Beetroot Tartare

I can’t believe I haven’t posted about these great beets before, I came across the method on Ideas in Food back in January, they took beetroot cooked it until tender and then dehydrated it, not so dehydrated it’s a crisp dry husk but soft, chewy, and sweet. Recently I had been thinking about these beets and what to do with them, I wanted to make a simple dish that really let the flavour of the beetroot shine, but add a couple of complementing flavours, what I ended up with is a ‘tartare’ of beetroot with ewe’s milk feta and rather food geekily olive oil powder*.

Firstly the beetroot needs to be cooked until tender, you can either steam them or as I usually do put them in a casserole dish with a few aromatics and a splash of wine, cover and put in a medium oven until fork tender, 40–60 minutes.

Remove the beetroot from the dish and allow to cool until you can handle them, then peel.


Set the oven to 65°C, or use a dehydrator if you have one. Place beets on a tray in the oven for about 12 hours. Then allow to cool and place in a bag in the fridge to allow the juices to equalise throughout the vegetable and the outer layer to rehydrate.


Finely dice the beetroot and serve a round with some olive oil powder* and ewe’s feta ‘grated’ through a sieve, and maybe a little thyme.

* Olive oil powder is made by blending together Tapioca Maltodextrin (N-Zorbit) with olive oil, then passing through a sieve. Use 1 part N-Zorbit to 3 parts Fat by weight. N-Zorbit is crazy light, 1 litre = 100 grams.

Cured Egg Yolk

Not much curing has happened in my household recently, something I mean to change, get my hands on a nice piece of pork to make some bacon, or should really stop faffing about and finally get around to making some homemade pastrami. But I’ve got to work my way back up to it, can’t just jump in headfirst, well I tell myself that, but who am I kidding, I’m just lazy, forgetful and easily distracted, ooooOoooo a kitty.

Anyway, I was in one of those moods, not really feeling like doing anything, TV wasn’t distracting enough and I didn’t feel like reading, so I thought I’d see what I could manage in the kitchen without actually producing anything to eat immediately, as I wasn’t really hungry. After staring at the pantry and then in fridge, and thinking ‘close the door, it’s not library, stop wasting power’ etc. I spied the eggs and ideas of the oft thought of but seldom produced cured egg yolk came to mind.


Pulling out the sacks of rock sea salt left over from the last egg curing madness that was kai kem eggs, I set about making a layer of salt in the bottom of a dish and digging through the draws for some cheesecloth, which I was sure was in the bottom draw, but now have no idea as I had rearranged the kitchen, disaster averted and cheese cloth in hand, a little rectangle was cut, slightly bigger than a yolk widthwise, and twice as long. An egg was cracked and carefully separated, yolk delicately placed on the cloth and wrapped gently, then placed on the salt bed, and buried in another layer of salt. The dish wrapped tightly in plastic wrap was placed in the fridge and left for 2 days.


Actually 24 hours should be enough, and quite truthfully I totally forgot about it, that is until I opened the fridge to dig about hoping to find something to eat, when I saw the bowl and remembered, oh yeah there’s a yolk in there, carefully unwrapped and salt ceremoniously (I said a little prayer at the wastage of salt) dumped in the sink, the yolk was extracted and unwrapped, placed on a pillow of kitchen paper towel and shoved with love and attention back in the fridge, where I’m sure it will be forgotten about again, not that it matters too much, the sucker needs to dry out.


Five days later, it had dried sufficiently enough for its purpose, being grated over some freshly made pasta. I set about getting the pasta sorted, two parts egg to three parts flour, mixed and kneaded and left to rest, wrapped, in the fridge for half an hour before being rolled, folded and run through a pasta machine until the desired thickness and cut into noodles. Cooked in generously salted boiling water, then drained and seasoned well with black pepper and good olive oil, dished up in a bowl and a little cheese grated over top, then finally finished with a good grating of the bright orange yolk.

“Does it taste like foot?” My partner asked as she poked her plate with her fork. Well no, be assured it is not a funky piece of dried egg with all the negative connotations one can take from eggs gone wrong, in fact it has no noticeable aroma, but the flavour is that of intense yolk, the curing and drying has concentrated all its rich wonderful flavour.

Cornbread

I'm sure the cornbread purists would argue that this is not traditional cornbread, and I would have to humbly agree, although it is indeed bready and corn is the main ingredient (in a form). So where do I stray? I use polenta, it's easier for me to get my hands on than corn meal intended for cornbread use, and I skip the sugar, most recipes I have read have about 1/4 of a cup of it, but that's just not my taste.


Cornbread has become a firm favourite to serve with a hot bowl of chilli, and it's a pleasant change from rice, tacos, tortillas, or nachos. On top of that, the variations you can make are endless.

Base ingredients
1 Cup of Flour
1 Cup of Polenta (or corn meal)
1 teaspoon of baking soda
2 teaspoons of baking powder
1 teaspoon of salt
1/3 Cup of Vegetable oil (or other fat)
1 Cup Butter milk
1 Egg

Preheat the oven to 200°C. Grease/line a loaf tin or lasagne type dish and set aside.

In a bowl whisk together the dry ingredients and set aside. In another bowl whisk together the wet ingredients and other additions (see below). Pour the wet in to the dry bowl and stir until incorporated, do this quickly as the butter milk will react with the baking soda and begin releasing its carbon dioxide. As soon as it has mixed pour it into the baking dish and place it on the middle rack of the oven, cook for 20-25 minutes, or until a knife comes out clean when pierced.


The great thing about cornbread is how customisable it is, the above has had its oil replaced with 50/50 olive oil and melted butter (unsalted), as well as chopped scallions (sounds so much more fun than spring onion) and corn kernels incorporated in the dough with a sprinkle of cheese over it.


And this loaf has had the oil replaced with beurre noisette (brown butter (unsalted)) and incorporated with the dough finely diced parsley, scallions, a touch of smoked paprika and obligatory (well I think so anyway) sprinkle of cheese.


Slices of the moist bread are great for scooping up the sauce of a hot chilli, we had it with a very spicy beef chilli.

Olive oil

Shopping at Moore Wilsons last weekend and much to my surprise I saw a little of my design work on display. I created the Gold label at least 6 years ago, good to see they're still going. Check out their website (Excuse the photo it was taken on my cellphone and the quality ain't too hot).