It’s been a long time since I wrote about my Hammer Stahl knife set and I said I would review them once I’d used them – I will get around to it, but I feel I should go over the basics of kitchen knives and what to look for when buying. First, you need to decide which knives you are going to buy. In my opinion there is an essential set of knives that everyone[…]
Gin & Yang
Reverse Spherification – Making Food Pearls
Spherification in molecular gastronomy is the process of taking a liquid and turning it into a ball of jelly with the centre still in liquid form. Spherification is achieved by one of two methods, “Spherification” and “Reverse Spherification”. For this post I’ll be focusing on Reverse Spherification because it is the one I used to make the grapefruit and raspberry pearls for my tasting menu. See the recipes here: Langoustine and Lobster Cannelloni with Grapefruit[…]
A word on molecular gastronomy
I have no real love for the term “molecular gastronomy” it makes the whole thing sound more complicated and difficult than it actually is. Tell people that you use molecular gastronomy and they will picture you running around a kitchen with a lab coat on, mixing various chemicals together to create some form of “food”. Molecular gastronomy gets a bad rap, it is often accused of “taking the fun (or mystery) out of food”. In reality it’s[…]
Cocktails: Recommended Drinks Brands
In my last article I gave a basic stock list for someone starting up their own cocktail bar at home. It’s pretty organic, if you like a certain kind of cocktail, you should buy the drinks for it! Then, you can look for cocktails with similar ingredients and build up from there. I’m (un)lucky in that I go crazy, buy a bunch of different drinks and start making cocktails without having to worry too much about[…]
Cocktails: The Household Stocklist
Alcohol: Booze, spirits, liqueurs, regardless of what you call it or what kind you use, all cocktails need some, otherwise it’s a mocktail! Most cocktails follow a set of basic rules in their construction. First off, you have a base, then a modifier and finally a taste or colouring agent. For instance, a Mudslide cocktail is vodka (base), Irish Cream (modifier) and Coffee liqueur (agent). The base, constitutes the majority of the alcoholic content of[…]
A word on Cocktail Shakers
Reposted as we are currently running a Cocktail Competition – see here for details! Before I start posting up cocktails recipes I thought I should give a basic introduction to cocktails and what you’ll need to make some, starting with shakers. Cocktail Making Kit: So first of all, you’ll need a shaker. There are three types: The Classic “Cobbler” Shaker – This is the one you will see most often, it’s usually the cheapest[…]
A word on Salt
Learn how to properly salt your food. Ignore the silly health warnings, the mad ravings of the health freaks and the government guidelines to salt intake – it’s for the those of us who live off microwave and packaged meals and fast food 7 days a week. When you are cooking at home and making things from scratch you need salt. No, not lo salt (or No Salt), put that rubbish away! I’m talking about[…]