To familiarize ourselves with the selection and preparation of vegetables to be used in a variety of cooking methods. This includes the appropriate cutting and portioning of those vegetables and presentation for service.
Sanitation and Safety
Certain vegetables arrive in the kitchen very dirty, for various reasons. In terms of leeks, they are a bulb vegetable which grows underground and has tight layers within which dirt is easily trapped, and must be washed away before preparation. In terms of some leafy vegetables such as spinach, which are difficult to cultivate without the use of fertilizers or pesticides, they must be cleaned to ensure none of these are passed through to the consumer of the dish in which the vegetables are used.
Information
During week 4 we prepare many different vegetable dishes while exploring the different cooking methods, which can generally be broken down into three categories:
- Dry heat - Broiling, Grilling, Roasting, Baking, Sautéing, Pan-Frying, and Deep-Fat Frying
- Moist heat - Poaching, Simmering, Boiling, Steaming
- Combination - Braising, Stewing
- Flowers/Buds - Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, Cauliflower
- Fruit-Vegetables - Avocados, Eggplants, Peppers, Tomatoes
- Leafy Greens - Mustard greens, Spinach, Swiss Chard
- Fungi - Mushrooms, Truffles
- Bulbs - Bulb onions, Fennel, Garlic
- Pods and Seeds - Corn, Legumes, Okra
- Roots and Tubers - Beets, Carrots, Parsnips
- Stalks and Shoots - Artichokes, Asparagus, Celery
- Baby Vegetables - A vegetable which has been harvested prematurely or purposely bred hybrids to form true miniatures.
- Chlorophyll - gives vegetables a green colour, found in spinach, broccoli, and many more. When cooked with an acid, vegetables with this pigment will turn from bright fresh green to a drab olive green, but will maintain a firm texture. When cooked with an alkali, the colour will stay bright green, but the texture will turn mushy.
- Carotenoid - gives vegetables an orange or yellow colour, found in carrots and tomatoes. When cooking with an acid or alkali, the colour of a carotenoid will not be affected, however acid will keep the vegetable firm while alkali will make the vegetable mushy.
- Flavonoid - are broken down into two further categories, flavonoid anthoxanthin and flavonoid anthocyanins. Anthoxanthin is found in white vegetables such as cauliflower and will turn yellow when cooked in alkali, while maintaining its colour in acid. Anthocyanins are found in red vegetables such as red cabbage, and will turn blue in an alkali while maintaining colour an acid. As usual, acid will keep the vegetable firm, alkali will turn it mushy.
Practical
Partly due to the low cooking time required for vegetables, and general low prep time, we are able to get quite a few dishes in this week. We prepared:
- Broccoli Hollandaise
- Cauliflower au Gratin
- Buttered Green Beans
- Spinach Sauté
- Summer Squash Fettuccine
- Grilled Vegetables
- Vegetable Tempura
- Baked Butternut Squash
- Maple Glazed Carrots
- Pan Fried Zucchini with Aioli
- Glazed (Harvard) Beets
- Ratatouille
Cauliflower au Gratin is prepared by cutting cauliflower into florets of equal size, blanching in salt water and refreshing. Once well drained, this is then tossed in a béchamel sauce prepared per our previous experience, sprinkled with parmesan cheese and then placed under a broiler to brown. Once the sauce has an appropriate brown colour and before it burns, it is served.
Buttered green beans are prepared by blanching and shocking the beans, which are then reheated and tossed in butter seasoned with salt. They are served immediately to maintain temperature.
Spinach sauté is prepared by properly cleaning and washing spinach. Sweat minced garlic and shallot in olive oil over medium heat. The spinach is added and sautéed until hot. It should then be seasoned with salt, pepper, and nutmeg to taste, and served.
While summer squash fettuccine sounds like pasta is involved, we are in fact preparing the vegetables to appear as a noodle in this dish. The zucchini and squash have their peel trimmed but not wholly removed to leave some colour, and are cut into thin lengths as long as possible to resemble a thin noodle. Butter is melted over medium heat and we then sweat julienne leeks, then add the squash and zucchini. The combination is cooked until thoroughly heated and tender, with frequent tossing. It is seasoned with salt, pepper and lemon to taste, and garnished with chopped herbs for service.
Grilled vegetables are prepared by cutting to uniform size around medium to large dice while skewers (if wooden) are soaked in water. A marinade is prepared of rice wine vinegar, vegetable oil, garlic, herbs and spices. Vegetables excepting the mushrooms are blanched and shocked. The vegetables are soaked in the marinade for 30-45 minutes and are then placed onto the skewers in an even pattern and grilled until done, indicated by slight browning and some charring.
The vegetable tempura is started with a batter of eggs, water, baking soda and flour. The ingredients are combined and kept as cold as possible to keep the quality of the batter high, either kept on an ice bath or in the fridge while vegetables are being prepared. We prepare a dipping sauce of soy sauce, mirin, rice wine vinegar, lemon juice, and wasabi powder. The vegetables are cut into uniform sizes, placed in a flour bath for dusting to help the batter cling to them, then are battered and placed in a deep fryer. They should be cooked through but not overcooked, removed from the deep fryer and patted down on a paper towel to remove excess oil. They are then served with the dip.
Baked butternut squash is prepared by first peeling the squash and then cutting it into a medium dice. It is placed in a buttered pan, seasoned with salt, pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, and brown sugar. Lemon juice is drizzled over top along with some additional butter, and the pan is then placed in an oven at 350°F to cook until tender, around 50 minutes.
The maple glazed carrots are peeled and cut into a tourner shape. They are then parboiled in salt water and refreshed, maintaining firmness. They are then sautéed in butter until tender. They are seasoned with salt, pepper, and maple syrup, then garnished with parsley and served.
Our pan fried zucchini is prepared by peeling the zucchini while leaving some skin for colour. It is then cut with a bias to lengthen the cuts, while ensuring pieces are equal size. The pieces are powdered with flour, dipped in an egg bath, and then coated with bread crumbs. They are then pan-fried in vegetable oil until the crumbs have browned and the zucchini is tender. The aioli is prepared similar to a mayonnaise with the addition of tarragon. Once the zucchini is cooked they are served with the aioli as a dipping sauce.
Harvard beets are started by cooking the beets until tender for easy removal of the skins, as well as preparing them for their glaze. The glaze is a combination of sugar, vinegar, salt, and pepper which is brought to a boil and stirred until the glaze is thick and clear. The beets are added and stirred gently to coat completely, then served while warm.
The ratatouille is made by first preparing eggplant, onion, green and red pepper, zucchini, in a medium dice. Mushrooms have their stems removed and are quartered. We then prepare tomato concassée (tomatoes skinned, seeded, and roughly diced). Once the eggplant is cut, it must be purged - this is the process of removing water from a vegetable that contains excessive water. It is lightly salted and placed in a colander or on paper tower to allow water to drain away for around 45 minutes. We then sauté the onion along with some chopped garlic in olive oil. The peppers, eggplant, zucchini, and mushrooms are added and sautéed until tender. We then add the tomato, along with some tomato purée or paste as needed, and stew for about 5 minutes. The ratatouille is then served hot.
Personal Observations
I was very excited about this week as we began to prepare actual dishes rather than simply the bases for dishes. Although mostly simple in preparation, none of the dishes disappointed in flavour, aroma, and general enjoyment of preparation or tasting.
While the broccoli hollandaise was not a complex recipe, it was nice to have something to taste our fresh hollandaise with. Along with hollandaise, I am becoming a big fan of béchamel sauce - it's light and creamy flavour went very well with the cauliflower, and using the salimander to give it a glaze added extra visual and flavour appeal.
Getting into coating and battering vegetables for frying was interesting as well. I don't know what you can fry that comes out tasting bad (assuming you do it right), so this was going to be a good flavour experience as well. I was surprised at how simple the tempura batter was to make, and it turned out very well. I'll be doing this many times for myself.
For the most part the cooking turned out well this week. The major folly came in our baked butternut squash. Unfortunately when preparing the spice mixture for tossing with the squash, I added too much salt. I knew it, the others in my group knew it, and we sat there hoping that we could cook it away by adding more cinnamon or believing that after cooking the flavour would not be as prevalent. While it's our responsibility to be food conscious in the kitchen and not throw food away on a whim, I look back and should have made that decision on this one. The squash came out salty rather than the buttery-sweet it should have, and this would easily have been rectified with a new spice mixture. Apart from this, we had some minor timing issues getting the correct tenderness with some vegetables in a few dishes, all cases of having undercooked them, but otherwise I was happy with our work.
Chef's Observations
In general, Chef's observations were positive this week and we didn't get too much feedback that we weren't already expecting. I take this as a good sign that we at least recognize what we're doing wrong - the next step is correcting it and making sure things are right before service next time.
Our broccoli hollandaise turned out well, with our turned stems being a little more al dente than Chef would have liked, but otherwise the hollandaise was fine, and the broccoli was drained of water well enough so that it wasn't pooling on the plate. Our cauliflower au gratin turned out well, along with our buttered green beans and spinach saute. Chef was happy with our squash fettuccine, saying we had a good texture and flavour to the dish. Our grilled vegetables were good as well.
The vegetable tempura turned out very well, Chef did not have any negative comments on this.
As expected, the immediate comment on the butternut squash was the saltiness. We knew this was coming and couldn't do much about it at this point. Otherwise, the dish was presented well and the texture of the squash was fine, it had not been overcooked. However, the saltiness simply overpowered the sweetness we were trying to capture in this dish, so it did not turn out well.
Our maple glazed carrots turned out well, although some of our cuts were irregular leaving some of the pieces firmer than others. The pan-fried zucchini turned out nicely as well.
Our Harvard beets was another dish where the vegetable had been undercooked. We tried to rectify this by cooking it longer in the glaze, but had to be careful not to heat the glaze too high otherwise it would burn and the entire dish would be ruined. After getting the beets slightly more tender, we served the dish, but it was not enough. Beyond this, we couldn't decide on an attractive presentation and ended up giving Chef just a pile of beets, on a plate which was not spotless.
Our ratatouille, one of the more difficult dishes to get a proper consistency from, we did very well. It turned out very stewy, as it should have, rather than too soupy or saucy. Chef commended us on a job well done for this dish.
Blog Notes
Not much to say this week, it's midterms coming up so I'm studying. Good times. See you next week!
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