Heirloom Carrots

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In early April we sowed some heirloom carrot seeds into the ground, and now after just a couple of months, we have a rainbow variety of carrots in different sizes and shapes. What can we do with these wonderful colours? We were so smitten with the fantastic roots we pulled from our garden, we wanted to make sure that they received the attention they deserved on our plates.
The heirloom carrots were prepared in different ways to provide multiple textures. The carrots were: 
  1. juiced, frozen and turned into a granita; 
  2. sous vide with orange juice and sugar in a 95 degrees Celsius bath until tender; 
  3. shaved raw;
  4. oven roasted.

This carrot salad was also accompanied by orange segments, a coffee mayonnaise, almonds, pumpkin seeds, dried goji berries, dried mulberries, coriander flowers, and marigold petals.

KREAM (Koji Rules Everything Around Me)

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Koji: aka Aspergillus oryzae aka Japan’s national fungus (yep!)
We recently had the good fortune of coming across some rice koji while doing a little bit of supermarket exploring (if you don’t do this, you should!).  I think it’s safe to say that we may be on the verge of a new obsession, but in our defense, here are some reasons why this is totally acceptable:

  1. 1. Fermentation pretty much always makes things awesome.  See examples: booze, bread, cheese….
  2. A couple of the basics that you can develop with koji are about as fantastic as they are simple to make.
  3. But most importantly, and most exciting to us — the possibilities!

Now that we have a taste (figuratively and literally) for what it can do, we have our sights set on getting some spores!  Koji-kin are the spores used to inoculate grains, and subsequently produce starters like koji rice.  Once we get our hands on some of that, we can start making koji wheat (and with that — naturally our own shoyu), koji barley, koji-“insert any grain you can think of here”, and experimenting with all kinds of different flavour combinations.

Fruit Fluid Gel

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Fruit Fluid Gel
280g sugar
12g agar agar
64g lemon juice
480g fruit puree
120g water
1. Combine sugar and agar agar in a bowl with the puree and water
2. Place the contents in a pot and heat mixture
3. When the mixture comes to a boil, turn down the heat and simmer for 2 minutes
4. Whisk in lemon juice and pour into frame, and place in refrigerator
5. Using a thermomix, blend gel until fluid

Mango fluid gel in half litre container

Versawhip Foam

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This recipe is adapted from Antonio Bachour and John Placko.
170g fruit juice/ puree
15g versawhip
* If the juice is too thin, you need to add xanthum gum to thicken (1/2 tsp)
* Add sugar to your taste
In a thermomix with the whisk attachment, 
combine all ingredients and whip on medium high for 4-5 minutes.
You can use this foam for a plated dessert, but if you wish to make it into a dried foam, simply pipe some meringues and bake at 170F for 3 hours and let it come to room temperature in the oven.