Heirloom Tomato Bavarois... I think

Big Gnarley Tomato

So the tomatofest is coming up this Sunday at Cedarbrook.  Overall a very cool event, run by an extremely hep kat of a chef Roy Breiman.  He invited me (via text ;) to be one of the chefs about four months ago, but honestly I didn't really think much about it.  Do you want to do a tomato themed event in August?  Ummm.... sure.  cool.

But of course, that was back when I was at the Swinery, with a kitchen, and tools, and a crew.  Now, I am sitting in my kitchen at home wondering... WTF?  Sexy bites for 160?  Sure, I can do this, but what?  The essence of this event is to make the tomato sing, not to hide it.  We each get 30# of crazy good mixed heirlooms and need to make something to fuel the 6 hour long event.  I have been pulling my hair out for weeks trying to think of what to do.

I don't want to cook them, cause why bother using heirlooms if you are going to cook them down; I don't want to really mess with them anyway at all frankly.  BLTs? ;)  Now that my cheap bacon source is gone, that seems a little silly.  Besides, talk about being type cast.

So thanks in part to a conversation with KT, I decided to do a cold terrine of layered heirlooms and goat cheese, held together with tomato aspic.  But now this has evolved into a bavarois of sorts.  (Honestly I am rereading Julie/Julia project and was annoyed about how big of a deal that she made out of the orange bavarian).

Your standard Bavarois/Bavarian is a creme anglais custard, set with gelatin, then with whip cream folded in, just before the whole thing sets up.  So it is light, airy, and moussey.  The goal here is going to be make it with goat cheese, tomato aspic, and whipped cream. Then top it with a tomato "petal" then set the whole thing into a mold that is lined with a layer of tomato aspic.  Except I want basil in there somehow, and I can decide how.  (Do I make a basil puree and fold it into the goat cheese, thus making a green cloud in the middle, or do I put whole leaves in the middle, or a chiffonade in the aspic?)

Dunno, but I only have 4 hours on Saturday night to finish and set up the bloody things.  which is no where near enough.

Step 1: Blanch the tomatoes... quickly in boiling water, shock, peel.

Tomato Petals draining

Step 2: Concasse: Cut the tomatoes in quarters, carefully removing the center flesh and seeds.  Save these for the aspic.  Salt remaining flesh "petals" lightly and set aside to drain overnight.

Step 3: Make tomato water: Mash all of the pulp with a potato masher or pulse in a food processor.  Set aside to drain in a cheesecloth lined colander.  The water should be more or less clear.  Repeat if desired.  This step will take about 4 hours.

drip drip drip

Step 4: Set the tomato water... ok, so here is the first pseudo tricky part.  First off, having to use powdered gelatin, which is in itself annoying.  But how set do we want it here?  Hmm, I vote sliceable gel.  So I just turn to my handy-dandy Garde Manger book... DOH!  At the Swinery.  grrr.  Thank God for the internet!  I looked up gelatin gel strength and found the exact same table stolen from the CIA garde manger book! http://bit.ly/cqvrZ6 .  Ok, it says I need to use 1 oz of gelatin per pint of tomato water for a sliceable gel.  Gelatin first needs to be bloomed in cold liquid (until it looks grainy) then heated gently to 120F and it clears.  Then it can be added to the main batch and the whole thing sets up.  Later, I will melt some and reset it in the molds.

Stupid plastic bowl thingies
The Trailer Park equivalent of a Bavarian Mold!!

Step 5: Line the molds.  Ok, so what the heck am I going to use for molds.  I don't have the room, time, resources, or molds to actually make 160 of these buggers and the tomato petals are too big for that.  (yes, I know they could be cut down, bite me).  So, with my very very limited budget, I ran off to Cash and Carry and pick up little plastic rice bowls.  They should work nicely and each finished product can be sliced into wedges and serves 6.  Sweet.  I only hope the gelatin doesn't pick up the recycle logo!

OK, take your warm but not hot, tomato aspic and pour about an ounce into each one.  We want a nice layer to hold the tomato petal.  Dammit, come to think of it, I should really cut the petals with cutters.  grrr. It will look nicer. ok.  I am in.

As an aside: Why I owe my life to Colin Aleveras (But why I hate him too) by Gabriel Claycamp.

When I first graduated CIA, I worked at an amazing restaurant in NYC called the Tasting Room.  Colin and Renee were young punk rock kids who opened their little dream wine bar in the East Village.  Colin shaved his mohawk and took out most of the piercings.  They went to France and staged at Arpege (God's own Michelin 3-star) and came back and rounded up some investors.  I was their first sous chef right after they opened in the fall of '99.

Fresh out of "the best culinary school in the world" (hahah) I thought I was the shit.  Until you go to NY and realize, CIA grads are a dime a dozen.  We are very similar to the Puerto Rican illegals doing the dishes, other than often the latinos are better cooks.  Colin wasted no time in breaking me of my cocky attitude and showed me how good a chef can be. 

I learned a lot from Colin (who became kind of my big brother) but the most important lesson I took away from him was this: IF YOU THINK OF A WAY TO MAKE IT BETTER, AND YOU CHOOSE NOT TO, YOU ARE THE WORST KIND OF HACK.  You can not look something in the eye and not improve it.  Better to turn a blind eye to something, then identify how to fix it and not.  This has carried over into all aspects of my life.  Tis a very frustrating rule.  Anyway, back to the bavarians.

9pm Saturday Night: Alright, back from my other gig and truly not too excited about this whole process.  The Aspic is set nicely, tastes fine.  Now I need to melt it down and pour a little in each mold.  There are 50 of them to do and it takes my whole dining room table.  Then a round cut out of each tomato petal in each one.  The catch is, you have to wait till the gel sets up again, at least mostly, or the tomato will sink down to the bottom and will be poking out when the bavarian gets unmolded.  add 30 minutes.  Did I mention that I hate jello?

10PM: Make the actual Bavarian base: To start this, I  

dumped 2 # of goat cheese in the kitchen aid and paddle the hell out of it until smooth and creamy.  Meanwhile, I made a gelatin solution on the stove with a quart of half and half.  This is where things start to go wrong... 

Goat cheese, tomato guts, basil

Ok, so mix the warmed gelatin solution in with the goat cheese, then whip cream and fold it in, simple, yes?  It isn't going to yield enough however, so panic insues.  I decide (it is after 11pm at this point and I have been up since 6AM) to take the residual puree of the tomato seeds and fold that into the goat cheese.  Sounds good, right?  I adjust seasoning and dump it in.  Then add a chiffonade of basil for color.  Fold together and voila!  ...

Um sort of.  It is still too warm to start to set, and one of the catches of a bavarian is that you have to stir often as it begins to set otherwise it will SEPARATE (sounds ominous) This mean pull everything out of the refrigerator to make room for a giant bowl.  And stir every 10 minutes for then next 40 freaking minutes.  

An aside: Midnight: I have decided that now would be a good time to quit drinking for a while.  I need to purge a bit, and besides, there isn't anything to drink in the house other than an old bottle of tequila, which I swear is corked (didn't know that could happen).  I haven't been drinking all day, and well hell, I might as well keep it up for a few weeks. 

So, it is midnight, I am just pouring the bavarian batter into the molds and I am very sober.  It sucks.  This really should be done with a lot of bourbon. Oh well.  By 12:30 they are all poured and starting to set.  It is going to be ok.  I will find out in the morning. 

This is the kitchen right now:  I hate Jello and Tomatoes.