As part of my recent Raspberry Panna Cotta recipe I finally took a good photo of my food only took like ~7 years. Finally getting better at food presentation as well.
Adam Finally Takes a Good Picture of Food
Month: December 2022
Raspberry Coconut Panna Cotta
I have recently had a big pull toward heterogeneous foods where instead of having a homogeneous blob of taste, each bite is unique and food blends together in your mouth. No recipes exemplify this more than my Tri-Layer Raspberry Panna Cotta.
A fantastic recipe that just pops in your mouth but requires a bit of prep. The initial layer is a mix of raspberry puree mixed with coconut cream. This is set at an angle allowing for a visually pleasing cross section ( I set them in muffin tins). The second layer is a vanilla and heavy cream layer and then this is finally topped with a sweetened and acidified raspberry puree. Each layer on their own is great but put together this make an amazing blend. This is all topped with the obviously appropriate raspberry and mint garnish.
Raspberry Sauce
I had a chance to breakout my vacuum filtration setup again for a raspberry sauce I plan on using in a separate recipe. Took some time but created a very clean sauce. I taste tested and adjusting the acidity with citric acid and sugar to make a sauce that just pops.
Drink Cactus Juice It’ll Quench You
Taking inspiration from one of the greatest TV shows and a sale at Costco I decided to try my hand a my own cactus juice.
A bit of a difficult task in retrospect, cactus fruit has very tough seeds and creates a very viscous pulp when blended. The process was fairly simple. the cactus pears were peeled and pureed. I then sent these through my vacuum filter to remove all of the pulp and to thin the liquid. This then allowed for a nice sipping juice that is great on ice.
Homemade Sicilian Cannoli
Though unfortunately I don’t live in Sicily that won’t stop me from make traditional cannoli.
A bit of a laboured dish it provided a fun weekend challenge. The dough was made traditionally with Marsala wine so that it had plenty of bubbles during frying. I also added a bit of cocoa powder to add a different colour to the shells. The filling was made with drained and sweetened ricotta blended both with coconut and chocolate. Lastly the finished cannoli were coated with home toasted coconut shreds.
Lots of work but worth the effort and sat perfectly under our Christmas tree once completed.
Focaccia
A quick and easy classic rosemary focaccia is staple dish. Not much to note other than the fresh rosemary that add a perfect touch. Great on its own straight out of the oven or with some refreshing toppings.
Hazelnut Financier
Known as my “Feel Good Cookies” my hazelnut financier are exceedingly addictive. A combination of hazelnut flour and browned butter make this a supercharged nutty explosion. I coat the baking mould with butter and sugar to give it a “sugar glazed” finish. Overall a 10/10 recipe that always makes you feel good.
Bison Steaks
I found a reasonably priced cut of Bison and decided to give it a try. It was not the best quality and being that it was a round steak it was a bit tough. I decided to sous vide the steak to get the best process window and got pretty acceptable results. I didn’t notice much of a different flavor probably because it was ranch raised and went pretty well with roasted potatoes.
Vacuum Filtration
As a follow up to my recent cactus juice post https://adam-s.ca/drink-cactus-juice-itll-quench-you/ I wanted to share my experience with vacuum filtration and it uses in the kitchen.
I recently purchased a vacuum filtration setup with a Büchner funnel and a vacuum pump for ~50$ in an effort to speed up some of my kitchen filtrations. I didn’t buy any filters and opted to use coffee filters instead as a cheap alternative. Initially this equipment was a success for most fruit juices (apple and peach) but cactus juice posed a significantly large problem. Due to its viscosity and polymer like nature it took a much longer time to filter but still proved effective.