Top Chef Texas, Episode 9: Modernist Malfunction

I only just got round to spending some quality time with Che, my DVR, and Bravo's crazy cheftestants, but I've got to say - this episode was worth its weight in GE Monogram appliances!

Not because of the elimination challenge, I hasten to add, a barbecue blowout that demonstrated only the degree to which a wife-beater is inevitably a poor fashion choice, no matter how good-looking the wearer might believe himself to be. I'm afraid my knowledge of and enthusiasm for smoky, saucy, slow-cooked goodness (I mean barbecue, of course, not Chris C. and his questionable undergarment) are limited by a variety of geographical disadvantages, not least of which is the fact that my formative culinary years were spent in a culture where barbecue means any al fresco cooking of chicken or sausages over an open fire - what we Yanks, in fact, call grilling. What The Others call grilling we call broiling. And don't even get me started on the confectionary confusion wrought by Mars Bars, Milky Ways, and Marathons.

But I digress.

No, my interest was piqued in the show's first five minutes, while our contenders were sitting around in the Top Chef House, smoking (!) and complaining, well, about pretty much everything as far as I could tell. A sinister knock at the door was followed by a flunkie rolling into the kitchen - be still my beating heart! - a trolley laden with all five volumes of Modernist Cuisine, nestled resplendently in their Plexiglas sarcophagus. What thrills! What excitement!

At my house, anyway. It may have been my imagination, but a number of the gladiators adopted the sort of blank stare that often appears on the faces of people who are aware they're expected to know what they're looking at, but emphatically do not. A kinder correspondent than yours truly would probably characterize the response as tepid rather than pathetically ignorant, as I am tempted to do.

It was the job of Edward to TH that Modernist Cuisine is 'like, a game changer about how to approach all of cuisine with a modernist mindset.' Not perhaps the most profound insight into the contribution of Myhrvold et al, but at least he tried. The best Chris ('I wear top knot') J. could come up with was that 'it is the most elite cookbook in all of America' - a pitiful description of a treatise that considers foams (a subject about which I have lately been reading a good deal) in terms of the Kelvin Problem, Weaire-Phelan structures, and the Beijing National Aquatics Center.

Chris ('I wear a wife-beater') C. dismissed the work as containing 'way too many graphs' while the rest of the chefs paged frantically through the volumes - looking, one supposed, for easy recipes to pull out during the next day's Quickfire.

Che and I sat back in our favorite toile-upholstered armchair, confidently predicting disaster.

Sure enough, our stunned wannabes dribbled onto set the following morning, to be greeted by Pads and my newest hero, Nathan Myhrvold. Given forty-five minutes to create a dish 'that best illustrates modernist cuisine' they all hurriedly got to work with their thickeners, starches, and gels, eager to demonstrate the one molecularly gastronomical trick they'd memorized over breakfast and would no doubt forget before lunch.

All except The Top Knot, that is. Chris J., it transpired, was already a bona fide expert - to such a degree that he seemed surprised Myhrvold et al had not thought to consult him during their painstaking research. 'A lot of the techniques in this book I've maybe done first,' he modestly TH'd - an assertion that, even without his ridiculous hairstyle, I might have had trouble taking seriously. He decided to introduce the judges to his secret weapon - a miracle berry tablet - a super-protein that 'blocks the tastebuds so that sour tastes sweet', allowing an unsuspecting victim to suck on a lemon without his face puckering into one of those wizened heads carved from dried apples.

Chuckling delightedly at his own cleverness, The Top Knot got down to creating a plate of deconstructed cheesecake and diet soda made from grapefruit, witch hazel, and battery acid. Meanwhile, The Wife Beater whittered on about how his own production of execrable 'modernist' paintings (thank you, Bravo, for sharing video of his primitive nudes - I almost went off my breakfast!) put him in good stead to walk away with the Quickfire prize. Ty-Lor prepared watermelon the way they do, presumably, on the planet Xarxax, with olive oil powder fabricated with tapioca maltodextrin. 'When it hits your tongue, it turns back into olive oil!' he gushed. Che and I were somewhat dismayed by this intelligence: I mean, when one is happily scarfing watermelon at a picnic, is a sudden mouthful of olive oil anything other than an unwelcome surprise?

The rest of the chefs thankfully limited their efforts to spherification and the output of cream whippers.

When time was called and the modernist mercenaries lined up for judgement, poor Beverly was first to present. She gave her siphon a few good shakes and prepared to squirt curry cream all over her dish. 'Foam away!' ordered out host, and with a hiss, a gurgle, and an appalling blast Pads received a healthy dose of goo all over her rather tacky skirt. Horrified by this turn of events, Beverly waved her cream whipper around in dismay, only to knock all her pots and pans off the prep table with a resounding crash. While the unlucky molecularist scrabbled around on the floor picking up the largest, most dangerous items, The Glamorous One demurely attempted to hose herself down. Nathan, in a heartwarming display of support, joked that it was truly modernist to serve food on the guests, and gave Bev a few hints on how to use her device. She had failed to hold it vertically, for one thing, and left on the N2O charger - two rookie mistakes that I, as an espumier of an entire week's standing, would not have countenanced. Muttering something about never being allowed to attend sleepovers as a child (huh?) Beverly slunk back to ignominy while the judges moved on to more successful plates.

Sarah's breakfast raviolo was a big hit ('Pasta is a high technique food!' enthused Nathan) as was The Alien's watermelon creation. The Top Knot's dish was welcomed more cautiously. Pads thought the miracle berry was beyond fabulous and swigged rapaciously from the proffered lemon, but Nathan was somewhat reserved in his praise, I thought. He informed the increasingly-deflated chef that he already knew all about miracle berries - indeed, he grew them in his own basement - and upon being told that he was about to taste 'the world's first soda made without artificial sweeteners,' he quipped, 'You just have to suck on the right pill first.' The Top Knot giggled nervously, lost the quickfire, and that was that.

While the barbecue brouhaha unfolded, I did some quick research on miracle berries, of which I had not previously heard. It's possible they're discussed in Modernist Cuisine, although that reference's lack of an index (that I've been able to locate, anyway), makes such an inquiry difficult to organize. Google directed me not, astonishingly enough, to Wikipedia, but the good people at Think Geek, providers of holiday stocking stuffers to the stars. 'Truly, words can't describe the life-altering sensations caused by these little tablets,' rhapsodized the modernist marketers. 'Join the new craze for hosting flavor tripping parties!' Quite apart from the chagrin caused by the realization that I have missed out on yet another culinary trend, I was still in the dark about the mechanism behind the phenomenon. The geeks told me miracle berries (Synsepelum dulficum from West Africa, to be exact) were 'first documented by a French dude in 1725' and that the active ingredient was a protein called miraculin, which somehow binds to taste buds in ways unknown to science.

Further reportage on this intriguing discovery will be forthcoming. I am reliably informed that in addition to being modernist, hip, and mind-bendingly awesome, miracle berry tablets are also - wait for it - gluten-free.

Whipped Into Shape

My latest obsession began, as so many do, with an innocent enquiry. After a particularly fraught bout of camembert wrangling some time ago, a concerned citizen (it might have been Sir) suggested a dive into Modernist Cuisine to see what Myhrvold et al had to say on the subject of cheesemaking. Three hours later (MC is a bit difficult to navigate), having finally found the appropriate section in Volume 4 under the heading Gels: Dairy and Tofu, we located the dispiriting caveat that 'a detailed treatment of cheesemaking is beyond the scope of this book', after which followed intriguing procedures for protein curds; cocoa nib curds; green pea yuba; milk skin with grilled salsify; and mozzarella balloons.

The family became quite excited about this last one, which required the stretching of fresh formaggio over the nozzle of a culinary siphon and squirting the thing full of cream filling, such that the cook was rewarded with something like a big squishy burrata. That was the theory, anyway, but I was unable to test it due to my kitchen's egregious lack of gaseous infrastructure.

Further perusal of MC's section on Foams confirmed this dismaying deficit. Recipes for citrus air, seawater foam, corn froth, and barbecued eel with whipped caramel would forever remain tantalizingly out of reach unless some remedy could be found. For months, froth-creation remained nothing but a girlish fantasy.

So when in early December DMR asked me what I wanted for Christmas, without hesitation I replied, 'A one-pint cream whipper, please.' Roughly three weeks later I had a sleek and steely dairy dispenser to call my own.

Yesterday, needing a pick-me-up after the desultory labor of taking down the Christmas decorations and wanting to get rid of the remaining holiday eggs-and-cream stash, I felt the time was right to try out my long-awaited treasure. Reasoning that the cream whipper would provide no great challenge, I nonetheless decided that mushroom and bacon cappuccino would have to wait and I would start simply with a straightforward recipe for chilled zabaglione thoughtfully provided by my new toy's manufacturers.

The contents of the box proved to be delightfully engineery, all but demanding they be disassembled and inspected from every angle. I spread the bits out on the dining room table in an attempt to catalogue the myriad components. The destructions to which I referred labelled the diagrams with part numbers instead of useful descriptors, but by process of elimination I was eventually able to identify various head gaskets, valves, and transportation locks. I deemed the ten N2O chargers would be more than sufficient for my needs and noted with satisfaction that I had two decorative nozzles from which to choose.

I was eager to get cracking and managed to get the thing together in less than half an hour. Its splendid pressure vessel was positively blinding in the bright winter sunshine!

Although I was tempted to call it a day and rest on my laurels, I had of course won only half the battle. I still had zabaglione to make! I hastily whisked together in my favorite deep-sided mixing bowl four egg yolks (unpasteurized, but I figured the alcohol would neutralize any unwanted bugs); 7 oz heavy cream; 5 oz Marsala (my dairy instantly curdled - ick! - at this point); and 6 tblsp powdered sugar. The result looked and smelled like extremely boozy tan-colored egg nog.

I consulted the destructions to find out what I had to do next. I discovered at this juncture that the manufacturer had seen fit to distribute key information across three different users' guides, requiring that I play hide-and-seek to find the necessary info. I do not claim to be an expert on technical writing, but wouldn't it make sense to have what is (after all) a fairly linear process laid out in some sort of numerically logical fashion? I found hints and tips for success littered randomly about, punctuated with lots of achtungs (did I mention my siphon was German-engineered?) warning of dire consequences should the pressure inside the thermos approach critical levels.

Undaunted, I persevered. I filled the bottle with my mixture, screwed on an N2O charger, and heard it discharge its contents into my soon-to-be zabaglione.

At this point, the destructions became very German indeed. Needing to shake vigorously the apparatus in order to distribute the fat-soluble gas into my soupy sauce, I was ordered to agitate the bottle 3-6 times, depending on the fat content of my cream. A carton-check revealed I had the 36% variety (anything less than 28% won't do the job, don't you know), and after a few more achtungs alerting me to the perils of both over and under-agitation, I concluded that four shimmies would do the trick.

I removed the charger, screwed on the protective cap, aimed the nozzle downwards (Achtung! Anything other that strict verticality will result in loss of pressure!), and let 'er rip.

The result was not encouraging. What came out of the dispenser amidst a good deal of spitting and burping was undeniably foamy and delicious, but hardly the photo op for which I had been hoping:

I consulted the trouble-shooting guide, which explained that I had either shaken my foam too much or too little. Achtung! Either extreme can lead to disaster and woe, but the symptoms are identical! Concluding that if it was over-shaken there was no remedy but that I had nothing to lose by shaking it some more, I gave it a really good workout and tried again. I thought I perceived some attractive surface swirling, but my dessert still resembled a big khaki-colored splat:

I began frantically to leaf through the many how-to booklets in mounting alarm. The device's hissing and belching might have been a sign that the nozzle was clogged with a microscopic mote of undissolved powdered sugar. The only way to clean it was to disassemble the entire thing. I discharged the pressure (Achtung! Keep away from your eyes, pets, and small children!), gave everything a good wipe-and-stir and started over with a fresh N2O cartridge, trying not to think about the damage I was doing to the ozone layer in pursuit of dessert perfection.

A definite improvement (no obscene noises this time) but my mixture was still too loose:

It was now getting late in the day and I was losing heart. Because N2O is bacteriostatic, I knew my project would be safe in the fridge until I could come up with a new strategy. I released the pressure again and placed the bottle on the bottom shelf of my chill chest while I pondered my foam fabrication failings, desperately seeking an answer in my pitiless pile of documentation. I finally found it, hidden towards the end in a discussion of gelatin and warm mixtures: Achtung! The whipper and mixture must be chilled in the refrigerator for several hours before use!

Oh, for crying out loud. Why didn't they say so in the first place?

When I returned home from work today, I retrieved the glaciated vessel from the fridge, clapped on N2O charger #3, exercised the lot with a good 5-second mambo, and had at it.

Success at last!

Of course, I could have saved myself a lot of trouble if I'd thought to consult MC, which has a stupefyingly complete guide to siphon use, including a fabulous photographic cross section on p. 261 of Vol. 4. Myhrvold et al play down the importance of the exact number of shakes, while stressing the vital role of temperature. Indeed, they recommend giving dairy the hot-cold treatment, whereby cream that is destined for frothy glory is heated to 86 deg F, held at temperature for 30 minutes, then chilled to 41 deg F before action. This process anneals and modifies the crystal structure of the fat droplets in much the same way that tempering does for chocolate.

Carp and cauliflower cappuccino might be within my grasp after all.

But first, I'll need to order several hundred more N2O chargers.

Devil in the Details

Today I made myself some deviled eggs the Modernist way - that is, deconstructed, backwards, and inside-out.

And completely amazing.

First, I simmered four room-temperature eggs at exactly 72 degrees C for exactly 35 minutes. Loyal readers may recall that maintaining a stable water temperature had proved immensely challenging during last week's Egg Blossom brouhaha, but now I have the whole cooker-knob twizzling routine down to a science. Taking account of the inevitable lag caused by thermal inertia, I was able to maintain my ideal temperature for the entire time, never venturing beyond a one degree (or 1.39%) error. Not bad, in my humble opinion, for a gal without an immersion circulator to call her own.

At the end of cooking, I plopped the eggs into a bowl of icy water to cool.

While that was happening, I assembled the mis en place for my mayonnaise: 25 g of white wine vinegar; 10 g of Dijon mustard; 100 g of good olive oil; and tarragon from the garden. I added salt and pepper at the end.

Time to peel the eggs! This is where things got interesting. The white was the same consistency as one would find in a soft-boiled egg. I carefully scooped it out of the shell, revealing the yolk beneath. Each one was a solid sphere, the texture of ... well, it was hard to describe. Think creamy fudge. Egg-yolk flavored creamy fudge.

Weird, but awesome.

I removed all the yolks from their white blankets and spooned the albumen into my blender. This was because ... wait for it ... I needed the whites for the mayonnaise. Yes, Nathan Myhrvold et al make their mayonnaise with egg whites rather than egg yolks. And guess what? It works!

I blended the four egg whites with the vinegar and the mustard, then drizzled in the olive oil to make an emulsion. I seasoned the result with salt and pepper and, hey presto, Modernist Mayonnaise! It was rich and creamy and delicious.

In the book, the gorgeous pic of the finished dish involved complicated schmears and sprinklings of Bottarga di Muggine. Sir and I thought it would be funnier to plate the dish like a sunny-side-up egg. We arranged a little flattened mound of mayonnaise on a pretty blue bowl and popped one of the cold yolks on top. A few pinches of chopped tarragon and we had a fine Deviled Egg.

Another impressive appetizer for guests! After all, what is a better ice-breaker than a good laugh prompted by a funny yolk? 

Egg-citing Cuisine

Last night, Sir and I spent almost two hours cooking four eggs for dinner.

It was quite the production and at times bordered on the hilarious, if not the hysterical. The project involved many pots and pans, two sets of eyes, four hands, and nerves of steel - and for that we have to thank Modernist Cuisine, which (if its chapter on eggs is anything to go by) never makes do with two or three easy steps when ten complicated ones will do.

We had a ball.

Here's how we made Egg Blossoms a la Nathan Myhrvold et al.

We assembled our mis en place (we added another egg later on).
The blue-flowered Japanese rice bowl contained melted duck fat.

We heated up a big pot of water to 85 deg C and watched it like a hawk.



We lined small glass prep bowls with heat-resistant plastic wrap.



We brushed the wrap with an olive oil/duck fat mixture,
at a ratio of approximately 1:2.



We broke a room temperature chicken egg
into each bowl and added more fat and salt on top. 

We gathered up the wrap to make a ball, being careful that
the yolk was fully enclosed in albumen.
We tied off the parcel to make a neat spheroid.

We placed the eggs into the simmering water and attempted
to leave them there for exactly twelve minutes.

Keeping the water at the correct temperature (even in such a large pot)
proved to be quite a challenge,
especially as the egg parcels tended to bob and float.
While I held them down with two wooden spoons,
stirring occasionally to keep the water moving,
Sir watched the thermometer and twizzled the
cooker knobs to keep the apparatus at optimum simmering conditions.

We subsequently engineered a setup whereby the eggs were weighted with
a spoon, thus freeing up two hands and one pair of eyes for
temperature control duty. Cutting off the excess plastic wrap
simplified things considerably.

When time was up, we carefully removed the eggs from the pot
and sliced their wrappings open with a pair of scissors.

The result was the Cutest Egg in the World,
which looked like a perfect little Chinese dumpling.

Here's an aerial view of the CEitW.
Note its little folds and anfractuosities!

In the interest of full disclosure, I am bound to admit that none of the eggs was cooked perfectly. The first two were a shade overdone (the yolk slightly set rather than oozy and runny) because we left the eggs in the pot for two extra minutes (getting them out of the water proved to be a task for which we were woefully under-prepared). We cut the timing of the next egg to eleven minutes, which proved inadequate. We had every intention of cooking the fourth egg for twelve minutes exactly, but somehow we accidentally sabotoged this specimen by allowing the temperature to creep up briefly to 88 deg C, thus rendering useless our careful timing.

Nonetheless, the eggs were creamy and tasty, with an utterly consistent custard-texture all the way through. The whites were fluffy but firm - and not at all rubbery. The eggs didn't drip water the way inexpertly poached ones sometimes do and tasted pleasingly of the fat in which they were bathed.

Sir and I agreed their dim-sum-like appearance was witty and fun.

We enjoyed our eggs thoroughly as part of a light Sunday supper. Sir arranged his next to a leftover piece of poached salmon and I perched mine atop a golden disk of polenta. As we munched away, we considered whether the Blossoms might be a bit too involved to serve to company, requiring as they do twelve minutes of uninterrupted concentration on the cook's part. Of course, if the victims - sorry, I mean guests - in question are particulary good sports, the cooking of their appetizer could be part of the show. They might even be encouraged to participate, particularly if they are of a scientific turn of mind.

Naturally, with an immersion circulator the job would be made much more straightforward and foolproof. All I need to build one are an immersion heater, an aquarium pump, a thermocouple, a temperature controller, a solid state relay, and a variety of easy-to-find bits and bobs (rocker switch, sheets of acrylic, silicon caulking, a soldering iron), many of which may be scrounged from my workplace's extensive knick-knack collection.

The Kid Squid has volunteered to be the project's Chief Engineer and I am tempted to take him up on the offer.

Although in saner moments, I think it seems like a lot of trouble for simmered eggs.

Even done the Modern Way.

Surprise from Sir

Friday has become delivery day a chez Fractured Amy. Last week, I was the recipient of thirty shiny new Weck jars, which arrived just in time to save me from sinking into black despondency after my camemberts went belly-up. I must admit, however, that since I ordered the jars myself, their fortuitous appearance on my front porch was not entirely unexpected - although no less welcome for that.

Today, however, as I pulled into the driveway after work (in the pouring rain, I might add - it has barely stopped tipping down all week) there was another shipping carton there to greet me. Whatever could it be?

I nearly put my back out hauling it into the house. The reason for this was soon abundantly clear: the shipment weighed upwards of fifty pounds!

I opened the cardboard flaps and peered inside.

More flaps!

Beneath them, a tantalizing clue.

Be still my heart. Could it possibly be ...

It is! I examined my new treasure from all angles ...

... and marvelled at its beauty.

I found it a place to call home ...

... and revelled in having become a member of The Club.

More details to come as I peruse the wisdom within: in less than five minutes, I've already discovered a full-page glossy photo of an elegant tapeworm; four pages of detailed instructions on how to cook a hard-boiled egg; and a lengthy discussion about curry varieties (including an extensive genealogy with footnotes and sidebars).

Sheer bliss.

But how I am going to find the time to go back to work?

Molecules, Shmolecules

Did you know that molecular gastronomy is out? Neither did I.

Of course, in my neck of the woods it was never really in: this little pastoral corner of Pennsylvania has yet to experience so much as a glass of bubble tea, much less foams, airs, gelees, and other examples of alimentary arcana. That is why the gods invented spherification kits, the Port Authority Bus Terminal, and Boeing commercial jets. Between the three, I have been able to keep up with cutting edge culinary trends to some degree.

Still, it comes as a bit of a shock to hear that yet another foodie fad has come and gone without so much as a ripple caused in the Valley's lakes of ketchup and barbecue sauce.

According to John Lanchester and The New Yorker, it is now passe to use the term 'molecular gastronomy' when describing the sort of cooking pioneered by Nicholas Kurti back in the 60s and since taken up enthusiastically by such luminaries as Sts. Ferran Adria, Heston Blumenthal, Grant Achatz, and Wylie Dufresne. Not to mention *shudder* Marcel Vigneron on his new Syfy series, Marcel's Quantum Kitchen (DVRd but as yet unseen by me).  

I do understand the reasons why the descriptor has fallen into disfavor. All cooking is molecular, whether you are boiling rice or baking a gluten-free cake. The benefits of, say, copper bowls for whipping egg whites have been known (if not properly understood) since time immemorial. You can't cook without a certain appreciation of the chemical arts.

So 'molecular gastronomy' is now 'modernist cuisine'. The new designation may be more strictly accurate but it is also less self-explanatory. It emphasizes inaccessibility and mystique, to be sure, a break from locavore enthusiasts and ingredients mavens who value the simple (albeit flawless) presentation of fresh proteins and veg. Like many modernist movements, it widens the gulf between the steely-eyed professional and the wide-eyed amateur by stressing the sad truth that it is no longer possible for home cooks to emulate a fine restaurant meal at home, if the restaurant in question happens to have anti-griddles, rotary evaporators, and centrifuges.

All of which philosophizing brings me round to my current conundrum: how badly do I require a copy of the latest herniating foodie folio, Modernist Cuisine, by Nathan Myrhvold and his team?

When I last looked, this definitive account of the very latest developments in kitchen tech was unavailable for Kindle, which is too bad because the dead tree version weighs in at 46 pounds and 2,438 pages. Amazon is hawking it (or them, really, since the work is contained in five volumes) for the super-low discounted price of $461. There are currently no copies available to purchase online, so somebody must be buying. 

I would have to sell my first-born to be able to afford it, but that might be a reasonable sacrifice considering the riches contained within. Exquisite photographic cutaways of pot roast set-ups and cross sections of woks in action! Exhaustive explanations of low-acyl gellan and carboxymethyl cellulose! Why, I bet in the index one can even find Gluten (why it is evil) under G and Lactose (friend or foe?) under L.

Even without buying the book, I have uncovered in its reviews a most valuable piece of validating information. Remember January's caramelized white chocolate panna cotta episode? Of course you do. Turns out, I was not imagining that the choice of roasting vessel could double, or even triple, a recipe's estimated cooking time. According to Myrhvold et al (in their discussion of wet bulb temperatures) the choice of bakeware can cause variations up to thirty-six degrees. And don't forget humidity! At the time of my crisis I didn't even consider that as an operational nonconformance factor, but it can cause an additional variation of up to eighteen degrees. By my calculations, that's a possible error of fifty-four degrees, even without relocating oneself to a higher altitude!

I wouldn't have been so nonplussed and demoralized during my sea-level snafu if I'd had the wisdom of Modernist Cuisine by my side.

The Kid Squid had better beware.