Roasted Sweetbread Quenelles
ROASTED SWEETBREAD QUENELLES
(serves one)
Ingredients
100ml sweetbread jus
100ml double cream
Salt and white pepper
1 roasted sweetbread
Lemon powder
4 fine rashers streaky bacon
4 poached chicken quenelles
1tbs sautéd trompettesdes morts
20g cooked haricots verts
1 large slice fondant potato
Candied lemon zests
Toasted almonds
Method
Boil the jus add the cream return to the boil and reduce to a light coating texture. Adjust the seasoning. Slice through the sweetbread and dust with a little lemon powder. Grill or roast the bacon until crisp. Arrange them on chicken quenelles around the plate.
Add the beans and wild mushrooms. Put the fondant potato in the middle of the plate and lay the sweetbread on top. Pour a cordon of sauce around it and garnish with lemon and almonds.
Lemon powder
Scrub lemons in mild detergent to remove any traces of chemicals. Dry pare away the zests without any pith. Dry on top of the range or in the plate warmer until hard and brittle. Blend to a powder in a coffee mill. Sprinkle on cooked food for the best results. It loses its aroma when cooked.
Chicken quenelles
Blend 1kg of seasoned raw chicken breast to a paste. Chill and blend again with 70g egg white. Chill and blend again with a litreof double cream. At Lettonie Martin Blunos folds in a brunoise dice of cooked bacon collar - about 150g per kg. Each quenelle weighs 15g.
Fondant potato "socle"
For each one cut a slice roughly 2cm thick down the length of a large kidney-shaped potato. Brush with clarified butter. Put on a baking sheet and roast until the outside is crisp. Season.
Candied lemon zest
Boil zests in a solution of sugar and water until they start to glaze - but they should neither caramelise nor become too sticky.
1. Removing the gristle
2. The pancreas has a rounded side better for presentation
3. Removing the membrane is like skinning a fish
4. Extract any blood spots
5. Ready for roasting
6. Dust the sweetbread in flour
7. Brown in oil and clarified butter
8. Slicing the roasted sweetbread
Preparing a Sweetbread "jus"
At Lettonie Martin Blunos serves about 30 covers during a service and only a handful will order sweetbreads so he freezes the trimmings until he has enough to make a basic jus. The following proportions would normally be multiplied by a factor of four or five.
Ingredients
500g sweetbread trimmings (membrane/gristle)
50g diced shallots
100g sliced button mushrooms
2 large slices of lemon zest (no pith)
1 clove garlic
1 sprig parsley
100ml Noilly Prat
700ml skimmed and reduced chicken stock
Method
Simmer the trimmings shallots mushrooms lemon peel garlic and Noilly Prat on the side of the range and reduce to a demi-glaze.
Add the chicken stock bring to the boil and reduce without boiling by about two-thirds. Strain chill and discard any fat which may have set on the surface of the jus.
Roasting Sweetbreads
Ingredients
For one portion
About 140g sweetbread
Salt and white pepper
Flour
1tbs olive oil
20g clarifiedbutter
Method
Preheat the oven to very hot at least 250°C gas mark 9. Season the sweetbread liberally. Coat in flour. Heat the oil and butter in a frying pan until almost smoking. Lay the sweetbread rounded presentation side down until lightly browned and crusted. Turn and brown the flat surface. Colour the sides and transfer to a hot oven for five minutes. Rest on the side of the range before serving.
A well-roasted sweetbread is almost cooked through springy to the touch and faintly pink and juicy in the middle.
