Charcuterie Sundays: Terrines

Showing posts with label Terrines. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Smoked Jowl Rielette

I've made some rielette's before, but this one is by far my favorite. Generally i make them with pork or rabbit, sometimes pheasant but never jowl before. I used some nice tamworth jowls, a bit of pork belly and the meatier Kurobuta jowls that i am in love with. I lightly cured the jowls and smoked the Kurobuta's which were then all cooked gently in duck fat and shredded, then pressed. The thing about a good rielette is that the temp and cooking times are very crucial to a good consistency. Its very easy to end up with dry meat and one can do there best to emulsify enough fat to make up for the dryness, but a good palette can always distinguish the difference.

Easy solution....Jowls.

Even a newbie could pull this one off and have it taste good and you'd have to do something seriously wrong to have this come out dry. I love the way the marbling of the kurobuta jowls show up throughout this terrine, and i already have plans for a 2.0 version of this where i'd like to press whole jowls throughout to show the amazing marbling. I tend not to really like aggressive smoke in most things, i find it covers up the flavor of the meat too much, so i only smoked a third of the jowls for an hour or so and folded them in. I tried to fork the rielette, but jowls just dont shred as well as cubed pork, so i just used a whisk and left some chunky goodness here and there.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Foie Gras and Monkfish Liver Terrine

Two weeks and one post of our 'hours of operation'....lame... i know.

Anyways, This week a fun week. We got a few fishy things in to play around with from True World fish, a supplier of special japanese products. The first was whole sacs of fresh pollock fish roe. None of us in the kitchen are too familiar with what to do with them other then deep fry the suckers but were working on it and perhaps it will make an appearence in some form on the menu in the future. The other fun thing we got in was Monkfish livers. We made a terrine of foie gras mi-cuit with steamed monkfish liver set in the middle. The liver is very fishy, but in a good way. Once steamed, the consistency of the liver is almost identical to foie gras, which makes for a perfect match for this terrine. We havn't decided on what will actually go with this dish, but were toying with the idea of pairing it with a pickled ramp jam and a reduction of black vinegar.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Lamb Headcheese complete

This turned out really well. We took the lamb stock cut it with gelatinous pork stock and reduced it. We mixed the lamby goodness with fresh mint and pressed it with the braised tongues set in the middle. Unfortunately, you would need 20 lambs heads to make a decent batch.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Lamb Head Cheese

We decided to make head cheese with the lamb heads. We've never made it with lamb before and after cooking the heads we realized we should have bought a dozen of them to get a decent quantity of meat worth making. But then again, this is all experimental so if its crap it will have only cost us 10 bucks.

We brined the heads and tongues and purged the brains.

We know brains have a short life span but we want to try them out in the cheese and will use them up within a day.

We cooked the brains shortly, then breaded and fried them for some flavor.

unfortunately we ran out of time tonight to pick the heads and press em, but hopefully tomorrow we will have it complete and ready to serve friday. We plan to use pork stock as the gelatinous binder but will add some of the lamb bouillon for flavor.

Other then salt, pepper and some fresh mint we plan to keep it quite simple.

Ideally, we would like to try to set a whole lambs tongue in the middle for esthetics. We shall see!

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Rabbit Terrine

Old school charcuterie is fun but very meticulous.

There seems like theres a hundred steps to each recipe and if you skip one your likely screwed.

i have several books that when you open them, they smell like grandma's linen closet. They usually contain two or three french chefs on the cover with very tall chef hats, thick rimmed glasses (also from grandma's closet) and decorated with what looks to be war medals, or perhaps just culinary achievements. These books are so intense and intimidating it would scare off most cooks. It took me months before even attempting a recipe. Finally, last week i picked one and went for it.

First off, i must warn people that for some odd reason, the recipes in these books dont really have proper seasonings. Theres no salt called for in there recipe's, and very little other spice mixtures. I just dont get it. There terrines look like Picasso paintings yet they taste like crap. I know this because the first time i attempted one, i followed the recipe exactly and even though the whole time in the back of my head i was thinking it was going to taste bland i thought somehow these french dudes who seriously know charcuterie knew something i didn't. Well the end product looked great but had no flavour.

So now, not only am i forced to go through a labour intensive recipe again, but now i must attempt my own seasoning ratios which could go either too little or too much. Frustrating, but like curing meats, its trial and error. Eventually i will get it and own it.

So here we go.

First step, take frozen back fat and slice thinly on a slicer and lay evenly on parchment paper. This step is to create barding fat. Extremely annoying to get nice sheets, yet the guys in the books have pieces that look like big sheets of homemade pasta. How? i have no clue. Freeze the sheets of fat.

Take two whole rabbits and debone all the meat, keeping the loins intact and seperate.

You should end up with 1.5 kg rabbit meat and four loins. Small dice the rabbit meat and set aside. keep the livers and discard the kidneys.

Now you need 2.5 kg pork jowl and belly, soft fat were going for here. Back fat wont work. If you must use back fat, blanch it for a minute to soften it. your going for about 1/3 jowl and 2/3 belly. Small dice this as well. Marinate overnight the meats combined with white wine and aromatic veg.

Take the trumpet mushrooms, clean them, and saute them off, reserving any left over cooking juices.

Make a stock out of the rabbit bones, brown them, deglaze with white wine, top up with pork stock, add reserved mushroom juice, and reduce to 1/3. strain and reserve.

Next take your chicken or duck livers and brown quickly in a cast iron on both sides keeping them rare in the middle. deglaze with Madeira and chill. This is called your "Gratin"

The next day grind the marinated meat through a fine die, add all your seasoning and set aside.

Chill your food processor before you need it.

Blend up all the livers (chicken cooked, rabbit raw) and then add your ground meat. Puree as fine or rough as you like but dont over heat your farce. I dont go completely smooth because im using a suzy homemaker food processor and i have to do everything in batches. add some reduced stock and eggs when your close to the consistency you want and incorporate.

Now take out the farce, and fold in the mushrooms. Set this all aside.

Take out the barding fat sheets and put a layer of farce on them. Then your going to place the loins skinny ends together in the middle and roll the fat and farce over to form a cylinder. What were going for here is a roulade of loin, followed by a layer of farce, with the whole thing wrapped in a thin layer of fat.

Were almost done now and i'm getting exhausted just trying to write this.

Roll this up in seran wrap and freeze.

Once frozen or atleast crispy, take your terrine molds and fill 1/3 way up with farce. drop your roulade(which should be the length of your terrine) into the mold and then cover up with remaining farce. Cover the whole terrine with caul fat and chill.

I'm not even talking here but i feel like im out of breath just writing this recipe.

Now the cooking process. You need to cook these in a water bath lid off.

Start at 400 degrees till you brown the tops nicely. About 20 minutes.

Then turn down to 200-250 degrees and cook till the center reads 165.

Take it out, let it rest a while, then pour out any excess fat.

Take any remaining rabbit stock and pour over terrine and allow it to suck up all those juices.

Press overnight weighted.

Next slice, serve on your charcuterie plate at the black hoof , run out two days later, then do it all over again. Greeeat...

Rabbit Terrine with Black Trumpet Mushrooms

2 rabbit's with liver (1.5 kg of meat)

2.5 kg Pork belly and Jowl

3 eggs

450 g Trumpet mushrooms

500 g chicken/duck livers

aromatic veg

pork stock

dry white wine

Seasonings

18g cure #1

2 g dextrose

10 g white pepper, ground

25g kosher salt

8 g pate spice

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Mastering French charcuterie ...or atleast trying to...

French terrines can be quite intimidating and difficult. It would be easier if i grew up in France i often think to myself. No one ever really taught me charcuterie. A few basics i learned from my old chef but for the most part ive learned it on my own. Experimenting with dry curing has been fun and its not really "technical" you just need to understand a few basic necessities and then you begin to understand how things work. Terrines on the other hand can be a little more tempermental. En croutes can be the queen bitch. But, me being the kinda guy that i am (and not wanting to be a one dimensional chef) i've decided to devote some time to understanding how all this works. Here are a few nice looking but fairly straight forward ones ive screwed around with. Foie gras in rabbit, head to tail terrine, and something that once was the filling to a cabbage roll that no one "got" at the restaurant and now has ended up in a terrine, Oxtail and Escargot. I'm happy with all three. But trust me.....this is only the beginning.

Monday, February 2, 2009

Head Cheese

So a lot of people like head cheese or hate head cheese, but lets face it a lot of people dont even know what it really is. Luckily for me there's wikipedia so i wont bother explaining it here. Its very hard to get pig heads, trotters, hocks, tongues, ears, hearts, snouts, and tails from any one supplier and if i could, it would take a week... atleast. Luckily, my restaurant is in the middle of little portugal and there is a small butcher who carries it all. So i've had all these goodies brining for the past few days until i had a chance to do something with it. Slow super bowl sunday was the perfect day. Theres no finesse with head cheese. Its a pretty sim

ple process that anyone can do easily at ho

me so i thought id post a quick how-to. Basically after brining your meats for however many days you wish, it all goes into one pot filled with water and aromatics of your choice ( i went pretty traditional here) and simmers away for hours. a good three hours of simmering and your good to go. Take your meat out, pick it off the bone, peel your tongues, wrestle with the gelatinous trotters, fight the ear cartilage, clean up the heart and mince it up good, season it well, recduce the stock to a 1/3 - 1/4 and pour over the diced up meat and press. Even though i said it was easy and layed it out for you in a few sentences, lets remember, it still is an 8 hour process but you dont have to be a professional cook to make it. I undertstand it isn't for everyone but with a few vinegary gherkins and some strong mustard to accompany it with you wont even be able to tell your eating

boiled pig parts suspended in its own gelatin. YUM!!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Rillette's

A very easy charcuterie item to make and a necessity to any charcuterie plate. Two favorites of mine to make are rabbit and pheasant. The key to a good moist rillette is cooking low and slow.

I use duck fat as its readily available from one of my suppliers. The first step is to salt cure whatever meat you are using for 12 hours. With something as lean as a bird or rabbit i usually add some cubed back fat or pork belly to help keep it moist and bump it up with some cubed pork shoulder. My salt cure is done by eye and if i had to guess its probably 2/3 salt to 1/3 sugar along with any aromatics i think would go well with the meat. For the rabbit, i saute off some apples and pears and flambe them with some good gin. A little toss of sugar to lightly caramelize helps too for a bit of added sweetness. For the pheasant, i add chopped up dried apricots or cranberries and both rillettes receive a bit of fresh tarragon. I generally stick to traditional spice mixtures like nutmeg, cinnamon, mace

and clove. Once cooked very slow and low in duck fat, the meat is strained, and then begins the meticulous process if picking out all those annoying little bones. Once the bones are removed, i use two forks to shred the meat. Once the meat is shred

ded, i add ay dried fruit and begin incorporating the duck fat with a wooded spoon back into the meat a bit at a time. You dont want to beat the fat into it while its piping hot, luke warm is good because you essentially want to emulsify the fat into it similar to making a mayo. Not enough fat and your rillette will be dry, too much and it will be all fat. Adding things like yellow mustard seeds are always fun as they will bloom a bit and become palatable with the finished product. The tarragon or fresh herb of your choice should be thrown in last minute so it doesn't discolour. Line a terrine mold with saran wrap and pack your mixture into your mold. U

se some cardboard cut to fit on top and weight the terrine down and into the fridge to chill. 12 hours later you should have a creamy fatty terrine ready to be sliced and served room temp with a bit of sea salt. One thing i should mention is that it is meant to be served cold or room temp, so when seasoning make sure you over salt while warm. Enjoy!

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Crazy for Pig Ears

This week i've had a serious infatuation with pig ears. With my second batch of testina i decided to throw in the pig ears and cook them over night. We shaved the hair and rinsed out what looked to be ear wax ( and i say "we" because i finally have another cook in the kitchen now). The morning came and the ears were extremely soft and ready to be made into something. The evolution of the pig ear terrine began. it started with just rolling up two pig ears and pressing them. As i finished the first roll, the next idea popped into my head. I sliced some pickled cow's tongue and layered the ears. First layer tongue then an ear, then some more tongue, then another ear and finally some more tongue. I saran wrapped it into a roll and pressed it. Then we were left with one single ear in the pot as the mate to that ear was all broken up. We then decided to wrap the solo ear in prosciutto and last minute through in some cremini mushrooms into the center. With all these terrines we wrapped tight and poked holes to release any air gaps. continuing the process reminding me of the meat cubes we used to do with Activa. Except this time it was the natural gelatin that holds everything together.

The first time i sliced into it there was a beautiful pattern of cartilage and wavy lines of tongue. Sure it kind of reminds you of tape worms or perhaps the ebola virus under microscope and is probably hard to stomach for most people. But if your a cook and appreciate charcuterie you gotta love how this turned out. Blaaam!

Charcuterie Sundays