Next: Tapas

Last night was my 11th trip to Next.  I say this alot, but I was genuinely excited when this menu was announced last winter.  Tapas, not much more evocative of a place, Spain, that I fell in love with the one and only time I visited in 2001, even before I was really into food.  The more I've studied and learned about food, I've been pining to go back to Spain and just eat and eat and eat and eat.

To get ready for this menu, Grant Achatz and Dave Beran went to Spain for two weeks and ate and ate and ate their way through the country, spending a fair amount of time in San Sebastian.  San Sebastian is small town on the northern coast of the country and is known for having the highest three michilin starred restaurants per capita of any city in the world.  Now, Achatz and Beran have a lot more access than I do and scored audiences with Juan Marie Arzak, chef/owner of Arzak and Andoni Luis Aduriz of Mugaritz and Alberto Adria of Tickets (younger brother of Feran Adria of El Bulli fame).

Ok, enough of me geeking out on people I'm never going to meet in restaurants I'm likely to never eat in, on to the food.

When we got to the table, our first three courses were waiting for us along with a little post card with four photos from Achatz's and Beran's trip to Spain.  Theses are Cocas, essentially little pastries topped with three different flavor combinations.  They are from front to back, anchovies and olives, mushrooms and onions and tomato, purple cauliflower and goat cheese.  All three were delicious and fun way to start off the meal.

This was the only wine bottle I got a picture of last night this is a Spanish sparkling wine known as Ameztoi Getariako Txakolina.  They put a special stopper in the neck which allowed you to pour and aerate the wine at the same time.  The wait staff tried to turn it into a competition to see who at the table could pour from the highest level.

The next dish had several components with it.  The first picture is the octopus and eggplant dish that was served with shaved fennel and foam.  The second and fourth photos are the mussel portion of the dish.  So this presentation harkens to a chef who I've seen our Anthony Bourdain's show who decided that he would go out and get the best seafood from whereever in the world, can it and then age it in the can for months or even years.  Next put mussels, and a butter or oil sauce inside.  The third photo is the bread which was used to sop everything up.  I loved the interactivity of this course even though some of the flavors were a bit off for me.  Our mussels were a bit gritty which is always off putting.  This course was served with a tequila, ginger beer and citrus cocktail.

The next two bites were Next's take on calcots, a relatively new tradition in Spain where green onions grown out of whole onions are grill roasted and dipped in romesco sauce a somewhat spicy red pepper sauce.  The first picture Next did a wonderful thing and added pork to the equation.  This is perfectly roasted pork belly with charred romesco sauce that is lit on fire by the waiter.  The second photo is the charred onion, in this case leeks.  This was served with a bright flavorful white wine known as Lar Cartuja Priorat.

The next three bites included a very very very famous dish invented in Spain, more on that later.  The first picture is the fried egg yolk which was topped with an anchovy.  The second dish is the fried cod I believe (I only say that because all the info I have indicates brandade which is made of cod) and dipped into brandad cream.  The final dish, while the menu credits Albert Adria, it was actually invented by his brother Ferran.  Spherical Olives.  This is olive juice suspended in its own skin.  You definitely take that down all in one bite. This course was also served with a white wine from Lagar de Cervera Albarino Rias.  Another very fruit forward wine that went well with the food.

This was the palate cleanser of the night.  The first picture is a classic Next/Alinea playful presentation of grapefruit and pine nuts.  There is grapefruit gel and juice and I think pine nut puree or foam on top.  You push on the bottom and suck on the top to break the vacuum and you get a very flavorful shot.  The bottom is dates with sherry and chocolate.  Personally, I wasn't a fan of that dish.  It was chewy and not much flavor.  This was served with a Spanish red vermouth which really hit the spot at this point in the meal.   

What might have been the star of the evening was the iberico ham in the top picture.  This is ham that is harvested from a specific breed of pig that is only fed wild hazelnuts from certain hillsides in Spain.  This is such a different flavor from the prosciutto we all know and love.  The ham was served with an asparagus and squid dish as well as roasted potatoes.  All of it absolutely delicious. For drinks with this dish we had a white wine from Fuitan Godellow Valdeorras.

No meal is complete without red meat.  This a a ribeye that was roasted on the bone and then cut off and sliced thin.  This went with a tortilla that is in a smoking hot cast iron skillet.  The wait staff allowed you to cook it for as long or as little as you wanted once it hit the table.  The longer it sits the more in cooks.  The beef, was amazing.  Egg custards for me are a bit tough and while I didn't quite finish everything I came pretty close.  We had our first real red wine of the night with this one and this was a huge hit 2008 vintage La Rioja Alta Vina Alberdi REserva Rioja.

The first sweet course of the evening.  The top dish was an interesting use of some of the best shrimp in the world.  The head cavity was taken and filled with a strawberry and fava bean ice cream while the meat was poached and served cold.  The head portion was a bit weird to me, not sure I want to be picking up a shrimp head and then be hit with very sweet flavors.  The wait staff brought out an olive branch that had been studed with an olive oil candy.  Our final alcoholic cocktail of the night was a glass of Ameztoi Rubentis Getariako Txakolina.

The final course was a New York style cheesecake that was served with a plate full of chocolate sauce topped with blueberries and gooseberries and we got a sweet bread to mop sauce up with.

Overall, I'm still not sure what to think of this menu.  Naturally, I was excited but I can't help but there there was something missing slightly from the experience.

Til next time Next, see you right before Thanksgiving. 

French Laundry at Home: Cauliflower Panna Cotta with Caviar

When I first opened the French Laundry cookbook and started flipping through the pages, the canape section was up first.  The first few recipes which I've already completed, totally in my wheelhouse and relatively easy to complete.  Then I got to this one and it sort of came out of left field.  A cauliflower custard served under a thin layer of oyster gel and caviar.  That can't possibly be good, can it?  Coming from my kitchen it turns out that in small doses it probably can be with time to improve the technique. 

So let's dive into this one.

My experience with oysters has been brief and not exactly pleasant.  It's a texture thing.  However, there is a store I recently discovered based in Champaign that is opening a second location in Normal, that has access to about 2-3 dozen different kinds of oysters three days a week.  So I ordered up a dozen of these bad boys for this dish.  I used three for the gel, and actually ate four of them.  Like I said still getting used to them, but I'm hoping with better access to them I will think of ordering a dozen every now and again and trying to learn to like them.  So I shucked them and combined them with some water and let them sit overnight to macerate and flavor the water that would become the gel.

While the oysters were sitting I worked on the cauliflower soup.  Naturally, a head of cauliflower and water.  This is the part of the dish I was actually sort  of looking forward to, because unlike a lot of people I actually like cauliflower.

The cauliflower along with the water cooked with some butter which wasn't pictured cooked for about ten minutes until the cauliflower was tender.

Once tender I added cream and cooked for an additional 10 minutes.

Once tender I put everything into the food processor and blended until smooth and then strained it. 

The oysters had macerated and it was time to make the gel.  This is actually where I had a bit of a goof up.  In following the recipe directions it should take a couple hours for the gel to thicken and be poured onto the cauliflower soup and to be spread evenly.  Well I checked it after about 30 minutes and it was stiffer than jello, oops.  So the presentation here was interesting to say the least.  I also mixed some fresh cracked pepper into the mixture before putting it in the fridge.

The whole thing was topped with a quenele of osetra caviar.  The recipe called for beluga, but beluga sturgeon are endangered and they limit the entire catch in the Caspian to like maybe a dozen fish per year, and the caviar I saw online for like $500/ounce.  Needless to say, A I couldn't find it in stock anywhere and even if I did no chance I was buying it.

Anyway, overall definitely not my favorite dish I've ever made and I probably won't be making it again anytime soon.

Ad hoc at Home: Roasted Chicken on a bed of Root Vegetables

So, when I do these Ad Hoc posts I know it's definitely not fancy food and that's sort of the point of this secondary Thomas Keller restaurant.  It's a small place where they do family style meals and the recipes reflect that.

This particular recipe would be ideal at a fall festival or family gathering with a bonfire in the crisp October evening, especially since that's the perfect time to get some of the root vegetables that are used, even though they are available year round now.

So the bed of root vegetables included leeks, turnips, rutabaga, red potatoes, carrots, garlic, onion and thyme.  I cut the veggies into their constituent parts and tossed everything with olive oil salt and pepper.

Obviously, given the title of this post there would be chicken involved.  This is a whole chicken that I stuffed with some garlic and thyme and then coated it with oil, salt and pepper.

Once seasoned everything went into a roasting pan and then into a 475 degree oven for a half hour then I turned the oven down to 400 degrees for another hour.

And when it was done it looked like this. From there I let it rest for about 20 minutes before carving.

The final plate.  The chicken was delicious, the veggies, not so much, they did not cook all the way through.  This will be one I probably make again, but maybe in the fall.