Ryan Zimmer

Lemon Cake

lemon olive oil cake - passion lime curd - strawberry rhubarb jam - candied pistachio - milk gelato - sorrel

 

New dessert menu started this week!

 

My rules for the new menu

-no micro sponge

-no foams

-no spherification

Nothing wrong with the above, however it becomes easy to repeat the same thing over and over.

I like the simplicity of this dessert, no smoke and mirrors, just great ingredients.

Along with using beautiful sicilian lemons we also are Using some stunning olive oil for the lemon cake, EL POAIG, tastes just as good as the packaging looks. We generously brush the luxury olive oil on the cake before serving and use a more economical but great olive oil for the batter. 

The milk gelato is made with Hokkaido milk which I have to say once you start drinking this milk it is very hard to go back to any normal supermarket brand. Quite often I will spoil the family and myself at home with the good stuff! 

First time I have used sorrel  in the pastry, being a perfect match to the strawberry and rhubarb NH jam as well as being a very pretty herb.

As rhubarb is not a popular ingredient in Hong Kong I am hoping people will not be scared off by it. It is second to the strawberry in the jam making it very well balanced. Every time I use rhubarb it reminds me of child hood summers at my grandparents where there were several rhubarb patches that would come up during summer. Cant say I loved to eat it freshly picked but I do remember always being intrigued by the colour and by the texture of the skin and summertime and grandma and grandpas was always the best!

 

 

 

 

Melting Raviolo

 

 

Were going a year back on this one.

I had never really liked the idea of dessert pasta however I took the dislike of an idea and turned it into something that I deemed worthwhile and challenging. You would think that the execution would be more or less simple but that was far from it. The chocolate pasta dough kept turning out less than desirable. In the end one of my rising stars had the idea to steam it rather than cook in water. This fixed our dough texture problem, turning it from tough and chewy to delicate. We finish off the ravioli by sauteeing it in buerre noisette and sugar to give it more flavour.

The next challenge was the filling. I wanted for a long time to take the beloved and overdone chocolate fondant off the menu and this was to be the brilliant replacement. I had more difficulty with getting the perfect melting chocolate with this one. A regular ganache would not work, different perecentages were used but it was either too thick, too runny or too rich, never just right.

I broke out the methocel with the idea that I could make a light ganache that while hot it would have the thickness necessary to be stable for cooking and as by the time the raviolo got to the table it would be nice and runny.

 

it worked ;)

 

The raviolo sits on top of a chocolate sponge to soak up the goodness. To go with the raviolo, apricot sorbet made with apricot puree and to give it a really great apricot flavour I froze chopped dried apricots before freezing it in the paco jet container. A cocoa nib and mint free form brulee pairs well with the chocolate and apricot. And earl grey whipped milk foam finishes it off, technique Alex Stupak.

It was a dish that I think looks simple overall but was a challenge to pull off well.

mango mille feuille and friends

 

The foundation is the mango mille feuille composed of puff pastry, mango iota cream, mango glass and mini passionfruit capsules.

It's surroundings are:

Fig agrodolce = caramel + vinegar + fig puree

Caramelized pineapple and kalamansi jam = pineapple + kalamansi juice + NH pectin + sugar + torch        

Why? NH pectin sets the jam and is thermoirreversible which allows us to brulee the top creating layers of flavour, textures and temperatures

Fizzy Grapefruit = grapefruit + CO2 charger + isi whip + grenadine syrup + fizzy sugar(texturas)

Why? Citrus is always nice, refreshing and cleansing. The effervescence from the CO2 and fizzy makes even more cleansing and enjoyable.

Coconut gelato = coconut milk + coconut puree(ponthier) + paco jet

Why? because mango and coconut are best friends and ponthier coconut puree is delicious

Coconut powder = coconut oil + malto

Why? I love coconut oil for it's lovely floral fragrance

Frozen mandarin orange = freeze dried mandarin orange + LN2 + orange oil perfume + table side

Why? By perfuming the LN2 frozen FD mandarin orange table side the evaporation of LN2 carries and magnifies the orange perfume for the guest.

 

Yuanyang Affogato

evaporated milk panna cotta - black tea jely - walnut biscotti - tea LN2 meringue - espresso

 

 

I will let wikipedia sum it up first.

Yuanyang or Coffee with tea (often spelled according to the Cantonese pronunciationYuenyeung,^[1] Yinyong^[2] or Yingyong^[3]) is a popular beverage in Hong Kong, made of a mixture ofcoffee and Hong Kong-style milk tea. It was originally served at dai pai dongs (open air food vendors) and cha chaan tengs (cafe), but is now available in various types of restaurants. It can be served hot or cold.^[4] The name yuanyang, which refers to Mandarin Ducks, is a symbol of conjugal love in Chinese culture, as the birds usually appear in pairs and the male and female look very different.^[5] This same connotation of a "pair" of two unlike items is used to name this drink.

I especially like the last sentence about a pair of two unlike items that go together.

The beloved hong kong style milk tea is transformed into a evaporated milk panna cotta, black tea jelly, and  black tea LN2 meringue. Still using liptons as the fancy stuff just doesnt taste the same. 

The guest pours the espresso (should actually be instant coffee but we are a fancy restaurant after all) themselves over the frozen meringue and there it is, yuenyang affogato.

Very simple and always fun to break out the LN2!

Prost

In the spirit of our annual German Bierfestival which is kicking off today, here is a german inspired dessert

 

vanilla bavarian - guiness gelatin - kettle corn - german rye chips - coffee sponge - chocolate mint