Mixed Berries & White Chocolate Trifle

* recipe adopted from Donna Hay

Ingredients:

Jelly:
1.5L Cranberry Juice (the brand i use is "Ocean Spray" which is lighter)
Gelatine Powder (i use "Vahine" brand, basically 6g per sachet. For 1.5L juice, you need 6 sachet)s
1 cup (220g) caster sugar
500g frozen mixed berries

White chocolate Ganache:
180g white chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup (250ml) whipping cream

Mascarpone Cream Topping:
1/2 cup (140g) mascarpone 
1/2 cup (80g) icing sugar, sifted
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
1.5 cup (375ml) whipping cream

Toppings:
Fresh Mixed Berries of your choice
Icing sugar

How to Make:
<Jelly>
1. To make the jelly, place the 125ml cranberry juice and the gelatine poweder into a bowl and stir to combine. Set aside for 5 min or until the gelatine is absorbed.

2. Place the remaining juice  and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat and stir until sugar is dissolved. Bring to boil and cook for 1 min.

3. Pour the boiled juice to the bowl of gelatine mixture and stir to combine. Set aside to cool down for 20 min.

4. Once cool, pour the jelly mixture into your serving bowl and top with the frozen berries. Refrigerate 4-5 hrs or overnight until set.

<White Chocolate Ganache>
5. Place chopped white chocolate in a stainless steel bowl on top of the hot of boiling hot water. Stir the chocolate until melted and smooth, then remove from heat.

6. Add 60ml of whipping cream to the melted chocolate in a thin steady stream stirring constantly until well combined. Set aside to cool down or refrigerate until just cold.

7. Whisk the remaining cream (190ml) until stiff peaks form, then add the cooled chocolate mixture and fold through to combine.

<Mascarpone Cream>
8. Place mascarpone, sugar, vanilla paste and cream in a bowl and whisk until soft peaks form.

<Assemble>
9. Take out the set jelly from fridge.

10. Spoon the white chocolate ganache on top of jelly and smooth it out with a palette knife.

11. Quickly dip the sponge fingers with the liquer and line them up on top of the white chocolate ganache.

12. Layer the mascarpone cream on top of the sponge fingers.

13. Top with fresh berries and dust icing sugar over sift and cream.

enjoy!

  

Creamed Spinach

Ingredients:
Baby Spinach x 4 bags
Onion x 1 , minced
Garlic x 4 gloves, pressed
Bacon, diced **
Whipping Cream, approx 2 cups 
Flour, approx 3-4 tbsp 
Butter
Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper

** For Vegetarian version, please skip bacon


How to Make:
1. Boil a pot of water, once boiled, add all spinach and cook for 1 minute, then drain immediately.

2. In another pan large enough to hold all the cooked spinach, melt the butter, add some olive oil, add the minced onion and garlic and stir-fried until all soft.

3. Add bacon to the frying pan until cooked and fragrant, add sprinkle the flour and mix well, then add the spinach, mix well, then add the cream. Adjust the thickness by adding more cream if you want it less thick. Add more flour if you want it thicker. Season with salt and pepper. Once the taste and consistency is ideal for you, remove from heat and pulse them at a blender in a few batches.

An ideal side dish for chicken, beef and even seafood dish!

Enjoy!

White Truffle Tagliolini

Ingredients:
Alba White Truffle (approx 10g per person)
Pasta of your choice (i prefer using Tagliolini)
Onsen Egg (i prefer using Italian eggs as their yolks are golden yellow!)
Butter (1/2 to 1 tbsp per person)
Whipping Cream (1-2 tbsp per person)
Parmesan Cheese, Grated
White Truffle Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper

How to Make:
1. Prepare onsen eggs by preparing hot water bath (sous vide) at 63'C. Once temperate is reached, lower eggs to the bottom of the hot water bath using a laddle or using a basket to avoid breaking the eggs and cook for 30-35 minutes.

2. Cook your pasta as per the instructions as shown on the pasta bag but less 30-60 seconds.

3. Once your pasta is ready, drain them. 

4. Using another pan, medium heat, add butter and when it's almost all melted, add the whipping cream and the grated cheese, then add the drained pasta and mix well quickly (1 minute) with salt and pepper. Turn off heat and mix with white truffle olive oil too.

5. Divide the pasta into serving plate, making a dent in the middle.

6. Gently break the cooked egg in a small bowl, then spoon out the cooked egg portion into the dent of the pasta. (sometimes some egg whites will still be watery, discharge that, and just spoon out the cooked egg). 

7. Shave Alba White Truffle on top and serve as soon as possible.

Enjoy!

Black Truffle Risotto

Ingredients:
Fresh Black Truffle
Risotto Rice x 2 cups
Onion x 1 - minced
Garlic - 2-3 pc - pressed
White wine x 1/2 cup
Chicken Stock x 4-6 cups **
Butter x 2 tbsp
Olive Oil
Parmesan Cheese - grated x 2-3 cups
Black Truffle Olive Oil
Truffle peeler/grater

** For Vegetarian, replace chicken stock with Vegetable Stock

How to Make:
1. Order your black truffle from a reliable importer in advance. Once received, cover them with a kitchen towel and store inside an air tight box containing the risotto rice - the risotto rice will absorb some of the fragrance of the black truffle! 

2. On the day of cooking, just take out the truffle and wipe surface clean with a kitchen towel or brush them clean with a clean brush - gently. 

3. Boil the chicken stock, then keep simmering at low heat.

4. On a separate non-stick pan, heat some olive oil together with the butter, add the minced onion and garlic in high heat and stir fried until the onions become translucent and soft.

5. Add the risotto rice and stir until they are evenly coated with the butter olive oil and the minced onion mixture.

6. Splash the white wine until all evaporated.

7. Turn heat to medium. Add the chicken stock, laddle by laddle until each laddle of chicken stock is fully absorbed by the rice. Keep stirring the rice but without bashing them.

8. It takes approx 20-30 min to have the rice all cooked using the method in 7 above. Taste the rice from time to time to see if they are al-dente enough for you. If it is, season with some salt and pepper. Then add the grated parmesan cheese, and have the pan covered for 3-5 minutes.

9. Stir well, remove rice from pan and place at serving dish, sprinkle with truffle olive oil before grating the black truffle on top. 

Serve with champagne or white wine and enjoy the dish!!

Chirashi

* a very easy to make dish, but extremely welcomed in the Summer season. Most important is to get fresh and superior quality seafood and make the sushi rice right!

Ingredients:

Rice:
Japanese rice x 3 cups
Rice Vinegar x 6 tbsp
6 tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt

Toppings:
Toro - clean and diced to a size you desired
Salmon - belly part - clean and diced to a size you desired
Urnin
Ikura
cucumber - diced
scrambled eggs - thinly sliced

wasabi/ sushi soy sauce

How to Make:
1. Wash the rice gently until the water drain away is no longer milky colour but looks like clear water. Usually takes 6 to 8 rounds of washing.

2. Put rice to rice cooker and usually the rice cooker will indicate how much water to put for the number of cups of rice you are cooking for sushi use. 

3. Add the required water and let the rice rest in the water for 30 min before you switch on rice cooker.

4. Once rice is cooked, let the rice cools down a bit.

5. Prepare the vinegar sauce by heating them in a small pot, i,e. the vinegar, the sugar and salt - until all is dissolved and mixed well. No need to bring to boil. Check tasting. Then cool down the vinegar.

6. Put cooked rice to wooden sushi bowl and sprinkle vinegar dressing in a circular motion. Use a flat wooden spoon to mix it quickly in a cutting motion. * a wooden sushi bowl helps to remove extra moisture, preventing rice from being sticky.

7. When rice is loosened without any lumps left, evenly mix with vinegar dressing, mix the rice further with the wooden spoon quickly in a sideways slicing motion, while cooling it with a hand fan, to allow the extra vinegar to evaporate. When the rice cools down to room temperature, it's done. Cover the rice with a clean cloth moistened with water and tightly squeezed. * the moistened cloth covering protects the rice from drying out.

8. When ready to serve, add toppings sparingly! 

Enjoy with a glass of your favourite sake!

Pumpkin Coconut Soup

* a recipe adapted from Donna Hay's one. Easy to make. Yummy and Healthy as it's all vegetarian!

Ingredients (for 4 persons):
Japanese Pumpkin x 1/2
Coconut Water x 1L (i prefer the Jax Coco brand)
Coconut Cream (those in cans are good enough)
Shredded Coconuts and Shredded Fresh Mint

How to Make:
1. Cut pumpkin into chunk size (no skin) and blanch them in hot water for around 15 min (or until soft).

2. Add spoonfuls of soften pumpkin and coconut water in a blender and blend till it's silky. Pour it to a pot. Do it in a few batches. If mixture is too dense, you can add more coconut water to the next blend. If mixture is too light and watery, then add more pumpkin to next blend.

3. Heat the soup, stir it from time to time, then add say a dash of coconut cream to make it creamy. Season with salt and pepper to a taste of your liking.

4. Upon serving, use coconut cream to draw pattern on soup, garnish with mixture of shredded coconut and shredded mint.

Enjoy~~

Karage (fried chicken)

Ingredients:
Boneless Chicken Thighs x 4 pc -  cut into a medium size
Flour
salt and pepper
Lemon - cut into wedges

Batter:
6 tbsp x of flour
grated garlic x 3 tbsp
200ml cooking sake
water - a littl bit

How to Make:
1. Put the batter ingredients into a bowl and whisk gently. Ensure no bubbles formed. Lift whisk to see if batter is smooth enough to fall unbroken. If so, the batter is ready. 

2. Heat oil in a frying pan.

3. Sprinkle cut chicken with a little bit of salt and pepper and coat with loose flour. Shake off excess flour, then dip into batter.

4. Fry chicken until golden color. Drain oil first before placing them in a serving plate. Serve with lemon wedges.

Enjoy with a bottle of chilled beer!

Ramen with homemade Char Siu and Half Boiled Eggs

Ingredients:
Boneless Belly Pork x 1 slab - roll into a swiss-roll like and tightly tied with ropes (I used UK belly pork as the meat is juicy tender while not as fat as those from local markets)
Eggs
Spring onion x 2pc cut into a few pieces
Ginger slices x 4pc
Garlic - a bunch - pressed
Konbu - 2 pc
white vinegar
ramen of your choice
garnish - minced garlic - deep fried in low fire until golden./ Seaweed.

Pork braising sauce:
200ml mirin
200ml cooking sake
200ml japanese soy sauce
sugar
water

Eggs braising sauce:
ginger x 3 slices
garlic - 2 pc pressed
50ml Japanese soy sauce
1tbsp Shaoxing wine
1/2tbsp oyster sauce
1tbsp honey or sugar
200ml water

How to Make:

PORK:
1.Boil a pot of water, then add spring onion, ginger, garlic, konbu, then add the tightly tied pork roll and blanch for 20min.

2. In the meantime, prepare another pot with the braising sauce and bring to boil. Check tasting and adjust accordingly. If preferred more flavour in the pork, feel free to add garlic, ginger, spring onion, onion, shallot or even carrot to this braising sauce pot.

3. Once the pork finished blanching, transfer the pork to the braising sauce pot and cook in medium fire for 1.5hr to 2hr until tender enough when a needle is poked to the middle of the pork. Make sure the sauce is sufficient to fully covered the pork.

4. Switch off fire and keep the pork in the braising sauce pot with lid covered until cool down.

5.Place the pork with the sauce in a pot and keep in fridge overnight.

6. On the day of cooking ramen, take out pork from fridge, and slice it with a sharp knife.

7. Just lightly re-heat the pork slices in a microwave before placing on top of ramen.

Half Boiled Eggs 
1. Remove eggs from fridge and place in a bowl of room temperature water.

2. Boil a pot of water large enough to hold the eggs you will be cooking.

3. Use a pin to gently pin a tiny hole and top and bottom of the egg. 

4. Once water is boiled, add 1tbsp of white vinegar.

5. Place the eggs to the pot using a laddle and cook for 6 min.

6. In the meantime, heat the braising sauce. Once boiled, keep cooking for 1 minute, then remove the ginger and garlic from the sauce and cool down the sauce. Then pour sauce to a plastic bag.

7. Once eggs are ready, transfer them to a pot of iced water filled with ice cubes. gently crack the eggs using the palms of your hands, and remove shells gently under the iced water. Best to crack the bottom of the eggs as there are empty space under the shells there and easier to remove.

8. Once all shells nicely and smoothly removed, put them to the plastic bag filled with the braising sauce. Ensure the bag is closed/ sealed to avoid sauce leaking out. change eggs position from time to time to ensure all sides of the eggs can dip into the sauce. Keep them in the sauce for at least 3 hrs in room temperature.

9. When ramen is ready, gently cut the egg into half and the yolk will be half cooked and looks "golden". Place on top of ramen. Garnish with golden minced garlic and seaweed too.

Enjoy~~

Crispy Pork Belly with Cider Pickled Pears

* this recipe is adopted from Donna Hay. Easy to do just some preparation in advance. Yummy and the pickled pear is a real good compliment to the pork!

Ingredients:
Boneless Belly Pork around 7" x 7" or around 1.5kg
2 tbsp sea salt flakes
2 tbsp 5 spice powder
1 tbsp olive oil
1 cup (250ml) apple cider
1 cup (250ml) apple cider vinegar
thyme sprigs x 6
bay leaves x 2
1/2 cup (110g) caster sugar
3 cups (750ml) water
6 small firm pears, peeled
balsamic vinegar to serve (optional)

How to Make:
1.  The night before your dinner, wash and wipe dry belly pork. If you have really sharp knife, score into pig skin at 1 cm intervals with the help of a metal ruler, i..e. really cut into the skin but not the meat. If no sharp knife to help out this job, then just use those meat poker to punch into the skin and meat all over.

2. Rub the sea salt flakes into the cuts in the skin or on top of the skin and the bottom of the meat. Rub some 5 spice powder to the meat too.

3. Place pork skin side down on a baking tray, place a kitchen towel on top (ie. meat side on top), then place another baking tray on top of the pork, place some heavy cans on top to press down - purpose of this is to make the belly pork as flat as possible, gives you better shape to cook and cut afterwards. Also, no need to put any cling film wrap so that the skin of the pork can dry out in the fridge for a better crackle at cooking. Refrigerate overnight.

4. On the day of cooking, then out pork to room temperature for 1 hr before cooking. If you have a metal hook, hang it up so that all extra moisture in the skin will be released, Otherwise, use kitchen towels to wipe and absorb all extra moisture from the pork. 

5. Pre-heat oven to 180'C.

6. Rub some more sea salt flakes to the pork, black pepper and any spice you like. Brush olive oil to skin and meat. Place the pork, skin side down on a baking tray and roast for 1 hour.

7. After 1 hour, turn the pork to skin side up, increase oven heat to 200'C, roast for another 1 hour. You can put the baking tray at 1 level up inside the oven.

8. While the pork is roasting, make the pickled pears. Place the cider, vinegar, sugar, thymes, bay leaves, water in a medium saucepan over high heat. Add the pears, cover with non-stick baking paper and top with a small lid to submerge the pears. Poach the pears for 20 mins or until they are tender. Then set aside on the pickling liquid until ready to serve with the pork.



9. Once the pork is done, remove from oven, drain the oil from top of skin (if any), then cut and serve with the pickled pear.

Enjoy!

Crabmeat Cannoloni

Ingredients:
1 box of dry cannelonni (get any brand from supermarket and read the cooking instructions)
Fresh Crabmeat - steam crab and remove meat when crab is cooled
Yellow Zuccinni x 1- small cubes
Green Zuccinni x 1 - small cubes
onion x 1 - minced
chicken stock
fresh morzarella cheese cut into slice
fresh parmesan cheese - grated

Bechamel sauce:
plain flour x 2-3 tbsp
butter x 1-2 tbsp
whipping cream
chicken stock


How to Make:
1. Preheat oven - at a temperate as stated in the pasta box.

2. Prepare the bechamel sauce by using a non-stick pot - under medium heat, add the butter and flour and use a whisk to mix them together until it forms a roux (like a thick paste), then add cream and chicken stock until it reaches a consistency and flavour to your liking. ** Pls remember to have the sauce quantity to be enough to cover the top of all the cannelonni and not too thick also. Put aside.

3. Use a large pan, heat up minced onion with olive oil until they are soft.  Then add the crabmeat, stir fried with onion until evenly mixed. Then add the diced zuccinni, adding 1-2tbsp of chicken stock to make the zuccinni softer. Season with salt and pepper. 

4. Once the crabmeat mixture is cooked, drain them in another bowl so that crabmeat mixture is not moist with water/sauce.

5. Once crabmeat mixture is cooled down, stuffed them into the cannolini one by one. ** Dont stuff too hard or else the cream sauce will be difficult to permetrate into the stuffings.

6. Spoon some bechamel sauce to the bottom to the oven-dish. then line up the stuffed cannolonni to the oven dish, then spoon over the bechamel sauce to cover up the top of all the cannolonni - but ensure the dish is deep enough so that after spooning the sauce over, there's empty sauce before top of the dish as the sauce will expand and overflow if there's not enough "head room"! Place the sliced morzarella on top evenly, then sprinkle with grated parmesan cheese and some breadcrumbs.

7. Bake in oven as per the pasta's instructions on the box.

Serve when piping hot!! Enjoy!!

Braised Beef Shin with Quail Eggs

Ingredients:
Beef Shin (金钱牛展）
Five Spices Marinade Sauce
Five Spices pack (with different spices including star ainse, chinese 
peppercorns, bay leaves, etc which you can purchase in spices shop)
Rock Sugar
Eggs or Quail Eggs

How to Make:

1. Wash the wipe dry beef shin - pack them in vacuum bags and cook in sous vide machine at 80'C for 12 hours. After cooking, remove the beef from the bags and save the juice after sieving.

2. Boil the eggs for 8-10 minutes. Cool them down in ice water. Then remove shells.

3. Prepare your marinate sauce in a deep pot by adding: 1 part of Five Spices Marinate with 3 parts Water + 1 pack of the Five Spices and some rock sugar. Make sure the beef is fully submerged under the marinate sauce. Once boiled, add the beef shin and cook in low heat for 1 to 1.5 hrs until the centre of beef is soft when chopstick is inserted into center. You can add the eggs from the beginning or for at least 1 hour in the marinate sauce.

* If you do not use sous vide machine, you will need to cook for at least 2-3 hrs in low heat to achieve softness in the beef.

* better make the marinate sauce taste light at the beginning as it will become more condensed and tasty after 1 hour cooking. If by that time, taste is not strong enough, you can always add marinate/soy sauce.

4. Remove beef shin and set aside. Once cool down, keep in fridge in an airtight box.

* you can cut and serve immediately, But by chilling it in fridge, you can cut and slice it thinly. If you cut or slice immediately after cooking, it is not possible to have thin slice.

5. For the marinate sauce with the eggs, check tastings and adjust accordingly. Adjust thickness using cornflour solution. Once cool down, keep in fridge in an air tight box.

6. Before dinner, take out beef shin and cut it as thin as you can. Line them up in a plate for steaming.

7. Reheat sauce in a sauce pan and once boil, spoon the sauce and eggs over to the steaming dish lined with the sliced beef shin. Cover with foil and steam for approx 20 -30 min.

Serve with a bowl of rice and Enjoy!!

Braised Belly Pork with Fresh Squid

Ingredients:
Belly Pork (approx 8" x 8")
Fresh large Squid x 1
Star ainse/ chinese peppercorns
ginger x 6-8 slices / spring onion x 1 big bunch
five spice marinate sauce/ light & dark soy sauce/ rock sugar

How to Make:
1. Wash and rinse the whole belly pork and cut into 2 rectangular pc.

2. Remove the eyes and the hard skins of the squid. Cut the big center part into 2 pieces and the tentacles into a few pieces.

3. Boil a big pot of water and add the spring onion and ginger. Then blanch the belly pork for approx 20-30 min until you can stick a chopstick inside the centre of the pork. Remove pork and set aside.

4. Add the squid to the same pot of ginger spring onion water and blanch for 15-20 min. Then remove and set aside.

5. Using a new pot which is deep, fix your marinate - approx 1/4 part light soy sauce, 1/2 part five spice marinate, 1 part dark soy sauce and 2 part water, then add a bunch of star ainse & chinese peppercorns. Multiply the above portions until the pork and squid are fully submerged under the liquid, then bring to boil, adding rock sugar until desired taste is achieved. Braised the pork and squid at low heat for 2 - 2.5 hrs until they are soft enough. 

** beware that the longer you cook, the more condensed/saltiness of the sauce. So you can prepare the marinate sauce at the beginning a lighter in taste as you can always add more soy sauce or five spice marinate sauce later. But if you start your marinate/sauce very strong taste at the beginning, it's more difficult to adjust to lighter taste except by adding water which is not too ideal.

6. Cut and slice the pork and squid. Adjust taste of the sauce. Adjust consistency of the sauce with cornflour solution.

7. Pour sauce on top of the pork and squid and serve with a bowl of rice.

Enjoy!

Chinese Mushrooms with Prawn Paste and Abalone

Ingredients:
Dried Chinese Mushrooms - L size x 10pc
Fresh Prawns x 20pc
Abalones in cans
egg white
seasonings

How to Make:

Day before dinner:
1. First prepare the can abalone by boiling the whole can for approx 6-8 hours. Take out abalone and sauce from can and pour them to a saucepan, adjust taste and sauce consistency by adding some more oyster sauce, soy sauce, sugar and cornflour solution to your liking. Cool down and keep in fridge.

2. Rinse and then soak the dried chinese mushrooms overnight - covering all mushrooms under water.

On the day of dinner:
3. Drain water from the Chinese Mushrooms - wipe them dry. Mix wine and sugar with the chinese mushrooms and steam for approx 40-60 minutes until they are completely soft.

4. Wash the prawns with cornflour solution, then rinse, cut in into half lengthwise - remove intestines.  Cut 4-5 prawns into small dices. Keep in fridge until later use. For the rest of the prawns. Use the back of the chinese knife, mash the prawn into paste like. Never cut it!! You can also bang the paste from time to time to make it glue together more. Add seasonings like salt, white pepper and sesame oil. Then keep in fridge for at least 30 min.

5. Boil water in the steamer.

6. Take out prawn paste and diced prawns from fridge. Mix together with 1 egg white. Divide into 10 portions and spoon into each chinese mushrooms. Steam them for approx 20-30 min.

7. Sliced the abalone and re-heat them together with the abalone sauce in another saucepan.

8. Once the steamed mushrooms are ready, drain water from the dish, then spoon sliced abalones on top and top with abalone sauce and serve.

Enjoy!!

Taro Cake

Ingredients:
Taro x 250g
Fish Paste x 150g **
Chinese Sausage x 2pc **
Dried Shrimp x 2 tbsp
Spring onion - diced
Cornflour solution
seasonings

** For Vegetarian, skip fish paste, and replace chinese sausage with Omni Pork or skip altogether.

How to Make:
1. Wash the dried shrimps then soak them in water until soft, then diced them into s all pieces.

2. Steam the Chinese Sausages and diced them into small pieces.

3. Steam the Taro for approx 30 min until they are soft, then mash it with either the back of a chinese knife or with a potato masher.

4. Mix the mashed taro with the fish paste, diced chinese sausages, dried shrimps and the spring onion, add seasonings like salt, sugar, sesame oil, then the cornflour solution.

5. Divide them into round patties, then pan fried in a wok until golden brown in both sides.

Serve with Worchester sauce and enjoy with a bowl of steam rice!!

Omelette with preserved vegetables 菜莆蛋

Ingredients:
Eggs x 6 - roughly mixed with a fork 
Preserved Vegetables 菜莆 x 1 cup 
Spring onion x 1/2 cup diced
Light Soy Sauce & Sesame Oil

How to Make:

1. Clean 菜莆 under tap water and squeeze them a bit to release the saltiness.

2. Soak the 菜莆 in a bowl of water for another 30 min, then drain and wipe dry.

3. Diced the 菜莆. Add some light soy sauce and sesame oil to the eggs mixture.

4. Pan fried the diced spring onions in a wok with little oil. Once fragrant, add the diced 菜莆 and stir fried until fragrant.

5. Remove from pan and keep aside until cool down.

6. Add the cooled down 菜莆 and spring onion to the eggs mixture.

7. Heat up a flat pan and add some oil. Once hot, pour the egg mixture to the frying pan, gently stirring to keep raw egg mixture touching the base of the pan. Let it cook itself a bit until the egg mixture moves when you shake the pan. Then slide it down to a big round plate. Use another round plate to cover it, then turn upside down and slide the omelette to the pan again - so that both sides are cooked.

8 Sprinkle with more diced spring onion on top before serving.

Enjoy!!  

Fresh Tomato Essence

* original recipe from Raymond Blanc.

* serves 4 - makes 700-800ml tomato essence

Planning Ahead:
This tomato essence is best prepared a day in advance of cooking day.

Ingredients:
2-3kg cherry tomatoes, washed and cut into halves
1/2 celery stick, washed and finely chopped
1/2 fennel bulb, washed and finely chopped
1 shallot, peeled and finely chopped
1 garlic clove, peeled and finely chopped
a handful of thymes springs, leaves stripped and chopped
5g/ a box of basil leaves, chopped
10g sea salt
10g caster sugar (optional if tomatoes sweet enough)


How to make:
1. Combine ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.

2. Blitz the mixture in food processor for a few times. Blitz each batch using the pulse button for 2-5 seconds only.

3. Return to a big bowl, cover and leave to macerate at room temperature for 3 hrs.

4. Pour the above to a cloth bag (eg. muslin bag) over a big bowl and hung/suspend the bag above the bowl, which will collect the golden liquid as it drips through. It is best to hung overnight to collect these golden drops. Otherwise, it will need 2-3 hrs.

5. After you collect the golden liquid, if it is not "golden" enough OR if you are greedy like me and don't want to waste any tomatoes inside the bag which might still contain some juice and would like to squeeze them all out via the bag, you can pour the liquid in glass container and chill in refrigerator overnight.

6. Next day, the "red" stuff will sink to the bottom of your glass container, and you can just pour out the "golden" liquid - which is the TOMATO ESSENCE and which is this essence which makes your dishes SPECIAL and FRESH like  no one else!

Enjoy~