Friday, February 18, 2005

Tasting menu opus

I'm sitting here pondering a tasting menu that I will probably never do, but don't want to lose the ideas so I will write them down, have someone steal them and make them and call them their own and get rich and famous for it and I'll still be here writing a run-on sentence with no forseeable end. End. Here's my imaginary (for now) tasting menu in 9 courses. Amuse bouche: A cold seared scallop lollipop wrapped in yuzu gelee inset with chive in a pomegranate molasses. Dish number 2: Spoon of spicy ahi tuna brunoise in mustard oil. Course three: Green and white asparagus salad topped with baby greens in 4-citrus vinaigrette. Intermezzo: Mango and bourbon granita. Course five: Some kind of red meat. This is the course I'm currently at odds with. We'll come back to this one later, or I'll willingly consider any suggestions. Course six: Baked breast of squab on crispy basil chips with a chardonnay sauce. Cheese course: 3 cheese course consisting of some kind of chevre, a cow's milk, and a sheep's milk cheese served with candied citrus peels. Dessert course: Mini white chocolate bread puddings served with rum and caramel sauce. Mignardise: A droplet of cognac-ganache suspended in a cube of champagne gelee dusted with sugar. Some would argue that the Amuse-bouche, intermezzo, and mignardise do not constitute a course since they are typically left off the printed menu making that actually a six-course menu. I however call it nine and would say so the printed menu where it only showed the six primary courses. This is assuming I would even state the items on the menu. This particular menu tells a story as well as leads the patron on a topographical journey. It starts at the bottom of the sea with scallop and then moves into the middle of the ocean with the tuna. It then moves onto land with the salad and from there into land beast with "some kind of red meat", wow, I'm really stuck here. It then moves into the air with the squab...yes, a pigeon, a flying rat, whatever. It moves back down to land with the cheese, and then the bread pudding, and comes full circle with the common element of a gelee at the end. This is quite an ambitious menu and hope one day to produce it. This is what I think of as I'm laying in bed trying to sleep. Now, I can probably fall asleep if I try. We'll know if I can't if there's another entry within an hour or so of this one. Goodnite. Find me a meat dish!

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