Tiramisu

 

I made this today for Andrew's sister's son, Alex's 18th birthday dinner party. The theme of the party was "Little Italy".  I adapted a recipe from the "Italian Food Safari".  The tiramisu turned out to be nicely creamy but yet light in texture. Everyone at the dinner party, liked it. I am not a fan of rich tiramisu, and I must say even I liked this one. :-). Very happy indeed with it.

Ingredients - Serves 10-12p
3 egg yolks
40g caster sugar
500g mascarpone
50ml Masala
1 tsp whisky
30 savoiardi biscuits
1 large hot coffee
4 tbsp organic cocoa
4 tbsp freshly ground coffee
Zest of 1 orange
50g hazelnut chocolate, grated finely (dark chocolate preferred, but I ran out of it today).

Italian meringue
45ml water
110g caster sugar
125ml egg whites (whites of 4 large eggs)

Place the egg yolks and caster sugar in a mixing bowl, and whisk on high speed until pale to almost white and fluffy. Add the mascarpone and, on a medium speed, whisk until it starts to thicken but smooth. Be sure not to overmix as you may split the mascarpone.

Add the liqueurs and mix until just combined. (You may adjust the quantity of liqueur according to personal taste.)  Place to one side and make the Italian meringue.

Add the water to a clean, grease-free saucepan, then slowly add the sugar, making sure that all the grains get wet. Place over a medium heat and bring to soft ball stage.  ( you can see lots of "bubbles" at this stage)

Making sure that your mixing bowl is completely grease-free, add in your egg whites and whisk on high speed until white and fluffy. As your egg whites reach medium peak, start to slowly add your hot sugar. Do not add sugar any sooner. ( A chef told me this would not overcook the egg whites, the sugar can go up to 120 deg and the egg whites would be fine). Once all the sugar has been added, continue to whisk until the Italian meringue has completely cooled. It would have stiffened such that when you turn the bowl upside down, the meringue would not fall. The meringue would start to look nice and glossy by this stage. Italian meringues are very stable and hold its form for a long time. Note: Use castor sugar otherwise you may get a grainy meringue instead of a smooth one.

Take your Italian meringue, and carefully fold into the mascarpone mix. Feel the mix "airing" as you fold. Taste and adjust the amount of liqueur if necessary.

Take your sponge finger biscuits, and soak in the coffee (add with 20ml of the masala) quickly, one at a time. Give the biscuits a light squeeze to remove any excess coffee. (Do not soak the biscuits all the way through.  There should still be a little portion in the middle that has not been soaked in the coffee so that there is still a little texture to the bite.)

Line the bottom of a serving dish packed with the biscuits. (I used a large pyrex round bowl, as I wanted the lid to cover for "transporting" the tiramisu). Sprinkle the top of the biscuits with cocoa evenly.

Using a large spatula, spoon in 1/2 of the mascarpone mix and level. Sprinkle with the ground coffee evenly.

Add another layer of coffee-soaked sponge finger biscuits.  Sprinkle again cocoa. Spoon in remaining mascarpone mix and level.

Cover the bowl tightly with cling film. Place in the fridge, and allow the tiramisu to become firm enough to cut, minimum 4 hours. ( I was told it is even better if left overnight to allow the flavours to develop)

Just before serving, sprinkle evenly with orange zest, then grated hazelnut chocolate and finally, the freshly ground coffee.

Note: In future, I will add lemon zest to the mascaporne/meringue filling. And try using sambuca/strega instead of masala.

Tip: For achieving light meringue and mascaporne mix, use stainless steel mixing bowls. Or glass, but not plastic. The steel bowls helps the "airation" process.
Bon Appetite!

Gary Mehigan's Veal Osso Bucco with Canelloni Beans

Ossobuco or osso buco is Italian for "bone with a hole" (osso bone, buco hole), a reference to the marrow hole at the center of the cross-cut veal shank.
Originally, Ossobuco is a Milanese specialty of cross-cut veal shanks braised with vegetables, white wine and broth. It is often garnished with gremolata and traditionally served with risotto alla milanese.

This dish's primary ingredient, veal shank, is common, relatively cheap and flavorful. Although tough, braising makes it tender. The cut traditionally used for this dish comes from the top of the thigh which has a higher proportion of meat to bone.^[4] The shank is then cross-cut into sections about 3 cm thick.

The version below was cooked by Gary during Masterclass on Masterchef, I liked how it looked and tasted.

1.5kg bobby veal shin, cut 2.5cm thick (about 12 pieces)
1 cup plain flour
100ml olive oil
2 stalks celery, diced
1 medium onion, diced
1 carrot, peeled and diced
¼ bunch parsley stalks, leaves picked and roughly chopped, stalks reserved
4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
250ml white wine
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 bay leaf
6 sprigs thyme
Zest of 1 lemon
400g tin crushed tomato
2 cups veal stock
100g dried cannellini beans, soaked overnight

To finish
Freshly cracked white pepper and sea salt
½ bunch parsley leaves, roughly chopped
Zest of 1 lemon
1 loaf crusty bread, thickly sliced

Preheat oven to 180⁰C.

Season meat with salt and white pepper and toss in flout to coat, shaking off excess. Heat oil in a frying pan, add meat and panfry until caramelized. Add celery, onion, carrot, reserved parsley stalks, garlic and cook10 minutes.

Add tomato paste and cook for 1-2 minutes and deglaze with wine.

Add remaining ingredients. Cover with a lid and cook for 1 ½-2 hours.

Remove lid, cook for 45 minutes until sauce has thickened.

Remove from oven, sprinkle with cracked pepper, sea salt, chopped parsley and lemon zest.

Serve with crusty bread.

Bon Appetite!

Spiral pasta with Cherry and Sundried tomatoes, Mushrooms, Anchovies, Parsley, and Garlic

Bon Appetite!

Poached hainanese chicken with wine, served with chicken mushroom risotto

This technique creates super tender and moist chicken, even the breast is moist.

I make use of the stock from poaching the chicken to produce all the sides that complements this meal:-

- chicken mushroom risotto

- prawan chawan mushi (see recipe under "Label - Japanese").

Can be served with Asian salad of lebanese cucumber and mini roma tomatoes.

Ingredients for poaching the chicken

1 whole chicken

1 large onion - cut into small bits.

1 whole bulb of garlic  - which usually have about 12 cloves of garlic. Smashed the garlic.

300ml (cc) cups of chinese cooking wine

2 tablespoon of palm sugar OR 1 tablespoon of normal sugar

4 tablespoon of light soy sauce 

1 pot big enough to put the whole chicken in

About 2 litres of water (or enough just to cover slightly more than 1/2 of chicken).

Ingredients for making the risotto - 4 people

2 cups of arborio rice

3 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 big French shallot or a few small ones (the small red onions) - sliced finely, or chopped

2 large portobello mushrooms - cut into small 1cm cubes

30g butter

chicken stock made from poaching the chicken above (the usual amount that you would put for steaming rice)

chicken fat cut off the chicken

1/2 cup of chopped parsley

Ingredients for Salad

2 lebanese cucumber - each cut into half lenghtwise, then sliced up.

12 mini roma tomatoes - cut into 4 quarters

1 cup of fresh parsley chopped

Salad Dressing

1 tbsp sesame oil

1 tbsp Braggs soy protein (or light soy)

2 tbsp caramelised balsamic vinegar

Juice of 1/2 a lime

1 big tbsp palm sugar

Poaching Chicken

After washing the chicken, cut off the big lumps of fat near the chicken bottom and the neck. Keep the fat for making the rice.

Stuff 1/2 the garlic into the chicken stomach.

Pour cold water into the pot.

Put all the ingredients into the pot of water.

Put chicken into the cold water.

Turn on heat - slow simmer heat for 30 minutes. Do not put on high heat or boil. This way chicken will be very tender and soft. If on high heat, chicken become tough and dry.

After 30 minutes, turn the chicken upside down, and cook another 30 minutes. (As the chicken is only half in the water, we turn it at half time so that both sides get cooked in the water). Only half water is used, so that stock would have good chicken flavour and not too dilluted.

After cooking total of 1 hour, immediately take the chicken out of the stock, put into a big bowl ( I used a steel mixing bowl), cover with clingwrap, and put into fridge freezer! Leave in freezer for 45 minutes. This is to remove heat from the chicken and stop the cooking process.  

After that, carve chicken and serve with some stock, garnish with coriander leaves.

Chicken Risotto

Sautee the chicken fat in a little bit of oil - to release the chicken flavour into the oil. When chicken fat turns golden, remove from pan.

Slightly fry garlic and shallots in the chicken fat oil.

Add mushrooms.

Add butter.

Add rice.

Fry for about 5 minutes to fragrant the rice.

Add about 2 cups of chicken stock into rice, or enough to just cover rice with stock. Stir. Cover for about 5 minutes on low heat, or until stock is mostly absorped into rice. Stir. Add stock to cover rice again. Cover for 5 minutes. Repeat process another time. (ie about 20 minutes process in total).  

Leave rice cover with lid for another 10 minutes. Stir in parsley, and serve.

For time management, I would prepare the chawan mushi while cooking the risotto. Chawan mushi is ready to be steamed when I start serving the guests with the rice and chicken and salad. Guest get chawan mushi piping hot halfway through their meal.

Bon Appetite!