Sarah, one of our close friends, is a regular participant of my dubiously entitled Cooking Masterclass, occasionally referred to as a 'Fancy Pants Dinner'. Sarah expressed an interest in learning a bit about Japanese food. As chance would have it, Sheila had recently bought me a new cookbook,
Nobu Now.
Nobuyuki Matsuhisa is a world renowned restauranteur and chef and has almost 20 restaurants all over the world. So, I decided to send through photographs of the index page to Sarah and I asked her to choose the menu.
This turned out to be a trifle of an oversight as Sarah chose the
Kobe beef main course and the Layered Hazelnut Cake which both seemed innocuous in the title until you read the recipe or investigated
cost... The Wagyu 'Kobe-Style' fillet cost a whopping £160 per kg (not even the true Japanese beef but from Australia) and the layered hazelnut cake had 6 tricky elements!
Sheila, being the pastry queen now, had to make Hazelnut Wafers, Caramel Ice Cream, Hazelnut Succes (a type of meringue biscuit), Roast Hazelnuts, Cabernet Sauce and Chocolate Sticks... and this is all before garnishing! A few of the elements also required prep 24 - 48 hours in advance. In comparison, my starter and main course role was easy!
In addition to the Kobe Beef and Hazelnut Cake, Sarah asked to be taught how to make Sushi rolls. Phew... this is something I can do with a reasonable level of skill. A quick gloss over the sushi as the blog is really about the beef dish.
Learning to roll...
Salmon and Daikon Maki...
Tempura Prawn and Avocado Maki with Sesame Seeds...
And onto the beef dish. Even though our budget did not extend to Wagyu beef, I did still choose a top quality
British Organic beef fillet that had been well aged. In addition, I learnt about a new type of mushroom that I was worried I wouldn't be able to source. Silly me, because of course it would be available from our favourite Oriental food store,
Korea Foods! This was the
Eringi mushroom, a big old fella that I found shelves full of at the store.
The ingredients (for 6):
3 Eringi mushrooms
30g Black Truffle
3 cloves Garlic
50ml
Sake
Shichimi Togarashi
50ml Olive Oil
50ml Lemon Juice (supposed to be
yuzu juice, but our store didn't stock it)
20ml Soy Sauce
750g Beef Fillet
Salt and Black Pepper
Jalapeno Salsa
2 Green Jalapeno Chilli
1 Red Onion
50ml Olive Oil
50ml Lemon Juice
The first thing I did was preheat the oven to 200C before jumping directly into the mise en place. Grabbing my knife, I sliced the Eringi mushroom into thin slices, maintaining the mushroom shape.
Next I moved onto slicing the truffle and garlic.
This was all added to an oven tray along with the sake, olive oil, lemon juice, soy sauce and shichimi togarashi. I gave it a good toss to coat and mix all the ingredients and then covered the oven dish in foil. This I put to one side till later.
Next I moved onto the salsa. I deseeded the chilli and finely diced the flesh.
Then I peeled and finely diced the onion.
This was all mixed well in a bowl along with the olive oil and lemon juice. I covered the bowl with cling film and put it in the fridge till service.
Time to brown the fillet. I heated up a pan and added a little oil and when hot, I placed the seasoned fillet into the pan and browned each of the sides. The fillet then went into the oven for about 20 minutes. Halfway through the oven cooking of the fillet, I added the Eringi mushrooms to the oven and started their cooking. The mushrooms would need about 15-20 minutes.
As the fillet reached it's 20 minutes, I removed this from the oven, covered it in foil and allowed it to rest for about 10 minutes. During this time, I steamed the green beans and got the plates ready for service. Next, I sliced the rested beef and by this time, the mushrooms had reached their 20 minutes and I removed them from the oven. Plating was simple and required a spoonful of the mushroom onto the middle of each plate.
Next I layered 3 slices of beef per person on top of the mushroom followed by a couple of spoonfuls of the salsa over the top of the beef and finally the green beans draped over the top.
I found this dish to be very tasty, quite fresh and light, with a lingering spicy tickle from the Shichimi. The beef was excellent, soft, succulent and beautifully rare. The mushrooms were tasty with the shichimi heat and the salt and sour from the soy and lemon juice adding a great balance of flavour. The texture was new to me but definitely not unpleasant. It was soft and slightly slimy with a dense texture. Apparently it is a texture similar to Abalone which doesn't surprise me as my first thought about the texture when eating it was oyster but with a beautiful earthy mushroom flavour. I also really enjoyed the hot beef and mushrooms contrasting with the cold salsa. A really yummy plate of food!
With main course finished we moved onto the dessert. Oh wow... delicious velvety ice cream, sweet syrupy cabernet sauce and soft chewy meringue biscuit. I want more please... but this requires giving Sheila at least 4 days notice!
Another delightful evening spent with friends, experimenting with recipes from our cookbook range and learning a thing or two. What more could you ask for, really?
