A few weeks ago with the Sous Vide summit coming up ( now since past of course … see the blog post ) I decided it would be a great dish to make given that I could prepare it a few days in advance and reduce the amount of things I’d need to prepare on the actual day of the event.

The ingredients list is dead simple… Some smoked ham hocks, Peas and some vegetables, herbs and spices. The first thing to do was soften some Onion, Carrot, Celery and Garlic in the bottom of the pressure cooker. Once this was done I added some fresh Thyme from the garden and a couple of bay leaves, some coriander seeds and white pepper corns.

After the vegetables were softened I added in 4 smoked ham hocks and topped up with water. The lid went on and I brought it up to pressure and cooked for about two hours.

While this was cooking I made some mustard butter ( mixed a softened stick of butter with a tablespoon of seeded butter ). I also blanched some baby peas quickly in salted water.

Once the pressure cooker had finished doing its thing I pulled out the ham hocks and pulled the meat and skin off the bones into a bowl. I stirring this well with a wooden spoon to break down any of the bigger bits and make sure the different textures of meat, fat and skin were evenly distributed throughout. To this I added the mustard butter and stirred more. I also added salt to season making sure I oversalted it as the seasoning dulls down when its cooled.

Oh and the stock from the ham hocks is brilliant, don’t throw it out, filter it through a cheescloth, clarify it with eggwhites if you want and freeze for soups, risottos, etc.

I then added the peas and folded it gently so as not to break the peas. This mixture went into my terrine mold and was weighted down and in the fridge overnight. After cooling and setting I took it out and cut it in half to check how it looked.

Perfect! When it was time to slice I served it with some home cured pork belly, some quince paste and some jalepeno jam made from chillis from the garden.

It was a great way for us all to get in some practice with our equipment, which for most of us is still relatively new. and try some things that we wouldn’t ordinarily try. Highlights of the night were the blind taste testing of different grades of the same cuts of meat.

Sous Vide Dishes that were prepared and served :-

• Feral hog shoulder cooked for 48 hours
• Steak taste test ( Prime, Select, Choice Prime Rib.   Prime, Choice Sirloin )
• 72 hour Beef short rib taste test ( Grass fed organic,  HEB, Randalls )
• Shrimp in butter ( 140F for 50 minutes )
• Pork belly two ways ( plain, with marinade )
• Soft cooked eggs
• Duck Rillets ( confit in sous vide )

Along with this we had :-

• Pea and Ham soup Terrine ( smoked ham hocks and baby peas )
• Home Cured Pork Belly
• Cauliflower Soup
• Home made Jalepeno Jam ( from garden )
• Fried Okra ( from garden )
• Fresh Figs ( from garden )
• Sourdough Ciabatta
• Beans cooked in pork backfat with crispy garlic
• Peach Crumble
• Chocolate Fudge
• Almost ( dry ice ) Nitro Fennel and Pandam Ice Cream

Everything was brilliant.   The surprise standout for me was the figs …   I’ve never been a big fig eater, and I don’t think I’ve ever just eaten raw figs straight, so I was very surprised at how tasty they were.    Other standouts were the shrimp, they had a moussey texture ( or Mouthfeel if you want to get food snobby ) that was amazing.   The taste tests of the different meats were really interesting …  Everybody could tell the difference between the Prime, Choice, and Select meats.    They all still tasted good ( with maybe the exception of the select, which was okay, but not worth writing home about …  oh wait I just have … damn ).   The Sirloin had a much meatier taste to it than the Prime Rib,  and the colour range was quite remarkable with the Prime being a strong red,  to the Select which was more of a dull red colour.

In the Meat section I saw that they had some Grass Fed Beef steaks. I grabbed a couple and as I was putting them in the basket saw ‘Product of Australia’ on the sticker. Looking through the shelves I also found some Organic Grass Fed Beef from Uruguay. I find it mind boggling that they could import quality grass fed Australian beef for cheaper than they can produce beef here even when force fed subsidized corn and tallow in factory farms. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Irony of buying imported meat from a store with ‘Farmer’s Market’ in its name.

This particular pizza I made the long way. I mixed together 500g flour, 400g water, 8g salt, and about a 1/4 tsp of yeast in a glass bowl until they were well combined, but definately not what I’d call kneaded. This went into the fridge.

Every twelve hours for 3 days I took out the dough and folded it over itself a few times to help build the gluten and push out the air. On the third day the dough came out of the fridge at about midday and left to be brought up to room temperature and have it’s final rest.

I tipped the dough out onto a well floured silpat and cut it into quarters. Each quarter was folded under itself to form a ball and left while I prepared the toppings. I also put a pizza stone under the broiler at full temperature.

Once the toppings were prepared I pushed out the bases with my hands ( no rolling pin ) and then topped them. Using my pizza peel I slid a pizza onto the stone under the broiler for about 5 minutes and it was done.

This dough is also excellent for making Ciabatta with as it’s very wet, and holds large bubbles to form a nice open crumb.

I had some ham bones from a ham I’d cured and smoked some time ago in the freezer ( My mother used to save ham bones for pea soup ). I also saw a restaurant that cooks just split pea soup on some random TV show.

By the time I got around to making the Pea soup I’d actually already made a Ham Consommé with the bones and had some in the freezer. So I went ahead and diced up some onion, carrots, celery and garlic.

These went into the pressure cooker with some olive oil and got fried off until the onion was soft. I added in a good splash of white wine and some black pepper.

In went the Consommé, topped up with some water to make it about 4 cups. I added 400g of rinsed green split peas and brought up to pressure for about 20 minutes. I then turned off the heat and let the pressure drop down.

Once I could safely open the pressure cooker I wazzed it up with a stick mixer. On serving I sprinkled over some chopped crispy bacon and served with some freshly baked quinoa, flaxseed, and soy bean sourdough.

I decided to make a stock with the ham bone and use this for some French Onion Soup, Use the duck in a Cassoulet, and the belly and ribs for an appetizer plate.

For the appetizer plate I warmed up the beef ribs and the config pork belly in a water bath so that they remained nice and tender. I also made some Ham Croquettes with the meat that came off the stock bone and some sourdough bread crumbs. To go with them I made a Charcuterie Sauce which is a ‘Sauce Robert’ with chopped cornichons from The Saucier’s Apprentice.

For the French Onion Soup I made a strong stock with the ham bone and the usual collection of vegetables, herbs and spices in the pressure cooker. After straining I clarified the stock with egg whites.

I then cooked down 6 finely sliced onions in some french butter, added a splash each of balsamic vinegar, and port wine.

I then added in the stock, some sliced cured pork belly and and a bouquet garni. I simmered this for about 40 minutes scooping off any scum.

To serve the soup I poured it into ramekins and topped it with two slices of toasted sourdough, sprinkled with Guyere cheese and popped it into the oven to melt the cheese. For added effect I hit the cheese with a gas torch.

For the Cassoulet I started by browning some chopped cured pork belly, some diced pork shoulder, diced lamb shoulder and some sausage. Obviously you’ll want to do this in batches so that you brown the meat, not boil it.

Once the meats were nicely browned, I was left with a pot covered in beautiful brown bits of fond. I browned off some onion and garlic in the pan, stirring it to loosen the fond off the surface of the pot and then added some tomato puree.

I cooked this for a few minutes and then added a few peeled tomatoes and a splash of water. When this cooked down to a nice tomato sauce I added some canned navy beans ( ideally I would have used dried beans and rehydrated them etc ), a bouquet garni and some dark veal stock.

I then added in the pork and lamb and topped it with some sourdough breadcrumbs and put it into a hot oven.

I cooked it for a good three hours, breaking the crust of the breadcrumbs and mixing it up, then topping with more breadcrumbs three times. The last time I added the sausage so it formed part of the final crust for serving.

Meanwhile I had some duck legs in fat cooking in my Sous Vide setup, a great way to confit duck legs with minimal duck fat required.

Once cooked I seared them off in a hot pan and then shredded the meat off the bone.

When the Cassoulet was ready I topped it with the duck confit and plated it up.

Cassoulet may not photograph well, but it tastes amazing.

The process is extremely simple, just make up your cure following Ruhlman’s recipe in Charcuterie. I added some bay leaves, some juniper berries and pepper. I drenched the belly in the cure and then bagged and sealed it under vacuum. I refrigerated it for two weeks, agitating the bag frequently to ensure it was evenly cured.

After two weeks I took it out of the fridge, washed it down and hung it in my coat closet for another two weeks. I then sliced it into managable chunks and it was ready to store. Some in the fridge and some in the freezer for longer term storage.

Since making this I’ve eaten it thinly sliced on sourdough, I’ve used it in braise, and I made a killer pizza topped with thin slices of it.

I googled on and found some cool hardware in the form of the Auber Instruments Sous Vide Controllerand paired it up with a crazy big 36 cup rice cooker. The idea is that the Controller reads the water temp of the rice cooker and turns it on and off to keep the temperature constant at your chosen temperature.

Of course with the way my luck runs the rice cooker arrived via fedex broken and I was stuck with just the controller. Thankfully I was able to beg a rice cooker off a friend and was ready to cook.

I decided that I was going to go hardcore and really test the limits of the system so chose to cook some grass fed beef spareribs for 72 hours ( google it, there’s plenty of info and recipes ). I decided to keep it reasonably simple and simple seasoned the ribs with smoked salt, long peppers, and Grains of Paradise ( errr keep it simple … yeah right ). I then bagged them with the vacuum sealer and popped in the cooker set at 56 C ( 133 F ).

Fast forward 72 hours and the ribs are ready to come. It’s a good thing the food is sealed in a bag, I don’t think I could have coped with delicious cooking smells for that long.

I slipped out the bones and then seared the ribs on high heat to crisp up the outside and brown it nicely.

Before browning the ribs though I made a red wine reduction to sauce it. I also prepared a roast beetroot, mashed potatoes and tomato caviar stack. A carrot and poppyseed salad, and a broad bean and home grown baby potato carpaccio.

I grabbed a whole duck from Central Market and some vegetables to make an Asparagus and Bacon Hash.

I cut the legs off the duck and put them in vacuum bags with some salt, spices, bay leaves and dried chillies. These will be used for Sous Vide at some point in the future. I then cut the rest of the duck up so that I could roast the breast on the bone. I put this in a bag with a brine of beer, sugar, and some spices.

I then made a stock of the left over carcass bits and giblets in the pressure cooker.

I took the duck out of the brine and dried it well. I then cut grooves into the skin to allow the fat to render out. I pan seared the duck skin side down to get it nice and brown and render out as much fat as I could. Once browned it went into the oven for about 20 minutes.

While the duck was cooking I made the hash. Using some of the rendered duck fat I browned off potato cubes, bacon, onion and chopped asparagus seperately and then mixed them all together and left them in the pot with the lid on to finish cooking through.

I also reduced down the duck stock and added a splash of cream and a piece of butter right at the end.

By this time the Duck had been in the oven long enough and came out to rest for 10 minutes before slicing.

Once the duck was well rested I sliced the breast and plated it up.

So every feeding you either throw out some starter, or you do something with it. A great use for Sourdough stater is Sourdough Pancakes. Pour on some good quality maple syrup and they make for an excellent breakfast.

Pancakes

1 cup sourdough starter
1 egg
1 Tbsp Vegetable oil
1 Tbsp ‘White Powder’.

In a large bowl mix the vegetable oil, egg, and “The White Powder”. Make certain that the powder is evenly mixed with no lumps. Add one cup of starter and beat vigorously for about than thirty seconds.

Cook pancakes on a cast iron griddle.

White Powder

One part salt
one part baking soda
three parts baking powder
five parts white sugar

Mix well and store in an airtight container.