Friday, July 3, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
Executive chef services chefs demo in New York
Absinthe
Blog contents
2. Brief chef bio from each of our master chefs.
3. A description of Ecs. its founding and environmental direction.
4. Recipes from the Demonstration itself as well as a few more to wet the appetite
5 . An out line of Kirk Lafferty's Cookbook in production looking for publication in the new year. Around the world in eighty menus.
6. Whatever we dream up next.
New Zealand born International chef Kirk Lafferty will be bringing his unique style of ‘Art Cuisine’ to the Macy’s cellar demonstrations on August the 7th in
Bio
Kirk lafferty is an international chef, his experience hailing from cooking in over a third of the countries in the world and still counting. Alternating from Executive chef jobs in restaurants to private chef to some of the richest people in the world on yachts and estates his influences are too many to list and very hard to pick when sampling his cuisine. The essence of his cooking style is in primarily loving his craft and as a result this comes across in his end product. Serial killer profile picture aside, “what you feel comes across in what you cook, if you love what you do people can tell, if it’s just a chore then people might as well just eat at burger king”. His ‘Art Cuisine’ style was originally conceived in “The White Room” restaurant in New Zealand in 1998 and he has been developing it ever since. The basis of the approach is similar to an Artist where he uses fiction through menus as the initial vehicle which is then accentuated through monochromatic at times plate displays. The cuisine itself is international fusion, no one country taking president over another, all working together to combine and express a meaning. The dessert ‘El Toro rojo y Hermosa Chiquita’ is the red bull and the beautiful girl a journey through flavors and textures meant to relate the different
Chef Alex Forsythe, All American like Apple pie.
Chef Alex Forsythe will be bringing his extensive chef experience in the Air ,on land and from the sea and using his environmentally friendly approach to organic cuisine to on August the 6th in Macy’s Cellar Kitchen Herald Square New York. As all good chefs do before they cook Alex will be raiding the organic farmers markets finding the best of the organic produce before starting his demo. Strawberries will be injected with Muscovia sugar as a sweet induction of things to come. Squash fennel and gourds will transform themselves into a seasonal roasted harvest. Taking a rustic approach to down home flavors and exciting meats Buffalo will be prepared and presented Beef Wellington style oozing with fresh herbs and taking you back to the days when buffalo used to roam the plains, when all foods where still organic and natural. As Alex says “ Those days have not gone at least when it comes to what you serve on your table , you just have to know where to shop”.
Executive Chef Alex Forsythe boasts many years of unique experience delving into the highest echelon of personal chef services while offering his personal times in new philanthropic ways through food. His favorite event consistently is the annual Farm Aid event. While attending Greystone in 1997 he envisioned a consortium of culinary enthusiasts that has finally spawned into a position of facilitator of Executive Chef Services, a chef based referral service.While setting a new high standard in travel catering, including in the air, on the rails and on the high seas, Alex provides outstanding cuisine from the world’s markets. He enthralls his guests with his homely flair and international distinction of the world’s market basket while always paying homage to newly innovative and organic cuisine from local markets.
Executive Chef Services was conceptualized by a consortium of experts who work as culinary professionals in all types of environments. Every Chef on the ECS team is committed to high quality service and to the communities where they work and live.
The ECS Chefs donate their time and talents to a myriad of charities. ECS works at the same high intensity level to create flawless results whether it is for a non-profit or a Fortune 500 executive client. Quality services with impeccable creative genius are why the ECS team is among the best in the world.
As chefs, we know that food feeds more than just our bodies; it nourishes our sense of well being in ways that go beyond the immediate pleasures of taste and texture. Increasingly, people are realizing that what we eat connects us to the land and to those who grow it, and that our industrialized food system may sacrifice quality for convenience. Not only does food that has been produced locally and sustainably satisfy the palette with its freshness and high quality flavor, it connects us to a more socially and environmentally responsible system of production and distribution. Reducing the carbon footprint of the meals that we create minimizes our use of non-renewable, polluting fossil fuels while supporting the local economy.
As culinary experts, we at ECS are always looking for the highest quality ingredients, which often means food that is local and in season. The average American meal travels 1400 miles from farm to plate, which not only affects freshness and taste, but also uses tremendous amounts of fossil fuels. Using local ingredients helps to reduce this environmental impact, while buying locally helps to revitalize rural communities and small farmers. When possible, chefs with ECS are also incorporating organic produce in their cooking. Because it does not rely on fertilizers and pesticides, which are made using petroleum, organic produce further reduces the carbon footprint of a meal. In addition, these chemicals are harmful to the environment and to human health, and some studies show that organic produce has a higher nutrient content.
As an outgrowth of both our personal convictions and consumer demand, chefs at ECS are starting to offer "Environmental Chef Services," providing environmental and social awareness alongside their usual creative and quality gastronomical services. . ECS' environmentally aware chefs have been active with an array of philanthropic for years, and have also participated in the Harmony Festival's Taste-a-Thon promoting organic foods, Earth Day celebrations and other events that promote sustainable food and community.
Along the path that connects the farm and the table, chefs can play an influential role in deciding what food to buy, where it's from and how it was produced. We see ourselves at the forefront of the movement to strengthen local food systems. By transforming how food is produced and distributed, we can help reduce global warming, support family farmers and bring quality and freshness to a culture of food that is currently dominated by fast food chains. By reaching out to the sustainable food community, ECS chefs are finding ways to connect themselves and their clients to a healthier, tastier future.
August 6th demo Alex forsythe
Inspired By Domain Chandon California.
6 Tsp Nutiva Coconut Oil
2 2.lbs Nut Brown Squash
6 tsp Coombs Maple Syrup(1/4 later)
2 cups Veggie Stock 1/4 cup heavy Cream
Salt and Pepper
Fresh Fried Sage
Remove end's and stab with a fork or knife. Remove Seeds and save for the kids. You may roast each segment in the oven for a hour at 350. or microwave for Seven minutes rotating twice. ( let cool) Remove Meat and blend with Veg stock or other. Finish with Cream Fresh and Maple Syrup and fresh Cream Fresh swirl.
Grilled Corn
Non GMO Corn from Petite Jean Arkansas, Oaltha Colorado, Samples of each
Start by Inspecting corn for abrasions and fungi. Pull pack with out removing the husk. The silk will need to be removed and that may be done by running your hand or a light terry cloth towel over.
Cilantro Lime
1 bunch Cilantro
2 tsp Adobe trimmed
Lime From four Limes
2 tsp Smart Balance Butter or other.
Rub the kernels and the lay the husk back on the corn. Using some wire ties from old bread twit and tie for grilling. Low heat for 35 min. You may fold the Husk back and use as a handle. Plate serving I would suggest cutting on the bias and standing up were the dinner my choose his consumption.
Patch Work Farms Pork Tenderloin wrapped in Pancetta
1.8 lbs petite Pork Loin
10 slices Pancetta
8 Toothpicks, or Metal Skewer
Start by Removing packaging and rinsing with cold water. Pat dry with Paper towels and salt and pepper your trimmed loin. Take strips of Seasoned pancetta and wrap the loin securing with one metal skewer or many toothpicks. 450 broil for 11 min then rest for 10 before slicing.
Minnesota Red Lake Nation Wild Rice
3 tsp Smart Balance or Nutiva
1 cups rice
3 cups seasoned Stock
1 bay leaf
3 tsp Salt
4 Tsp Pink Peppercorn ground
Inspect rice and and soak for 2 hours.
Add Sauté minced garlic for 30 seconds add rice stir for 1 min then add hot stock and cook till rice is tender
about 30 minutes.
Alexander's version of low fat Apple Pie
Apple Strudel
20 sheets of Fillo
1 cup butter for brushing sheets
1 brush ( I like Rubber)
5 Granny Smith Apples
1 tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp Nutmeg
tsp all spice
1/4 cup Agava Nectar or Heavenly Whole Sugar
It's important work quickly as your apples with Turn along with your Fillo drying out. Start by having your oven on to 375. convection. Start slicing your apples into slices about 1/4 thick. Add Spice and Sugar and let sit covered till your fillo is ready to roll. Take one package of fillo and unfold take approx. 20 sheets and lay in-front of you. Now fold-half the sheets on itself and begin to butter ever third sheet. Now the other side and you will have your buttered Fillo. Take approximately 2 cups of apples and add them to the first three to five inches of the fillo. Now begin to roll the entire strudel till you run out of dough. Forcing the apples towards away from the bitter end is a great idea so that you have a seal on the ends. Butter the entire log and then pre slice 3/4 the way though the strudel. Sprinkle with cinnamon and bake for 15 min. Your looking for a golden fillo and you will be able to see that all the layers are cooked. This is one of my all-time favorites and hope you will share it with others.
Thank you for attending this demo.
Special thanks to
Executive Chef Services
Macy's Marketing Department
Winthrop Rockfeller Foundation
Coombs Family Farms Organic Maple Sugar
Nutiva
Iceland Spring Water
Heavenly Organics Sugar
Palm Leaves Naked Earth
Red Lake Nation
Patch Work Farms
@ chef Alex Forsythe
jaforsythe@gmail.com
August 7th demo Kirk lafferty
Lollipops of New Zealand lamb chops will be demonstrated cooked in the half rack with a red wine thyme and dulce mole glaze. These will be set on a stage of chipotle en adobo whipped potato mash and intensified with a salsa de tamarillo. The aim will be to create a New Zealand and Mexican fusion contrasting the sweet of tamarillos intensity with the Smokey chipotle mash. The mole glaze will hint towards the rich complexity that moles exude but not be taken over by it. New Zealand lamb seemed the perfect vehicle for this New Zealand chef now based out of Mexico between his world stints on yachts and in restaurants.
New Zealand lamb Racks with aus jus mole glaze on
Chipotle mash and salsa de tamarillo.
1 complete Rack of Lamb (serves 3 with double chops per serve)
4 Tamarillos
3 cups merlot
1 sprig fresh thyme
1 large onion
200 grams cranberry jelly
1 cup fine sugar.
3 tsp red or dark mole. Available in Mexican specialty stores
1 kilo potatoes
300 grams sour cream
125grams chipotle in adobo
Olive oil for pan
From on pack of lamb racks remove fat from back of rack and then cut down each individual chop to the flesh turning around and coming back up the bone of the next chop. When each half rack is clean of fat cut into two chop sets.
Chop thyme leaves and onion and brown in a little oil in a medium pot. Add merlot and cranberry jelly and cook on a medium heat until reduced by half. Pour through sieve to remove leaves and onion then stir in mole and set aside.
Peel and cut potatoes and boil in water until soft. In a small blender blend Chipotle in adobo into paste. Mix 200 grams of sour cream with the potatoes and add chipotle gradually turning all into a spicy mash. Only add as much chipotle to your level of chili tolerance appreciates.
Remove stalks from tamarillos and score x cuts in each end. Drop the fruit into a pot of boiling water for 3 minutes until the skin starts to curl back from the cuts and can be easily removed. In a processor pulp the hot fruit with 1 cup of fine sugar.
Turn Oven to 400 degrees and then brown chops on the back and on both sides in a pan. Arrange chops linked into each other standing up and then finish them off in the oven to the desired tenderness. Medium rare is about 5 minutes. Just before the chops are ready brush them with the glaze. Do not do this too early as the sugar content of the glaze will burn in the oven pan. Arrange the chops linked on top of the mash and decorate with the tamarillo salsa and the aus jus. Place a teaspoon of sour cream above each mash mound to balance the chili heat.
Recipe and photo from upcoming cookbook "Around the world in Eighty menus "
El toro rojo y hermosa chiquita The Red bull and the beautiful girl
With this dessert I was trying to capture two different ideas primarily that the red bull and the beautiful girl which is about me and my partner Laura Lopez Lopez. The levels of the tamarillo (later seasonally replaced with blackberries) and the butterscotch mousse where supposed to identify with the strong character of myself and the beautiful character of my partner. Also I was trying to create love in a dessert in that love can be at times fiery and sweet and others light and flowery. The addition of red bull was not just for the namesake of the dish but also to put a layer between the mousse where I could add absinthe and then light it to toast marshmallows lovingly like a newly romantic couple often do on beach fires late at night. The shape of the glass was very important in that it did not hold to much space to accumulate heat at the top when the absinthe was alite.The resulting dessert is shared by two where they toast their marshmallows’ on skewers and then indulge down through the layers of the intensity of love.
I packet marshmallows, Skewers
100 mls 68% alcohol by volume Alandia absinthe (Green)
200 mls whipping cream, 50 mls Butterscotch snapps, 1 1/2 sachet gelatin powder
4 fresh tamarillos (tree tomato), 4 eggs, 1 ½ cups white fine sugar, ½ can red bull
.
Cut stalks from tamarillos and score crosses in both ends then dropping them into a pot of boiling water. Leave boiling for 3 minutes until you can easily remove the skin from the fruit. Put 1 cup of sugar with tamarillos and process till smooth in a food processor. Place fruit pulp carefully at the bottom of 4 straight sided champagne glasses as in picture. Dissolve gelatin in a little boiling water. Whip whites of 4 eggs till peaks achieved. Whip cream in separate bowl until light and fluffy. Fold cream gelatin and egg whites in with butterscotch snapps and remaining ½ cup sugar.
Set in mousse layer in freezer (10 minutes), Place in refrigerator. Dissolve the remaining gelatin with boiling water, add to red bull and pour a thin layer leaving a few millimeters on top of mousse layer. Serve by adding 1 tspn absinthe to each glass lighting immediately and use marshmallows on skewers to toast. This dessert should be eaten the same day due to the use of egg in mousse. Be careful children , don't play with fire. Blow out the flame when the marshmellow is toasted and also be careful not to use to much absinthe or your glass will eventually break , not romantic.....
Absinthe Exert from
“Around the world in eighty menus”
looking for publishing in 2010
The hard to find but worth the trouble glossary
50 ingredients from 50 countries.
This drink has such a wealth of history and famous consumers and is clouded in such great poetic and artistic representations that to not make comment about any of these and still use the spirit would be heinous crime.
So if you want to drink with the dead bohemians, with Oscar Wilde, Vincent van Gogh and Aleister Crowley. If you want to listen to the green angel as she whispers sweet invitations into deborchory in your ear while she is laid naked across your table. Or if you just like the bottles with their Art Nouvelle poster designs from the twenties of thinly clad semi- naked virgins then this is the drink for you. The recipe here is for a flambéed fruit on the table which I have cooked first for a dinner party in Prague and then in successive events in New York on Large silver pedistalled fruit bowls .The advantage of absinthe is that because of its high alcohol content flambé can be created without the addition of any other heat source on the table
. Peel and chop fruit such as bananas peaches pineapple and strawberries and roll them a little melted butter and a little fine white sugar. Add first a ½ cup of absinthe lighting flambé up in salad and then gradually add ½ cup Cointreau stir around with a steel spoon, turning and keeping flambé alight as long as possible. When flames have subsided add ½ cup of whipped cream and stir through. Serve with vanilla ice cream. Can be made individually in steel goblets, the amount of absinthe and Cointreau is entirely your own responsibility as is the possible damaging of fine silver platters. Please don’t sue me if anyone catches on fire…This is a exciting addition to any dinner party but like Homer Simpson lighting a bbq can easily turn a dinner party from laughs to tears, hopefully then followed by more laughs. The excuse if anything goes wrong is that green fairy led me astray.
Fruit of the imagination
