* i had this souffle at Koffman's in London and was in love with it. When i returned to HK, i tried to search for the receipe and at the end found one at "The Renaissance Epicurrean Cooks..." Give it a try. You wont succeed in the first attempt but when you do or when you did it in the next few rounds, it is a wonderful feeling!
Ingredients:
500ml milk
1/2 vanilla pod (slice it up lengthway)
4 egg yolks (or 120g)
100g caster sugar
50g plain flour
3 tbsp (40g) pistachio paste
25g butter, softened
25g dark chocolate, grated
4 egg whites (or 120g)
1 tbsp caster sugar
icing sugar, to serve
How to Make it:
1. Grate the chocolate and store in fridge first.
2. Preheat oven to 230'C
3. Boil milk with the vanilla pod. Once boiled, turn off heat and let the vanilla pod sits in the milk.
4. Whisk egg yolks with caster sugar until the mixture slightly thickens and turns light in color.
5. Sieve the flour and add into the egg yolk misture, continuing whisking until all smooth.
6. Add half of the milk, continuing whisking, until there are no lumps.
7. Remove the vanilla pod from the rest of the milk in the pot and sieve the egg yolk and egg mixture into the milk pot. Turn on the heat again (but dont boil it), keep whisking at simmering point for say approx 5 mintues.
8. Turn off heat and add the pistachio paste and keeo whisking untill all is well combined. Then pour it to a shallow tray or bowl and let it cool down. (you can make your own pistachio paste but i think it is not as creamy, smooth and consistent as the one i ordered online from amazon)
9. Generously butter 5 individual souffle bowls and coat the inside of the bowls with the grated chocolate.
10. Beat the egg whites until firm, then add 1 tbsp of caster sugar and whisk until stiff (eg. when you hold the bowl upside down, the egg whites do not fall down).
11. Add 1/4 of the egg whites to the pistachio/milk mixture with the whisk to soften it, then mix well quickly.
12. Fold in the rest of the egg white to the pistachio/milk mixture with a spatular smoothly but as quick as possible,
13. Then quickly spoon the mixture into the souffle bowls (right to the top of the bowls) and bake in oven at 240'C for 15 min on until well risen. (dont place it too high up in the oven, otherwise, when it rises, the top will get burn easily.)
14. Once you notice the soufle has risen well and the top is brown, remove it from oven quickly but carefully as each bowls are REALLY HOT!!
15. To serve, dust the top with icing sugar and serve with ice cream of your choice!
Enjoy!!
* the way to cook this part of the lamb is in fact quite similar with rack of lamb. But meat from saddle is much more tender and juicy. Very difficult to find this part in shops. I order through a meat importer from Wales.
Ingredients:
Lamb Saddle x 1 (usually the lamb saddle consists of 2 pc, right side and left side. just use 1 side. If it's a frozen one, make sure you give enough time to defrost in fidge. Then the centre of the saddle is still very frozen, you cannot cook this well)
rosemary - minced
garlic - minced
Potato
Mint Sauce
a few bunches of fresh mint leaves - remove stems, just keep the leaves
olive oil
red wine vinegar
golden caster sugar
pinch of salt
How to Make the Mint Sauce:
just put all the mint leaves, 1-2 ttbsp of red wine vinegar, 1-2tbsp of golden caster sugar and a pinch of salt to the blender with a good drizzle of olive oil, Blend to the consistency you like and the taste you like.
How to Make the Lamb Saddle:
1. Preheat oven to 230'C.
2. Wash and wipe dry the lamb saddle.
3. Marinate with salt, pepper, minced rosemary, minced garlic, paprika and olive oil - massage the saddle with this marinate mix thoroughly.
4. Wash and drain the potatoes and cut into wedges.
5. Heat up a frying pan with olive oil and brown all sides of the lamb.
6. Place the sddle on the oven tray, skin side up. Then add all marinate left on the fyring pan back to the top of the saddle. Sprinkle some more paprika and drizzle a bit more olive oil and place some extra rosemary leaves on top. Add the cut potatoes on the sides of the tray.
7. Roast for 15min, then turn down heat to 200'C and cook for another hour. Test with a meat thermometer.
8. Take out from oven and rest for 5-10 mintues before cut into slices.
Serve with the roast potatoes with the lamb and marinate juice left on the naking tray and the mint sauce!
Enjoy!
* a very easy to make seafood pasta. All is required is fresh seafood and your loving heart, hahaha!
Ingredients:
Fresh Scallops (choose those which you big in size and firm to touch)
Prawns
Squids
Garlic - slicese
Basil
Italian Minced Chilli
Pasta of your choice
How to Make:
1. Cook your pasta as per package instructions. (remember to add salt to the water and add and mix olive oil to the pasta after draining)
2. Clean and wipe dry all seafood and season wtih salt and pepper.
3. Heat up a wide frying pan with olive oil, then pan fried the scallops until both sides are golden, then remove them to a plate. Then pan fried the squids and prawnsm until done and remove them to a plate. Then add all sliced garlic to the oil until they are golden, (adding more olive oil if not enough to cover them).
4. Once sliced garlic are also golden, add all seafood back to the frying pan, then add a few pinches of the italian minced chilli. Turn off heat and add all pasta to the pan (with some of the pasta water is fine) and mix everything thoroughly together with the basil leaves.
5. Place on serving dish and drizzle a bit olive oil on top before serving.
Enjoy!
* using sous vide to prepare the tongue and cheek is real good - nothing much you have to do and they are just so tender and juicy! Unlike braising when the meat will loose flavour to the braising liquid, in slow cook, all the juice of the meat are retained inside the meat. All you need to do is to find a good sauce to go with it. The braising sauce from the oxtail recipe has a lot of the oxtail flavour, so the best to go with the tongue and cheeks!
Ingredients:
Ox Tongue x 1
Beef Cheeks x 2
Oxtail sauce (see Braised Ox Tail recipe)
Butter, salt and pepper
How to make:
1. Clean tongue and cheeks and wipe dry with kitchen towel.
2. Season with salt and pepper and place each of them in a vaccum bag with a dab of butter. (*if the tongue is a salted tongue, then you can omit with salt seasonings).
3. Set the temperature of the water bath machine to 80'C. Once temperature is reached, place the vacuum sealed tongue and cheek to the water bath. for the tongue, cook for 26 hrs while the cheek, 20 hrs will be enough. Check water level from time to time and add water if necessary.
4. After the cooking time is up, take out and remove tongue and cheeks from their bags.
5. Peel off the hard skin of the tongue gently, then slice up the tongue and cheeks to the thickness you desired and arrange on serving plate. Or you can pan fried each on a frying pan to give a more smoky flavour!
6. Bring the oxtail sauce to a boil and pour sauce on top of tongue and cheek on serving plate.
Enjoy!
Ingredients:
Oxtail x 5 pc
Tomato x 3pc - remove skins and pups as shown below, then cut into medium chunks
Onion x 2 pc - cut into medium chunks
Carrot x 2pc - cut into medium chunks
Garlic - presssed by 1/2 cup
Shallots - coarsely cut x 1/2 cup
Ginger - 2 slices
Sauce:
1/2 cup Chinese wine (shiu hing wine)
1/2 cup light soy sauce
1/2 cup worchester sauce (lee & perins)
1/2 cup ketchup
2tbsp dark soy sauce
Rock sugar
How to do this:
1. Wash and dry the ox tail and marinate with light soy sauce, sugar, sesame oil, chinese wine, white pepper and corn flour - use hands to mix them up and coat the oxtail evenly.
2. Remove skins and pups of the tomatoes in this way:
(a) gently cut a cross on the tomatoes
(b) boil water in a pan which can cover the tomatoes
(c) once water is boiled, swtich off fire, then drop the tomatoes into the hot water for 1 minute
(d) take out tomato and drop them to a bowl of ice water
(e) the skin will be peeled off easily
(f) after removing the skins, cut them up and remove the seeds inside,
(g) retain all the tomato juice on your chopping board with the board tomatoes.
3. Use a big pot to start the sauce - add all chopped tomatoes with the juice, the cut carrots, then the SAUCE above and start boiling it.
4. Heat up another frying pan and add corn oil, then stir fried the garlic, onion, shallots and ginger until fragrant.
5. Once the above is fragrant, removed them to a plate lined with kitchen towel - to remove some of the oil. Then add all these to the sauce pot.
6. In the same frying pan, brown the oxtail on all sides - do it in 2 batches as the frying pan might not be able to hold all oxtail on one go.
7. Remove the browned oxtail to a plate lined with kitchen towel.
8. Once all oxtail are browned and oil gently removed through absorption on kitchen towel, add all oxtail to the sauce pot.
9. Top up with hot water in the sauce pot until all oxtail are covered under the braising liquid., then add rock sugar.
10. Once the sauce pot with the oxtail and the rest of the ingredients are boiled, turn down to medium heat and braised the oxtail for 2 to 2.5 hrs. Check every 30 min to ensure nothing sticked to the bottom of the pot. Check taste from time to time.
11. Once braising is finished (oxtail is tender enough for your tasting), remove all oxtail to a new pot.
12. For the braising sauce remaining, use Japanese Oil Paper (for cooking) to remove the oil on top of the braising sauce. You will need to use quite a number of these oil paper to completely removed the oil retained in the sauce.
13. Once the above is finished and you can see sauce is not oily, then see if the sauce is thick enough for your liking. If not, then mix 2 tbsp of cornflour with cold water until all cornflour are dissolved, then add to the braising sauce and boil the sauce until it is thickened and adjust seasonings to your likings.
14. When you are ready to serve, place the oxtail nicely on the serving plate/bowl, top up with the braising sauce.
Best served with noodles or rice!
** you should have quite a lot of braising sauce left behind. Dont throw it away!! once cool, pour them in ziplock bags and put to freezer. You can use this sauce for a lot of other things.
-> simpliest dish of all but tasty and welcomed by most!Ingredients:
Fresh Portebello Mushrooms x 8pc
Italian Parsley - minced
Garlic - sliced
How to Make:
1. use a damp cloth to wipe off dirt on the mushrooms, then cut them into slices.
2. Heat up a frying pan and add olive oil (if you prefer to be more fragrant but less healthy, then add some butter too).
3. Add the sliced garlic to the frying pan until starting to become golden.
4. Add the slices portebello mushroom slices and stir fried with the sliced garlic until mushrooms become dark in color and softened.
5. Season with salt and pepper to your tasting.
6. Place on dish and sprinkle with the minced Italian Parsley.
Enjoy~
