Brown Veal Stock

Altough, I still have no clear plan about Christmas dinner, it is not a bad idea to start at the basics. This means to prepare some more stock to be on the safe side. I believe there is no such thing like "too much stock in stock". Some days ago I cooked Gordon Ramsay's vegetable stock, and now I decided to cook his veal stock instead of the usual one. I spent almost the whole day in the kitchen but it was worth it! This stock is simply gorgeous. I froze almost the whole amount, but I left bit aside for my lunch, that I am going to post tomorrow. Now let's see that magical stock!


Ingredients:
3 kg beef bones
200 ml olive oil
2 large onions
4 large carrots
4 parsley roots (not in the original recipe)
1 leek (not in the original recipe)
3 celery stalks
1/2 garlic bulb
2 tablespoon tomato puree
350 ml Madeira
350 ruby port
10 l cold water
200 g mushrooms
1 bouquet garni (2 outer leaves of a leek, 1/2 celery stalk,
1 sprig thyme, 1 bay leaf, each 1/2 teaspoon black and white peppercorns
6 coriander seeds)


Preheat oven to 220°C and roast with half of the olive oil drizzled veal bones for 1-1 1/2 hours until browned. Heat the remaining oil in a large pot and fry the chopped vegetables and garlic until coloured. Stir in tomato puree and fry for another 2 minutes. Add Madeira and port and reduce until it has a thick consistency. Drain roasted bones and add to the pot. Pour cold water over it and bring it to boil. Reduce the heat, add mushroom and bouquet garni and simmer for 6 hours. Skim off as often as needed. Let it cool a bit and strain through a muslim-lined colander. If you want you can reduce by half for a more intense flavour.

Vegetable stock once more!

For the first time I prepared Gordon Ramsay's vegetable stock, that is quite different from the one I usually prepare. It is done pretty fast and it is not much work at all. The only thing I changed is that I added some parsley roots and some leaves of sage as well.


Ingredients:
3 onions
1 leek
2 celery stalks
6 carrots
1 garlic
1 lemon
some white peppercorns
1/2 bay leaf
2 star anise
each 1 twig tarragon, basil, coriander, thyme, parsley and chervil
200 ml dry white wine

Chop veggies, half garlic, slice lemon and put all together in a pot among peppercorns, bay leaf and star anise. Bring it to cook with 2000 ml water and let it simmer for 10 minutes. Set aside, add herbs and wine. Let it cool completly and if possible let it stand for 24 hours.

Beef Glace de Viande

Yesterday I spent my whole afternoon preparing beef glace. It takes quite a lot of work and though I was toally happy with the result, I ended up with about 150-200 ml glace out of 800 g beef bones. I wish you could have a smell of it! It is simply fantastic! Mmm... and now some infos about stock and co:
Let there be stock! Stock is actually very similar to broth, but usually broth refers to the finished product, while stock is used as an ingredient. Stock is prepared by simmering various ingredients, such as: meat, bones, mirepoix, herbs an spices. Mirepoix is a combinations of onions, carrots and celery or sometimes other vegetables. Spices is usually added in a form of bouquet garni that contains various ingredients, depending on the stock you want to prepare.
There are many types of stock:
Fond brun (brown stock): bones and mirepoix are roasted, that gives it a brown colour.
Fond blanc (white stock): raw bones and white mirepoix.
Jus is a rich, lightly reduced stock.
Demiglace is any rich stock that is reduced half to enrich it.
Glace de viande is made the same way but it is reduced about 8-10 times more to have a really thick and highly concentrated reduction at the end.


Ingredients:
2500 g beef bones
500 g onion
250 g carrot
100 g celery
8 tablespoons oil
6-8 white peppercorns
1 bay leaf
2 cloves
2 juniper berries
1 twig thyme
1/2 garlic clove

Preheat oven to 180°C and roast bones until golden brown. Meanwhile chop vegetables. Pour oil from the roasted bones, add vegetables and roast until brown. Transfer everything in a large pot and pour water in the empty roasting tin. Scrap up all brown bits on the bottom of the pan and add this to the pot with the veggies and bones. Fill it up with water and add herbs and spices. Cook for 1 1/2 - 2 hours, while removing foam and fat as often as needed. Sieve and cook over low heat until it thickens. It can be kept in the fridge up to 3 months.

Fish stock

There is a smaller bunch of desserts waiting to be posted, but now it is time to share the fish stock recipe I used on friday. Generally flatfsh is the best to use for cooking stock, because that gives a strong aroma.


Ingredients:
200-300 g fish bones (and/or other parts)
2 celery stalks
1 carrot
1 onion
30-50 ml sherry or white wine
1 bay leaf
about 10 coriander seeds

Slice vegetables and put everything into a pot. Pour water over it so that is about 2 fingers high above the fish parts. Bring it right under the boiling point and cook for about 20 minutes.

Chicken Broth

Some chicken wings were hanging around in my fridge, and as I was almost out of chicken stock I decided to cook a new portion. As most of the time when I cook stock the lunch is risotto. I wanted something simple so I decided for a classical risotto. A classical risotto contains a good quality chicken broth, butter, onion, risotto rice, white wine and the most important part is the mantecatura: the cold butter and the parmesan. I have never added the butter cold to any risotto I cooked before, until now. I bet that made the difference!...and that I followed Locatelli's description. After I tried, it felt like I had first time risotto in my life. It was the typical wow effect, if you know what I mean. It's definitely worth to sink in the lines in Locatelli's book about risotto! Anyway it was the best risotto, that has ever left my kitchen, maybe except the one with porcini, but that is unfair because porcini are invincible, at least to me.


Ingredients:
500 g chicken wings or bones
1/2 tablespoon tomato puree
3 carrots
1 onion
2-3 celery stalks
3 parsley root
1 bay leaf
3 black peppercorns
2 juniper berry

Heat oven to 220°C and roast chicken wings until golden brown. Smear tomato puree on it and roast for another 3-4 minutes.


Add chicken and vegetables in a big pot together with 3-4 liter of water. On low heat bring it just under the boiling point and let it simmer for 3-4 hours.

Vegetable Stock: Reloaded!

There are so many options to prepare vegetable stock, I guess every household has its own way. Today it was time to make another portion as there was only one small box left in the freezer. This time I let myself inspire by Giorgio Locatelli, who is my absolute favourite chef. His way of making vegetable stock means simply simmering. Of course you can use any vegetable you desire. I can't wait to prepare a portion of luscious risotto with it.


Ingredients:
3 tablespoon olive oil
4 handful of fresh or frozen pea
2 handful of spinach
4 carrots
3 parsley roots
4 onions
2 leeks
4 celery stalks
2 potatoes


Heat olive oil, add pea and mash. Add the rest of the vegetables and let it stew until they start to split. Pour about 3 liters of cold water over and heat until a short before it would reach the boiling point. Reduce heat and let it simmer for 20 minutes.

Precooking for Christmas Dinner Vol. 2

Today it was time to prepare some more parts of my planned 7 course Christmas dinner. I cooked vegetable stock and made the decoration for the dessert: chocolate roses. I found a great tutorial in the Cake on the Brain blog. I never thought that would be so easy to model with chocolate and so much fun!



Ingredients:
3-4 carrots
3 celery stalks
1 small piece of celery
1 leek
1 big onion
1 clove
10 black peppercorn
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1 bunch of parsley
200 ml white wine
2 l water
1 teaspoon olive oil


Heat oil and roast halved onion until golden brown. Add chopped veggies and let it stew for 20 minutes. Add wine and let it reduce. Add clove, thyme, parsley, peppercorn and water and cook for another 20 minutes. Sieve and it is ready to use, or freeze. It is important to know if you cook vegetable stock, do not cook it longer than 45 minutes.

Precooking for Christmas Dinner

As some of you might have noticed, I have not been posting regularly the past months. This has a simple explanation: I did not cook for several reasons. Anyway I missed cooking very much, and of course my head was almost exploding with ideas: what and how and when to cook. That brought me to the decision to prepare this year a 7 course dinner for Christmas in order to catch up with my long "to cook" list. I planned already everything and it is going to be quite a task to prepare each course on time. One thing is sure: it is going to be a lot of fun! Yesterday I cooked beef jus for the main course and froze it.


Ingredients:
4 kg beef bones
200 g carrot
200 g parsley root
200 g celery
200 g leek
2 onions
200 g tomato puree
2 garlic cloves
1/2 bunch of thyme
2 bay leaves
2-3 cloves
10 black peppercorn
500 ml red wine
4 tablespoon oil


Wash and dry bones. Either you roast them in the oven or heat oil and roast bones for about 10 minutes while stirring occasionally. Add a glass of hot water and let it cook until it is absorbed. Add sliced vegetables, tomato puree, spices and herbs and roast for another 5 minutes. Pour wine on it and let it reduce. Add 4-4,5 liter water and cook for 4-5 hours. Skim often! Sieve and let it cool, remove fat from the top and store in the freezer in small portions.