download Hospitality August 2010 - Foodservice Gateway

poultry & game birds
From Dan Hunter
Executive chef, Royal Mail Hotel
“This dish is bit of a retaliation against the notion
that game has to be heavy. We did this dish with
beetroot, white chocolate and rose which are pretty
classic game elements. The pigeon is roasted
quite rare — it’s definitely cooked but it’s rare. The
flavour of the blood is really important in game
and in this dish when it’s cooked correctly the
flavour of the blood and the way it plays off the
beetroot and the rose is really amazing.”
Dan Hunter
Serves four.
Ingredients
2 size 5 pigeons
For the rose and strawberry purée
7g semi dried strawberries
3.5g fresh rose petals
6.25g fresh strawberries
9g cab sav vinegar
40ml arbequina olive oil
Salt
For the beetroot
4 small Chioggia beets
2 small bulls blood beets
2 small golden beets
For the white chocolate clay
37.5g white chocolate
17.5g caolin
11.25g lactose
For the rose petals
12 rose petals
37.5g pasteurised egg white
20g castor sugar
1.5g gold leaf gelatine
Lime salt
5g mineral salt
Zest of one lime
Herbs
12 anise leaves
12 baby beet leaves
1 Clean pigeons, removing the head, neck and gizzards.
Trim off the wing tips and remove the wish
bone. Dislocate the thigh and remove the legs
through the skin taking care not to damage any
part of the breast. Using scissors cut away the back
of the bird, removing the ribs and trimming any
excess fat that may be around the bottom of the
breast. Wipe blood from the breast. Reserve legs.
2 Place pigeon ‘crowns’ into individual vacuum
bags and seal on 30 seconds. Weigh birds to determine
cooking time. Between 180-200g the birds
will take 28 minutes, 200-230g birds will need 29.
Reserve cleaned pigeons in fridge until needed.
Pigeon, beetroot, white
chocolate, rose
3 Combine strawberries and rose petals in Thermomix.
Process to paste. Add vinegar and then oil
in fine stream so it emulsifies. Pass purée through
fine chinois reserving excess oil that separates. Reserve
purée and oil in separate containers.
4 Clean the beets. Place into a pot with seasoned
water and bring to a gentle simmer. When cooked
rub the skins off whilst maintaining the natural
shape of the beetroot. Slice the beets into halves
or quarters, depending on the desired size.
5 Compress the beets on maximum pressure with
a little of the rose oil following a ratio of half oil
to weight i.e 100g beets/50g oil. Marinate for a
minimum of 12 hours. Remove from the vacuum
and portion into foil containers, season with salt,
and dress with a little more oil. Reserve covered
with film until needed.
6 Melt chocolate over a bain marie. Combine
caolin and lactose and rub the melted chocolate
into the dry mixture. Leave the ‘clay’ to cool in a
fridge and solidify. When hard, break the clay into
different sizes, sifting away the fine powder.Reserve
in a sealed container, refrigerated until needed.
7 Combine salt with the micro planed lime zest.
Rub salt and zest together so zest is evenly distributed
through the salt. Make the salt as close to
service as possible to retain lime aroma.
8 For the rose petals start with hydrating the gelatine,
squeeze out excess water and dissolve it in a
microwave. Warm the egg white, dissolving the
sugar with it and combine the mixture with the
gelatine. Using a fine brush coat the rose petals
with the egg mixture and place them into a dehydrator
on the lowest setting to slowly dry out and
crisp. When crisp transfer the petals to a vacuum
seal bag taking care not to damage them. The best
method is to place the petals into a container first
and then vacuum seal the container.
9. Place the pigeons into a 65C water bath for the
required cooking time (depending on weight).
Once cooked transfer immediately to a blast chiller
and stop the cooking process. When cool remove
pigeons from the bag, dry off any blood and allow
the skin to dry out.
10 To reheat, place the birds into a 100C oven for
one minute and then under a salamander skin side
up for one minute. Blow torch the skin to a nice
roasted colour and then place the pigeons again under
a salamander back side up for 1.5 minutes.
Place the beets to warm in an oven.
11 To serve, spread some rose purée across the centre
of a flat rectangular plate and cover it with the
white chocolate clay. On the far left of the purée
place the beetroots, dress them with more of the
rose/strawberry oil and place leaves on top. Carve
both breasts from the birds taking care not to damage
the fillet and then carve each breast lengthways
into two. Rub lime salt onto the breasts, place two
halves (one whole breast) on each plate and press
two rose petals onto the pigeon.
30 hospitality | august 2010 hospitalitymagazine.com.au