Sweet Cuisine

Pastry Chefs, More Endangered in NZ than the Kiwi

When I arrived in Auckland for the very first time I knew nothing about the market here, nothing about the restaurants apart from the French Cafe which I studied due to gaining employment there. To be perfectly honest I never thought about coming to New Zealand to work, Although now it would be a fight to get me to leave. 

 Now after being here for nearly 5 years you come to realise a few things, one of the things very apparent for me is the lack of Pastry Chefs. Where are they all? The hotels have some, some restaurants do, Simon Wright does at the French Cafe and its me at Kermadec and a couple others scattered around. But not many others. Its more apparent when I choose to look for a job. ( not that I am looking). They are very few and far between, compared to the UK where I was in the lucky position to pick and choose my employment. 

I miss having lots of other Pastry chefs in the cities, as it would raise the standard of desserts, etc around town. The bakeries have become mass produced. We are lucky to have a bakery in Kermadec with an awesome Baker, Tetsuya Namekawa who will no doubt become the best baker in the country when he has his own place. The smell when I come to work in the morning is amazing, fresh baguette, pastries all done properly. No mass producing. seriously you must try his bread. 

Obviously cost does restrict some restaurants, and people like Michael Meredith and Sid Sarawhat make great desserts without the need of a trained Pastry Chef. I just hope in the future that more and more places take notice of that section that gets forgotten. Ive seen so many larder/pastry sections in kitchens. It can be a difficult thing to sway between savoury and pastry when on service, and hit a good standard. Every great restaurant in Europe has a pastry chef, and for me that says it all. 

Maybe also the sales of desserts is a factor? Is it worth the cost of a pastry chef compared to the sales? I think so, if managed well. Although I have known many pastry chefs that spend it up to have the best of this, that and the next thing. And many chefs who bitch and moan about how much the Pastry Chef costs them. I will admit to having all the toys a pastry chef could wish for in th kermadec kitchen, but what I have done is set up a station that will outlast me by a long way. 

Its my ambition in the near future just maybe just after I win lotto to open a Dessert restaurant, not like the death by chocolate which did die, I want to open something a little more upmarket on the food front. Possibly running a classic menu and a modern menu side by side to entertain and keep most guests happy, great wine, fantastic coffee, pastry classes. That is also the driving force of my trip to spain, as well as a hunt for knowledge in the kitchens there are some dessert restaurants there which Im going to sit in and study they're operation. 

Folic Acid Introduction to Bread

I found it incredible when I heard a few weeks ago about the planned introduction of a synthetic version of folic acid into bread. Obviously the government want to reduce the amount of brain damaged babies born and I sympathise with any parent who has gone through this but with studies that show Folic Acid may cause Colon Cancer, is it not treating one ailment to feed another? Maybe this is not 100% proven yet, but do we want to find out in 5 or 10 years that it is true? 
I dont understand how this can be enforced? Like everywhere else New Zealand is a place where you can choose what you want, live your life how you want, but to be forcefully medicated, on a nationwide scale? As I understand now they have deferred this ruling, so maybe we have more time to force them away from doing this. I believe we should have a choice and breads with the fortification of folic acid should be labelled clearly. 

In saying this , maybe supermarket bread sales suffer, the artisan bakery and organic breads and producers of small quantities of bread seem to be exempt from the standard that would be set by government, but will the price difference push people on a budget to buying the cheaper supermarket bread? Maybe we will get a return to more baking at home? 
what do you think? 

Kumquats

I recently recieved my first batch of Kumquats in New Zealand, It seems so hard to find these little gems here. The range of fruits and vegetables is not quite as large as I was used to when living in the UK. But what we do get is usually of premium quality,

They are quite expensive here, and only available for a short time, so my plan is to get as many kumquats as I can and make marmalade with them so I can use them for the next menu run with a chocolate dish that we are in the middle of working on. More to come on that.

So we split the kumquats in half, removed the stones added some sugar, vanilla and a little water, julienne zest of lemons and orange and pink grapefruit and made a awesome marmalade.

Although I have earmarked this for a chocolate dish the kumquat marmalade will be amazing with a smelly cheese like stinking bishop, Munster or Liverot cheese, even St vernier and the Kaipara Washed rind from Puhoi.

Labels: Kumquats, Marmalade, Vanilla

Blog to Blog for new foodie website

So ive been asked to blog for a new foodie website which you can check out here, also on the site are a couple of other kiwi chefs telling about there day to day musings

Chocolate Tart

Here is something a little more simple as I have a brasserie restaurant in the Kermdadec complex. The recipe has been posted on the recipes page. 

Sometimes I get a little bit over working on elaborate dishes, I just want to make a nice tart or something classic, simplify a little, here I made a chocolate tart, using Tarakan 75% chocovic chocolate served with Yuzu curd , rosewater and pink grapefruit jelly and vanilla Ice Cream, simple, but tasty as. 

enjoy

Labels: Chocolate Tart, Chocovic, Tarakan

Crazy week!!

Well its been a crazy week with no chance of creativity to shine through, some F@#ker broke into my house which sort of screwed up the week. Who ever it is , your an Ar#ehole!!! and apart from that due to it being winter Ive given my guys in the kitchen as much time off as possible so Im covering a few extra shifts, anyway that was last week , new week ahead, should have some cool things for you to see this week, thanks for the patience:) 

Changes are afoot

Couple of changes to the blog this week, the blog address is now

www.sweetcuisine.net although you will be redirected automatically if you log into my old address at blogspot.com. and will start offering consultancy for pastry in many mediums, check the link at the top of the blog.

Labels: consultancy, pastry, sweetcuisine

Caviar Tins

Here are the Caviar tins that I received, now, I know they have been used to death and to be honest I find the Alginate caviar balls made using the sphereification technique inside the tin a bit boring now so I've decided to use them for a pre dessert or part of the dessert degustation, today I just tried out an apple and calvados crème set with Iota so the tins don't need to be baked, topped with a crumble mix, small apple jelly and a small quennelle of Calvados Ice Cream. Tasted great but I intend on doing something more elaborate, so thats something i need to think about.

The weather here is really turning quite wintery so will start doing some specials next week to warm the guests up. Next week should be a good productive week.

Pinenut Horchata

Well I got a few sample of new service vessels to go with my dessert menu or on the tasting menu, got some normal looking caviar tins, some retro little jars and as seen in the pictures I got some little metal bottles. 

They come from a company called Arthur Holmes in Wellington NZ, So I tried out an old recipe I had for Pinenut Horchata which works fantastic, Very refreshing and tasty. and I think will go great on the metal bottles. I like to get the customer a bit interactive evenif its just to take a lid of something a put a straw in.

Horchata is made by soaking pinenuts over night(traditionally I believe it should be Chufa nuts but so far my searching in NZ is unsuccessful), The pinenuts are then Washed and blended to a paste, then you add sugar vanilla and water and a cinnamon stick, marinade overnight.

The next day I pass it through a fat filter or cheesecloth to leave a beautiful milky coloured Pinenut drink with a slight vanilla and cinnamon flavor. 

Yet to decide if it will feature on my next menu, possible at the end of the meal with petit fours.

Hope you like the pictures.

tomorrow I will show you what I did with the retro glass jars with lids. 

Labels: horchata

Cookbooks :No2- Quique Dacosta

Quique DaCosta published through Montagud Editories is one of these books that blows you away from the first sight, The Cover is shiney Silver with the man himselfs name blazed across the front of the book. The Book comes in English/French in one book, and is divided into 5 stages of the development of El Poblet. 

Section one is called Universe 1-Quique pays homage to his past and the base of his cooking, Universe 2- The focus is on the location of El Poblet in Denia with amazing seafood, Prawns, Tuna, Cuttlefish. Universe 3 moves on to the Research and development of El Poblet and the Cuisine. The team at El Poblet is well known for there research in cuisine, using Aloe vera to form jellies, Foams and as a thickener as well as its great anti oxidant and healing powers, and using Stevia Rebaudiana as a sweetener as it is naturally sweet and completely natural with none of the bad effects of normal white sugar. So you can see the healthy aspects of eating in this kind of gastronomic paradise.

The next section is called the 5 hits of El poblet Cuisine. They have taken the '3 universes' and developed dishes with 'taste, precision, essentiality, provocation and radicalism'. So in my own words this part of the book is 5 dishes which mark the individuality and perfection of a restaurant such as El Poblet.

Then the last section is dedicated to the History of El Poblet in dishes that have been created  at el Poblet that show why Quique Dacosta is such an important figure in the new wave of modern cooking not only in Spain but worldwide. 

The Photography in the book is amazing, very clean and of the highest quality, the book more narrative and like a photo album with the recipes being online, when you buy the book you recieve a password to log on to the QuiqueDacosta website. 

The Website is a different part to the book, with videos, Recipes, more picture and information on the Author and Publisher. 

For me I wish there was more dishes in the desserts, but in saying that the inspiration you can get from the savoury part of the book is immense, and with new techniques for most people to learn this book is up there with the best I have.

I will have the opportunity to work in the kitchens of El Poblet in October for a week and will be sure to share the experiences with you.

Labels: El Poblet, Montagud editories, Quique DaCosta

Spring menu planning: Rooibos Tea, Mango, Yoghurt, Coriander and Pinenut

It's time to look ahead to the spring menu as we have settled into the winter one so we have been testing the first of the ideas for the menu, we use similar techniques constantly but I try not to repeat dishes to much to keep things fresh and keep developing.

So we have come up with the initial dish of Rooibos tea custard set with Iota, wrapped in a mango Lime and Vanilla jelly, dehydrated 30 second yoghurt cake, goats milk Ice cream, and coriander.

So we set the Custard in Cannoli tubes with the help of acetate,

 then made a thin jelly coating with Mango juice, Lime, vanilla, gellan and agar. This forms the start of the dish. 

The jelly is made and wrapped around the custard similar to cannelloni. I then had some yoghurt cake made with albert adrias technique in the microwave then dehydrated to form a light aerated yoghurt biscuit, we then made a relish with Mango, lime and Pinenut, and micro coriander leaves finishes the first draft of the dish.

The Roobios Tea comes from south Africa, It has great anti oxidant powers and has a low tanin level, apparently very good for digestion and is said to ease peoples stress levels making it a perfect way to end a meal.

Labels: cannelloni tea, coriander, mango, rooibos

Links

Ive just created new links to my recipes photos contact and other stuff just to the left of the screen, check it out but be patient with me while i update them as the blog progresses