor is very consciencious of how much water they use for the plants and the use of the sun and some greenhouses for vegetables that need more heat and sunlight. Everything in the garden is organic. 

They do support buying local and sustainable foods because it costs the restaurant less money to buy produce as they grow it across the street but also by doing so they help the economy of Yountville. 

It is amazing how passionate Taylor is about gardening. He gets so excited to tend to his plants because they really are alive and need love and care. It is something to be excited for when you see the fruits or rather in this situation the vegetables of him and his team's labour. A farmers job is just as important as a chefs. 

The farmer helps care and tend to the vegetable's growth. It is up to the chef to determine a way to cook the vegetable to highlight it's flavours and ensure that vegetable wasn't killed in vain and it was used wisely.

Eat well,

K.M.W.

 

Cooking Game : Red Wine Braised Rabbit

For this assignment I chose to buy rabbit. I was interested in cooking a venison loin or a wild boar ribs or something of that nature considering the flavour would be oustanding because a wild animal eats anything out there in the wild. The animals we typically eat are cooped up in  barns and fed food pellets. I chose a rabbit because it is readily available and also I have not cooked it before. I purchased the whole rabbit at Sanagan's Meat Locker located in Kensington market. One whole rabbit cost around $26 and I wanted to ensure none of it went to waste. I looked upon youtube to find a good video to show me how to take a part a rabbit and I did. I used everything including the rabbit's organs.

 I kept the head and some of the bones as I did not want to waste anything. I roasted the head and bones in a pan and cooked a mirepoix and made a jus for the roasted rabbit. I was aiming for a recipe that involved keeping the pieces of rabbit as a whole. It is such a delicate animal that I don't want to do a typical rabbit fricasse where the poor animal is really shredded to pieces. 

I found a recipe that caught my attention: Red Wine Braised Rabbit. I floured the rabbit pieces, seared it in oil, then cooked it with roasted garlic, sage, rosemary, and of course red wine. You cook it for about 45 minujtes then another 30 minutes uncovered in the oven. It was an interesting flavour. I have to admit I was hesitant on trying rabbit but then I thought about Gollum in Lord of the Rings and when he ate that roasted rabbit how delicious it looked. I was expecting the flavours to be a bit weird and they were. The texture as cliché as it sounds tasted a lot like chicken. You definitely need to braise rabbit because when you think of the animal… the animal is constantly moving using its whole body hind legs and front legs. If I were to re-do this recipe I would probably brine the rabbit and then fry it. I thought the crispy beautifully coloured skin dissipated in the braise and you couldn't really taste it. I served the rabbit with some crispy roasted potatoes, roasted butternut squash with thyme, feta, and maple syrup and rabbit jus. 

Eat Well.

K.M.W.