fideo
with saffron oil

I made this a looong time ago. I just did whatever I could to garnish this dish and make it look decent, even if it didn’t make sense. Notice the Italian curly parsley and Thai basil on this Spanish classic. Sorry if I offended anybody; I know better now.
 

pasta
alla vodka

Pasta + vodka? Can’t mess that up. And if you do, just omit the pasta and everything will be just fine.

crispy braised pork belly
with maldon & cilantro

Slow-cooked, chilled, sliced, then rendered until golden. Crispy on the outside and delicately soft on the inside.

fried foie gras
with celery ribbon, maldon sea salt, meyer & lemon

Another view.

carne asada fries / lomo saltado
skirt steak, kennebec french fries, peppers

Carne asada fries sure feels like it was a recent phenomenon, but it’s basically the same as lomo saltado, which is a much older South American dish. Go to a good South American joint and order some of the stuff; you’ll find that the original just shits on any carne asada fries you’ve ever had.

For this I used kennebec potatoes for the fries, skirt steak for the beef, and a pan sauce made from soy sauce and a bit of sugar. Super minimal and very addictive.

fred steak
mystery meat

Every time I visit the Schaub’s butchery in Palo Alto, I pace the floor contemplating whether I should buy the mysteriously dark meat sitting behind the glass that all the locals seem to be clamoring for. For whatever reason, I never go for it. Luckily, our guest pastry chef at the time, Jenna (who is awesome, by the way) offered me some to take home.

As I said before, this shit is intensely black, like, light doesn’t escape its surface, kind of black. I paired it with whipped potatoes and a simple pan sauce. It was good. I think the flavor profile for something like this would be pretty decent, sliced thin, in a sandwich though. Gotta try that some time.

Here is some more info about Fred steak.

http://thisweekfordinner.com/2009/12/22/freds-steak/

mango ‘soda pop’
whipped cream, mango coulis, pop rocks

This was the cleanser that was paired with the fried foie gras pictured below. It’s supposed to be a play on a mango soda pop in a mini push pop form.

fried foie gras
with celery ribbon, maldon sea salt, meyer & lemon

This was an amuse bouche that was coupled with a Mango Soda Pop palate cleanser. The idea was to have the diner eat the foie in one bite and after fully consumed, wash it down with a mango/pop rock push pop.

The embarrassing reality was when we went to fry the foie it immediately fell apart so we had to go with an unfried variant. What was really upsetting was that we had fried a bunch off prior to sample and it came out fine (hence the picture). I think we overcrowded the fryer and all the bubbles agitated the breading off of the foie gras. Oh well, gotta try it again sometime, I guess.

@palantir

rib-eye carpaccio
dry-aged marin sun farms beef, dijon microgreens with lemon oil, white truffle oil, black truffle salt, saba (aged balsamic), shaved parmesan

This was an attempt at making carpaccio with rib-eye instead of filet. I took the eye of fat in the meat out, trimmed the sides, wrapped it up tight to shape a log, compressed it in the cryovac machine, and then froze it before slicing.

It worked out remarkably well. The proteins fused together even without transglutaminase. The extra marbling made the carpaccio more unctuous than if made with filet.

@palantir

sous-vide california halibut
with butternut squash puree, brussel leaves, bull’s blood, lobster demi

I kept this dish simple, but it turned out to be really good.

@palantir

everything apples
apple sorbet, distilled apple water, apple caviar, & fresh apples

As apples approach the end of their season, I wanted to give it a proper send off with this all-apple inspired dessert.

Work has been fun lately.

@palantir

sous-vide magret duck breast
with compressed melon, cucumber salad, huckleberries, and vanilla-infused olive oil.

This was made for a class focused on sous-vide cooking.

sweet potato gnocci carbornara
sapporito gnocci, sous-vide egg, & guanciale bacon

@google

grilled lamb chops
with mint vinaigrette & micro-herb salad

@google

stoner pb & j
bananas, marshmallows, funfetti frosting

I’m all about fine cuisine, but sometimes you just gotta take a break from all the fancy food, especially when you are high out of your mind. When you’re high, junk food is like sex—except in your mouth.

Sorry, that was gross. Enjoy the picture.

salt & pepper shrimp
alaskan spot prawns, garlic chives, szechuan peppercorns, cilantro

surf & turf
slow-cooked rib-eye, salt-roasted lobster, celery root puree, glace de foie, brussel leaves sauteed with bacon

Thanksgiving at my mom’s rarely ever involves turkey—we like our beef. This cut of ribeye was about 3 inches thick, bone-in. A good technique to cooking a piece of meat this large is to roast it in an oven preheated to 200 degrees F, stick a thermometer in the center of the meat, and pull it out when it reaches 125 internal temp. Let the meat rest and don’t poke or prod it—just leave it alone for 20 minutes. The steak pictured above is actually fully cooked, but it looks raw because it’d been cooked so gently.

Meanwhile, heat up a cast iron pan. When the pan gets hot (about the same time you should allow the steak to rest), coat the pan with oil and drop the steak in. Don’t forget to season it heavily with salt and pepper, this helps with the sear. After 2 minutes, flip the steak and sear for another 2 minutes. You can cut into the steak immediately now, since you’d let it rest for 20 minutes prior.

For the brussel sprouts, I hulled the outer leaves and sauteed them with butter and bacon. In the end, this turned out to be one hell of a surf and turf dish as there are about 5 animals on this plate alone: steak - cow, poached egg - chicken, lobster - er…lobster, bacon - pig, foie gras sauce - duck.

vietnamese garlic noodles
with crispy fried onions & thai basil

I use the word, ‘Vietnamese’ in the title loosely because this dish was created in the states by Vietnamese Americans and not a traditional recipe by a long shot. I’m not sure of the exact origin, but Crustacean, a San Francisco restaurant run by the An familiy, popularized the dish, and many a variation have spawned since.

Here’s my version:

1 lb fresh lo mein noodles
8 cloves garlic, minced/crushed
1 stick unsalted butter
2 tbl oyster sauce
2 tbl sugar
1 tbl vinegar, distilled white
1 bunch thai basil, leaves picked
1 bunch scallions, chopped fine
1 handful bean sprouts
2 tbl grated parmesan cheese

First, blanch the noodles per the instructions on the package (they vary from brand to brand). Drain, rinse, and cool the noodles.

In a frying pan, add half of the butter and sautee with garlic on medium heat. Sweat for 2 minutes, but do not allow the garlic to brown. Add oyster sauce, sugar, and vinegar and incorporate with butter. Add the noodles and bean sprouts. Season with salt and pepper. Sautee until evenly hot. Remove the noodles from the heat and add the remaining butter, parmesan cheese, half of the basil and scallions. Toss noodles.

Garnish noodles with remainder of basil and scallions, fried garlic, and fried onions. Add some lobster or crab to this recipe and you are fuckin’ golden.

 char-broiled steak
with chunky chimichurri

We’ve been getting an unusual amount of sunshine this winter, so last week my friends and I decided to head to the park for some barbecue and outdoor games.

For the steak I took some chuck and hard-seared it on a grill that we dropped all the way down so that it sat directly on the coals. It’s seasoned with salt and pepper, and then brushed with a glaze made from soy sauce, dijon, brown sugar, and orange juice.

The trick for an even pinkness is to flip the meat very often so the core temperature can’t ever get too hot. You probably won’t be able to achieve that generic cross-hatch grill mark look, but I think that’s so played out anyway, so let’s just forget about it altogether.

I prefer my chimichurri chunky and hand-chopped. Some restaurants blend all the ingredients together until it turns into a diarrhea-like substance. I’m good off that.

caprese salad
heirloom tomatoes, fresh mozz, radishes, purple & green basil, saba, and arbequina olive oil & vanilla sorbet

I always thought it’d be fun to do a tomato dessert when tomatoes are at their sweetest. This past year, the weather was so fucked up that I didn’t taste a good tomato until late Octover, early November (which was when this picture was taken).

This is a classic caprese salad reinterpreted as a dessert using saba balsamic vinegar and an olive oil sorbet.