| Salt crust roast chicken with sides |
Being Chinese, family has always been a central part of my life growing up (although I have a very different appreciation of it now than when I was a kid). Food in turn has been pretty central to bonding. Whenever I go back home to Taiwan, we always share meals with other family members.
Although we mostly go out to restaurants nowadays (Taiwan is a crowded place and most people have pretty tiny kitchens at home), my early memories of family bonding involve eating shared dishes around a table that have been prepared by my grandmother. She was a fantastic cook and would always cook for the whole family. I didn't fully appreciate it at the time, because I remember always wanting to eat out at restaurants or go to McDonald's. I guess it's in the nature of children to want what other kids are having (or what they think other kids are having).
Unfortunately my grandmother passed on a few years ago, but I always associate home cooking with her, and I know that my mom certainly does. As such, cooking for my mom on Mother's Day is kind of like a celebration for her mother as well.
| Fried bananas flambéed in Cointreau with homemade vanilla and macadamia ice cream. |
Anyhow, I thought that I'd make a roast for my mom. The weather in Melbourne has been horrible of late, and I thought that a roast would be a perfect way to take the edge off the chilliness. In particular, I had always wanted to try roasting a Chicken using a Salt Crust Pastry and thought that it'd be something my parents have never heard of and would enjoy.
I understand that baking chicken in Salt Crust pastry is a classical French technique that produces a beautifully seasoned and really moist bird (although I understand that many different cultures have their own salt crust techniques, including the Chinese). I understand that this cooking method has a few major benefits:
· The salt Crust Pastry insulates against the heat of the oven and allows the bird to cook gently and evenly.
· The salt crust pastry keeps moisture from escaping, allowing the bird to steam gently in its own juices and forces whatever flavours you add (herbs, vegetables, fruit) to spread throughout the chicken (as opposed to just flavouring the surface).
· The salt crust pastry gently seasons the bird mildly with salt – much more evenly than if you were to salt the bird yourself and more importantly, allows the salt to penetrate the meat.
· As a bonus, when the fat renders from the chicken skin, it gets absorbed by the salt crust pastry. This means even though the skin won’t be crisped, it won’t be slimy or oily either.
The downside is that because you are effectively steaming the chicken, you won’t get a golden crispy skin at the end using this technique. However, all of the other positives easily make up for this. If you really want to crisp up the skin at the end (assuming you can resist carving up and eating the bird then and there), I suspect it can be done manually by pouring hot oil over the skin until it crisps.
| Chicken just removed from its salt crust. |
| Visibly moist cut of chicken breast. Juicy and infused with flavour -- this is why salt crust roasting is awesome. |
| Crispy potatoes roasted in lard with smoked salt and toasted Nigella seeds. |
For was a salad of baby spinach, cherry tomatoes, shaved parmesan and pine nuts as an extra side dish. It was a very simple salad with a simple dressing of extra virgin olive oil, White Wine Vinegar, salt and raw sugar. Like the chicken and potatoes, the intention was to bring out the natural fresh flavours of the ingredients in the salad. I find white wine vinegar to be great at doing exactly that as it has a fairly mild flavour profile. The dressing is whisked together and poured over the salad right before serving so the leaves don’t get soggy.
Finally for dessert, I made butter-fried bananas sprinkled with Asian brown sugar flambéed in Cointreau with homemade vanilla and macadamia ice cream. Virtually every dessert I’ve been making involves some kind of ice cream or sorbet component ever since I got an ice cream machine for Christmas.
In terms of flavours, I thought that the orangey Cointreau was a nice link to the oranges in the main chicken dish, but very different at the same time. I thought that bananas would match well and be a perfect vehicle for a theatrical flambé at the same time. Finally, I thought that a nice ice cream would provide a cool contrast and the hidden macadamia nuts in the ice cream as well as sprinkles of Asian brown sugar would add a nice textural surprise (the Asian stuff comes in bars and are dry and quite hard – regular brown sugar is soft and moist).
| Baby spinach salad with cherry tomatoes, shaved parmesan and pine nuts with white wine vinegar dressing. |
| Despite the sausage like appearance, these are fried bananas flambéed in Cointreau with homemade macadamia ice cream. |
Also, my mother loves macadamia nuts and this menu was meant made for her, after all.
With that in mind, I now present some more pictures of the dishes below and recipes and detailed tips for:
· making salt crust roast chicken; and
· making crispy roast potatoes.
