MOTO: King crab and buttered popcorn
Oct. 2nd, 2006 12:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quisletSubmitted for your approval: A tableau of white porcelain, a perfect golden rectangle.
Down the right side of this culinary canvas streaks a creamy paste of blonde, a swath of late-summer straw reaching from top to bottom. On the left, at the bottom, a circle of malachite green marks the corner between seven and eight of the clock. Leading back from green to yellow is a dusting of purest white, a tiny cumulus trails lazily across the bottom of the plate, heaped about itself as it goes. Two plump strands of amber snake across the open plain formed between the open arms of sauces and garnish, fragile and near-translucent. Nestled atop them are the centerpiece of this dish, off-set, two long barrels of red on succulent white, one resting sanguinely on the other.
The barrels are huge lumps of king crab meat, each the size of my thumb. The ends flare a little, reaching out to be swathed in the sauces on the plate. The flesh is sweet and mild, perfectly juicy without being truly wet.
The strands are a flourless pasta made of passionfruit juice. Lacking the gluten that would allow true pasta to drape from the fork, they fragment naturally into half-inch morsels. The uncharacteristically gentle tang of unsweetened passionfruit accents the crab delightfully.
The cloud of white is dessicated coconut, also unsweetened, the consistency of powdered sugar. It is so dry that it takes a moment or two to taste the tropical oils, so fine that it squeaks between tongue and tooth like new-fallen snow underfoot.
The green is a nickel-sized dot of sweet coulis made from vaguely minty shiso.
The flaxen paste is the big surprise of this dish. It is undeniably buttered popcorn, liquefied to the consistency of hollandaise. It is rich and creamy, both strong and simple, the taste of weekend B-movie matinees somehow elevated alongside the French master sauces.
This is clearly intended as another opportunity to play with your food, mixing sauce, garnish, pasta and crab into the 120 combinations that the chef has laid before you. Trial and error prove that a bite of crab, paired with a segment of noodle, liberally dipped in the crème de maîs éclaté beurrée and then touched to the coconut snow is the proper way to eat this dish.
The shiso didn't do much for me, but I'd be willing to give it a second chance. ;-)
Down the right side of this culinary canvas streaks a creamy paste of blonde, a swath of late-summer straw reaching from top to bottom. On the left, at the bottom, a circle of malachite green marks the corner between seven and eight of the clock. Leading back from green to yellow is a dusting of purest white, a tiny cumulus trails lazily across the bottom of the plate, heaped about itself as it goes. Two plump strands of amber snake across the open plain formed between the open arms of sauces and garnish, fragile and near-translucent. Nestled atop them are the centerpiece of this dish, off-set, two long barrels of red on succulent white, one resting sanguinely on the other.
The barrels are huge lumps of king crab meat, each the size of my thumb. The ends flare a little, reaching out to be swathed in the sauces on the plate. The flesh is sweet and mild, perfectly juicy without being truly wet.
The strands are a flourless pasta made of passionfruit juice. Lacking the gluten that would allow true pasta to drape from the fork, they fragment naturally into half-inch morsels. The uncharacteristically gentle tang of unsweetened passionfruit accents the crab delightfully.
The cloud of white is dessicated coconut, also unsweetened, the consistency of powdered sugar. It is so dry that it takes a moment or two to taste the tropical oils, so fine that it squeaks between tongue and tooth like new-fallen snow underfoot.
The green is a nickel-sized dot of sweet coulis made from vaguely minty shiso.
The flaxen paste is the big surprise of this dish. It is undeniably buttered popcorn, liquefied to the consistency of hollandaise. It is rich and creamy, both strong and simple, the taste of weekend B-movie matinees somehow elevated alongside the French master sauces.
This is clearly intended as another opportunity to play with your food, mixing sauce, garnish, pasta and crab into the 120 combinations that the chef has laid before you. Trial and error prove that a bite of crab, paired with a segment of noodle, liberally dipped in the crème de maîs éclaté beurrée and then touched to the coconut snow is the proper way to eat this dish.
The shiso didn't do much for me, but I'd be willing to give it a second chance. ;-)
