Obsessions

Momofuku Short Ribs

Ramiro — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 00:58:51 +0000

This is the second dish in my series of 4 Sous Vide Beef Short Ribs experiments in the kitchen based on the best recipes I could find out there. My previous recipe as well as the background for all recipes was Drunken Ribs on Wine Reduction.

This one [...]

Drunken Short Ribs on Wine Reduction

Ramiro — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 23:50:32 +0000

One of the best showcases for Sous Vide cooking are tough cuts of meat slowly cooked for a very long time. As you’ve probably seen on my site, I’ve experimented with all kinds of proteins, including pork belly which also falls under this category. But if you are a beef lover, you will not [...]

Valentine’s Day Dinner

Ramiro — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 00:19:13 +0000

Since red seems to be the traditional color for Valentine’s Day, I wanted to create a dish for my wife that would carry the red theme to complement the roses I sent to her work, while at the same time making something interesting enough to qualify as a “special occasion meal”, something not that easy in our [...]

Liver Alone!

Ramiro — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 22:22:58 +0000

As a genuine child of the 80s, I grew up with the Friday the 13th movies, so on Friday January 13th, I decided to create a meal in honor of my favorite killer Jason Vorhees, properly entitled Liver Alone!

It’s basically three different dishes in one, beef liver prepared in a spicy Chilean ají mixture, [...]

Sopa de Zanahorias Caramelizadas

Ramiro — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 06:26:46 +0000

Esta receta es simple, pero representa una de las mayores innovaciones que uno puede hacer en casa con un mínimo de equipamiento. Originalmente publicada en el gran compendio The Modernist Cuisine, y disponible en inglés aquí.

El concepto está basado en explorar la Reacción Maillard, que es una reacción química que se produce [...]

Caramelized Carrot Soup

Ramiro — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 00:55:18 +0000

As most people who have The Modernist Cuisine books, there is always that first recipe you have to try to get a sense of all the possibilities in front of you.

Arguably the easiest one in the book is the Caramelized Carrot Soup, and thanks to the Modernist Cuisine team, [...]

Pork Tenderloin Stuffed with Foie Gras

Ramiro — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 20:53:14 +0000

One of the the advantages of sous vide cooking is that you can prepare several meals on the weekend and eat like a king or queen for the rest of the week. The reheating process is a snap and a really nice dish can be put together in a matter of minutes.

This dish is [...]

Faux Abalone and Uni Ceviche

Ramiro — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 19:23:45 +0000

As the final dish in my series of four regarding abalone and uni, I had to come up with a good way to take care of the leftovers.

They were primarily irregular sized pieces of pressure cooked abalone, a few more sous vide scallops I had from my [...]

Ultimate “Palta Reina” (Queen Avocado)

Ramiro — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 20:56:27 +0000

Palta Reina (queen avocado) is a classic staple of Chilean cuisine. Traditionally it’s a very simple dish made with half an avocado (minus a slice so it can be stable in the plate) with some filling, sometimes chicken-mayo, or shrimp-mayo mix. It’s a classic starter you find almost in any Chilean restaurant.

As the third [...]

Abalone and Foie Gras Soup

Ramiro — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 03:54:40 +0000

This is my second post on a series of four that I have on abalone. There is no uni in this soup, although I admit I had some uni shooters while I was making it (uni, quail egg, chopped mint, chopped green onion, a dash of mirin, a dash of yuzu and a dash of [...]

Abalone and Uni in Yuzu Sauce

Ramiro — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 00:33:58 +0000

Introduction

This is the first of a series of 4 posts where I attempt to successfully combine abalone and uni (sea urchin). My goal here was to integrate them in harmony and to make at least 3 or 4 completely different preparations with both ingredients.

Previous posts here will explain how I became such an uni [...]

Morimoto-inspired Beef Carpaccio

Ramiro — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 01:59:00 +0000

Two weeks ago my wife and I had the chance to attend a cooking demonstration from Chef Masaharu Morimoto at the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley.

I first knew of Chef Morimoto as one of the original Iron Chefs in the Food Network show Iron Chef [...]

The King of Beefs

Ramiro — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 21:29:23 +0000

Do I even need to say anything?

This is a 3 1/2″ center cut of USDA Prime filet mignon cooked sous vide in bay leaf butter at 130F for 1 hour, crowned with a generous slice of Sonoma Foie Gras cooked sous vide at 135F for 32 minutes, both [...]

My Thoughts on Foie Gras

Ramiro — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 17:27:23 +0000

In 2004, my home state of California approved a law that will ban foie gras production and sale in the state starting in July 1st, 2012.

In a way, it was pretty obvious that this was going to polarize the dinner table in foodie upscale Northern California, where we pride ourselves of being [...]

Uni and Ikura Gelée

Ramiro — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 06:34:48 +0000

In my previous post I explained how I became a fanatic of Japanese food and how my “proxy drug” was Uni. Well, my next step in this escalation was Ikura, or salmon roe (which was my hook to attempt molecular gastronomy spherification as I’ll discuss on future posts).

Ikura is particularly interesting to me because [...]

Uni and Avocado Appetizer

Ramiro — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 03:18:18 +0000

Uni is Japanese for Sea Urchin. Back in Chile we call them Erizos, and they are served in large plates with finely chopped onion, cilantro and lemon juice. That’s how I got to know and love them.

When I moved to the US, I realized that they are not very common at all, and the [...]

Sous Vide Pork Belly with Puré Picante, and Bruschetta Salad

Ramiro — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 18:19:38 +0000

In the Pastafarian Heaven, there is a strip club and a beer volcano, but they forgot to tell you that this dish is what they have for dinner every night. I’m not kidding when I say this is probably one of the tastiest dishes I’ve ever [...]

Shaken Beef

Ramiro — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 22:35:07 +0000

As I like to say, I’m a vegetarian by proxy. I enjoy quality meat any day, and Asian-inspired beef dishes are some of my favorites. In fact, just two blocks away from my office in San Francisco, I’m lucky to have Charles Phan’s The Slanted Door, one of the best [...]

Glazed Fennel

Ramiro — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 20:53:14 +0000

It’s very rare that a simple side dish would be highlighted as much as a main dish, but this one is worth it for two reasons: it tastes fantastic, and it’s ridiculously simple to do.

This dish comes straight from Grant Achatz’ Alinea cookbook (page 357), one of the best cookbooks out there when [...]

Sous Vide Oysters

Ramiro — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 00:17:23 +0000

I’m a big fan of raw oysters, in particular Drake’s Bay, Kumamoto, Tomales Bay and all the Hog Island varieties. However, I came across this blog a while ago where the author cooks them sous vide at 118 F for 20 minutes, which is one of the parametric measurments mentioned [...]

Pheasant Breast with Fennel Mushroom Risotto

Ramiro — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 02:12:47 +0000

Introduction

Pheasant is a game bird that can be obtained in specialty stores from commercial farmers. This particular one we got from Mill Valley Market was organic and free range.

In spite of its small size, the meat has a very intense and deep flavor, and the bird seems to be more muscular [...]

Rabbit Roulade with Plums

Ramiro — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 02:12:06 +0000

Description

Rabbit is a sustainable, local and mostly organic protein that seems unappreciated and undervalued by the general population in the US. I can certainly understand the issue when rabbits are adopted as pets, and like most people, I do find rabbits cute as much as the next person.

However, in the European and Latin [...]

Halloween meal

Ramiro — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 05:01:25 +0000

For this Halloween, I wanted to create some creepy-looking (but delicious) meal for my wife Kimberly and I, that I could start at 5 PM and have ready by 7:30 PM without too much work, but yet, making it interesting.

I settled for duck breast, as it has an intense red color when cooked sous [...]