Category Archives: Sauces & Custards

Sous vide wagyu with wasabi dipping sauce

January 19, 2017 9:09 am / 6 Comments /

Sous vide wagyu with wasabi dipping sauce

I had a great In-home cooking class with a lovely lady in Milsons Point who gave me a gift of two beautiful wagyu steaks.  I put them in my freezer before Christmas but had in mind what I wanted to do with them.  They weighed 320g and were already vac packed.  Perfect for sous vide as no need to even bag them up again.  They were quite thin so I reduced the cooking time from my previous sous vide attempt here.

Perfectly cooked to medium rare the sous vide method is definitely the way to go with good quality cuts of meat.  Apart from a very quick searing of one minute on each side in a smoking hot pan or BBQ you don’t have to worry that you are overcooking it; something that can easily happen, especially on the BBQ or with thinner cuts of meat.  Cooking at such a low temperature will allow the fat marbelling to melt away.

Try this, the sauce is amazing.  You can adjust the amount of wasabi to suit your tastes but start with these quantities unless you have a real issue with spicy food.  Remember to taste as you go.  Great with a green salad (also even better dipped in the sauce!) and a bowl of steamed rice here.

Ingredients:  Serves 2

2 x Wagyu beef steaks as above
2 bowls of pre-cooked steam oven rice
Cucumber and mixed salad to serve

Dipping sauce:
1-2 tsp wasabi (from the tube)
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 tablespoon sweet chilli sauce
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon lime juice
2 tsp rice vinegar
2 tsp Canola oil
Spring onions

Method:

  1. For dipping sauce mix all ingredients together in a small bowl except oil & spring onions.
  2. Whisk in oil to emulsify.  Set aside.
  3. Bring steaks to room temperature in bag, about 15 minutes from the refrigerator should be enough.
  4. Place steaks, in unopened plastic bag in perforated steam oven tray and cook @ 56ºC for 30 minutes for thin steaks of 320g.  If your steak is thicker you will need to adjust the time.
  5. Preheat a non-stick frypan or BBQ until smoking hot.  Add a dash of olive oil just before you are ready to sear them.
  6. Cook for ONLY 1 minute on each side, sprinkle with a little sea salt and remove to a plate to rest while you reheat your rice in the steam oven for 4 minutes @ 100ºC.

Serve with warm steamed rice, dipping sauce and a fresh green salad.  Yum!

 

 

Posted in: Cooking classes, Japanese, Main Courses, Rice, Sauces & custards, Steam Oven

Steamed asparagus with hollandaise sauce

March 18, 2014 7:36 pm / 1 Comment /

Steamed asparagus with hollandaise sauce

It has got to the stage where I not only can’t imagine not having a steam oven, but I wonder how people survive without one!

Asparagus is perfect in a steam oven.  2 minutes @ 100°C and it’s the best asparagus you have ever eaten.  It has a lot to do with the fact that all the nutrients are retained so vegetables, fruit and many other things actually taste better.

So when asparagus season hits you can quickly and easily enjoy it everyday.  Have a look at some of my other recipes that include asparagus in salads, risotto and this delicious stir-fry here.

Another delicious way to serve asparagus is with a 60/60 egg.  Easy to cook in the steam oven because of the accurate temperature control the egg category is fast becoming the most searched item on this site.

I am very proud to have come up with a way to cook the perfect hollandaise in a steam oven!  Quick, easy and delicious and a lot less washing up than a whole food processor.  Try it, you will never cook hollandaise the traditional way again.

Ingredients:  Serves 4-6

2 egg yolks
1 tbsp. lemon juice
140g unsalted butter, melted
Salt & pepper to taste

1-2 bunches of fresh asparagus

Method:

  1. Whisk egg yolks with lemon juice in a china mixing bowl until pale and frothy .  Your eggs should be at room temperature.
  2. Melt the butter until hot and bubbling but do not allow to burn.  Do this in a glass jug in the microwave if you have one otherwise a small pan on the stove.
  3. Set the steam oven to 60°C for 1 minute and place the wire rack close to the bottom of the oven (on shelf position 1)
  4. Place the uncovered bowl on the wire rack, close the door and press ‘start now’.
  5. Set another timer for 1 minute.
  6. Open the steam oven, remove the bowl and whisk again until light and pale.  Leave the door open while you do this. Just 30 seconds or so is enough.
  7. Repeat (5) and (6) 4 times in total.  You will notice that the steamer doesn’t get time to reach its set temperature as it is only in ‘warm up stage’ for the first 3 times then the last time will be the steam oven counting down its 1 minute.
  8. Remove from oven, sit on a towel or chopping board to keep the bottom of the bowl warm.
  9. Drizzle in the melted butter very slowly, whisking all the time until thick and pale.  Stop when you can see the ‘milk solids’ in the bottom of the butter.  Discard.
  10. Taste and add seasoning.  It needs quite a bit of salt.
  11. Cover with tight plastic wrap and set aside to keep warm.  If you want to make it ahead of time, let the steam oven cool down to warm and put the covered bowl back in there until needed.  Of course, remove before cooking anything else.
  12. Now put your trimmed asparagus into the perforated steamer tray and cook for 2 min @ 100°C.  You can peel it if you wish but I don’t bother with that.

Remove from oven, plate up and serve with the warm hollandaise.  Delicious 🙂

Note:  This is a recipe that you may have to adjust the timing if you have another brand of steam oven.  Test it for yourself to see.  If the hollandaise has thickened too much on standing then whisk in a little boiling water to thin.

 

Posted in: Breakfast/Brunch, Dinner parties, Eggs, Entrees, Sauces & custards, Steam Oven, Vegetarian