Benjamin Henion

Kitchens have always been a place to make people look and feel stupid. That's why it takes a certain breed of people to work in restaurants . We have done everything to haze the FNG's ( F'n New Guys) that we could come up with. Telling the bus boy to empty the hot water from the coffee machine, or fill up the water fountain before clocking out are a couple good ones. There is always telling the new salad guy to hurry up and get a bucket of steam from the steam machine downstairs or having them run to a neighboring kitchen to borrow the meat stretcher. Well, today I had a cook bring in this terrific can of dehydrated water. The can list its uses which include dry mopping, dry cleaning and my favorite is making dry ice. Its just a great idea. Being able to put an actual can of dehydrated water on the shelf. The instructions are easy too, empty contents into one gallon of water. Stir until dissolved . Chill and serve. Good luck FNG , good luck. I can honestly say, having ...

I wrapped this bite of veal in Prosciutto ham and gave it a nice sear. I then made a mushroom ragout with tiny diced portobella mushrooms, shallots, garlic, and deglazed with a Chardonnay and stewed with a beautiful veal demi -glace. I used the peelings from asparagus and fried them to make a nice "bed" for the amuse. A simple brunoise of red bell pepper gives a nice visual contrast to the dish. Seafood buffet ususally kills most of our ala carte business, but I hope to share this veal dish with a few lucky guests tonight.

A sort of knock-off of my lunch steak sandwich, this amuse has a ton of flavor. I cubed some beef tenderloin, rubbed it with garlic and cumin, then grilled it. Then I took our version of chimichurri (with cilantro and pepitas ) topped the beef and finished it in the oven. It is cooked to a nice medium, which takes no time due to the size of the portion. A simple sourdough crostini , mango pico de gallo and an avocado puree round of this one bite course.

I picked these lychee up at the large Asian market near my house. Lychee is a fruit native to south China. There are several different types of lychee , also spelled litchi, leechee , and a few others spellings. Most have a somewhat spiny, tough yet thin skin that varies in color from bright reds, to greens and yellows. The fruit has a hard seed in the center which pulls from the flesh fairly easily. The juicy aromatic flesh usually has an opaque whitish pinkish appearance . It has a similar texture to grapes I recall eating off the vine at my grandparents years ago. Lychee is low in saturated fat, very low in cholesterol and sodium, and is a very good source of copper and vitamin C (40% more than an orange). It has higher levels of Beta carotene than carrots. It is said to enhance the feeling of well-being and is said to prevent blood clots, severe cell damage and reduce strokes, up to 50 %, in heart patients.

I decided to do my own spin on gravlox . I cured the salmon with cumin, lime zest, cilantro, chili powder, tequila, coriander and garlic along with the salt and sugar. It probably cured a little long, but the consistency was nice. I diced the salmon and mixed it with a fresh mango pico de gallo . I used the pomegranate caviar from my last post as a garnish for this amuse- bouche .

I ran into the problem of having to come up with an alternative for pomegranate seeds for a relish today. I got online and found a recipe for making pomegranate caviar from gelatin rather than the sodium alginate and calcium chloride method. These are a little more firm than using the spherephication method, but works well since the dish require they be tossed with other ingredients before serving. The method consists of blooming the powdered gelatin (3tsp) with cold water (4Tbs). I then added heated pomegranate juice (3 oz) to the gelatin mixture and poured it into a squeeze bottle. I then dripped the mixture into chilled olive oil ( grape seed oil works well with pomegranate). After just a moment the liquid firms up and simply straining the caviar from the oil finishes this component. It has held its shape now for several hours.

Here is what we encounter on a daily basis. The picture on the left is of the resorts lake and golf course at about 3pm today. It looks like a lovely day to be out golfing or BBQing right? Well we do in fact have a party that plans to be outdoors at 6pm tonight, and if you look 90 degrees to the right of picture number one, at the same time the right photo what you would see. Now of course we have an indoor back-up plan, but setting up both places requires breaking down both places. We want nothing more that perfect weather for these groups, but mother nature tends to tease us into believing the weather will cooperate. Maybe this threatening looking cloud with just pass on by and by 6 the sky will once again be clear. My guess is that the party will be having an indoor BBQ tonight .