Adventures and Explorations in cuisine and flavour.

I just had a craving for some pancakes. So I made these rice flour and coconut milk beauties. Served with lime, peach and maple syrup.

Exploring Korean Flavours!

So first up in my Korean inspired dinner is potato. This is first sauteed with onion in a little veg oil. Then add some soy sauce, corn syrup, sugar and water. I didn't have corn syrup so I used maple syrup.

 Next up is some pork croquettes flavoured with lemon, spring onion and coriander. This is served with a sauce of soy, garlic, red chili paste, Korean red pepper flakes, brown sugar, apple vinegar, sesame oil and onion.

And I also did some carrots with sesame oil, salt, green onion, soy sauce, black pepper, butter and sweet chili sauce.

And here is my completed little assemblage of Korean inspired dishes. 
Admittedly, this is not the most stunning looking plate but all the flavours work really well together and I have ideas floating around in my minds eye and imagination on how I would really like to serve this.

  
Food, glorious food. Cooking up some spaghetti with chorizo, mushroom, tomato and Japanese pepper

 

A close up on the pot if you will, please, Clive. Here we have the pasta sauce simmering away. Also have some smoked garlic and dried birds eye chili in there. The Japanese pepper gives a nice citrus note to the dish.

 And lunch is served. A good sprinkle of grated Parmesan completes the dish.

 
Today for lunch I'm cooking up a stir fry of minced pork, spring onion, garlic, ginger, red chili paste, peanut oil, Korean red pepper flakes, black bean, lemongrass and chicken stock.

And this is this finished dish, topped of with shredded scallion and diced tomato for freshness.

Experimenting again. Cooking up a pate of Lambs liver, pineapple, coconut water, Japanese sansho pepper and mushroom/ seaweed seasoning. Watch this space for further information.

And this is the Lambs liver, coconut water, pineapple and sansho pepper pate all pureed, passed and ready to go in the fridge to set. I added a good amount of butter when I pureed it. More on this later.

Tonight for dinner I'm doing a chicken breast filled with minced pork. The pork is flavoured with ground coriander, black pepper, red chili powder, guindilla pepper, cilantro, egg, Dijon mustard, onion garlic and ginger.

I am also doing a Lentil and potato dal. The spicing/ flavouring for this consists of onion, garlic, ginger, whole red chili, fenugreek, fennel seeds, black cumin seeds, turmeric, red chili powder and salt.

And here is tonight's dinner. Drizzled with mint yogurt and cilantro oil for that final touch. The acidity of the yogurt being a great counterpoint to the heat of the spices.

So, after getting in from the office and feeling hungry, I raided the fridge and put this together. Heritage tomatoes, pork tongue, my lamb liver/ coconut water & pineapple pate. Onions pickled in Chinese black vinegar, celery/ apricot chutney, sansho pepper and teriyaki seasoning.

So for dinner tonight I did some pork loin slow cooked in a broth of garlic powder, onion powder, celery seeds, cassia bark, star anise, tarragon and Korean apple vinegar. Once the pork was cooked, the broth was strained, reduced and finished with white chocolate. This was accompanied by some root vegetable ( swede, turnip and parsnip) that had been poached in duck fat. There was a hoi sin/ strawberry emulsion, fresh strawberries and Japanese togarishi. This creation was inspired by David Munoz of DiverXO. I personally really enjoyed eating it and found it to be a great mix of flavours and texture. Sorry there is no photo but the ones I took were all far too blurred.

Strawberries, honey + yogurt, a red chili/ maple syrup/ sour cream butter sauce and szechuan pepper.