The recipes in this book are all from Bécasse, past and present. In creating them I wanted to bring out each product’s unique qualities as well as demonstrate its versatility. Many of the recipes use secondary cuts of meat, and offal. I have taken this approach to show how great these often-overlooked cuts can be with the right technique/recipe. While offal might not be to everyone’s taste, the point I want to make is that a whole animal can be used in cooking and can, when handled correctly, display an extraordinary breadth of flavour and texture.
Before you start on any dish, I ask you to read the recipe through several times. By doing this you will gain a sense of its scope and complexity, and hopefully see that elegant food should be prepared with patience and a respect for the ingredients.
Some dishes will take only a few minutes and others might take you a day or even longer. Where applicable I have offered a faster alternative, but creating good food takes time, and I know you will savour the experience.
There is a glossary of ingredients, and French culinary terms that I use throughout. I also keep a copy of Larousse Gastronomique within reach at all times. It’s an amazingly comprehensive cookery encyclopedia, and a worthwhile investment for cooks of all abilities.
Although these recipes are the real thing, made the way we prepare them at the restaurant, they are only guidelines. Please use them as a base from which to experiment with other flavours and ingredients. Good cooking takes time and practice. So relax, enjoy and have fun!
Alcohol
I often add a splash of raw alcohol to freshen a finished sauce or soup; a good example is a drop of Madeira to finish a mushroom consommé. Red and white wine I tend to reduce, depending on the level of acidity required for a recipe – the more it reduces the more acidic it will become. A good quality wine can be used to freshen a sauce, but should only be boiled for a few seconds. This will kill the straight alcohol taste but retain its unique flavour. Cognac, Armagnac, dry sherry and the like should never be reduced as they will lose all flavour. If a fresh drop is too strong, boil for a second.
Braising
The comfort of a warming braise simply cannot be beaten. Once a cook has mastered the art of braising, a whole new world of cookery will open up – one that includes the amazing array of secondary cuts of meat that are so often overlooked. The slow cooking process breaks down the collagen and sinew in these tougher cuts, leaving you with a highly flavoured, meltingly tender dish.
There are three parts to a braise: marinating, browning and then slow-cooking the meat in an oven, covered with an aromatic, flavour-rich stock that becomes a sauce. A braise has such integrated flavours it becomes hard to tell where the meat ends and the sauce begins. A braise should never boil: just a gentle ‘blip’ on the surface will suffice.
Butter
Using unsalted butter gives you greater control over the salt level in your cooking.
Foaming with butter: This method is invaluable to the cuisinier’s repertoire. Foaming is the caramelisation of meat, fish or vegetables by adding butter to the pan during the cooking process and heating the butter to a light, frothy ‘beurre noisette’, over a constant heat with regular basting.
Caramelising
I love to roast a piece of fish and then caramelise its skin until crisp and aromatic. Fish skin has a similar nature to that of chicken skin. Making small incisions in the skin with a sharp knife, slowly caramelise the fish and roast it, basting with foaming butter, lemon and all the pan juices. These are absorbed through the incisions.
Frothing sauces
There is the misconception that this technique is a trend simply for visual effect. When executed correctly, frothing aerates a sauce, emphasising its lightness while still getting intense flavour from a good, fragrant and tasty base.
Herbs
All herbs used in the recipes are fresh unless otherwise stated. If you use dried herbs I suggest drying them yourself – the flavour will be far superior.
Garlic
Always use fresh, new-season garlic – as garlic ages and dries it loses its flavour.
Meat
I recommend cooking meat from room temperature. This produces a more evenly cooked end result, as the heat is able to penetrate the meat almost instantly. As a general rule, and in most cases in this book, I rest meat for half the amount of time it has been cooked . This allows the meat to relax and the juices to be absorbed back into the meat, keeping it moist and tasty.
Oils
I refer to non-scented cooking oils throughout. Canola or grape-seed oil fit the bill perfectly. Grape-seed oil is almost totally neutral in flavour – ideal to take on robust flavours. I use extra-virgin olive oil for finishing foods and if any heat is required I use a second-pressed olive oil. Always buy your olive oil locally and as fresh as possible as this will have the purest taste.
Salt
When used correctly, salt is a trigger to release the full flavour of foods. Food should be seasoned with salt immediately before and after cooking. Too far in advance and the salt will penetrate the meat too much. Without salt just prior to cooking, the moisture in food is drawn to the surface which causes stewing in the pan. In cooking I use fine sea salt that doesn’t contain any chemicals. To season raw food or to finish foods that do not require any further cooking I use fleur de sel as this salt has a clean, fresh taste.
Pepper
Peppercorns are berries from a climbing vine that ripens from green to red and then brown. They are harvested at various stages of maturity. I always cook with freshly ground white pepper straight from the mill – these are ripe peppercorns with the husks removed, which makes the pepper less spicy and, in my opinion, more suited to cooking. Black pepper is simply red peppercorns that are dried, which makes them a lot more pungent and spicy.
Vegetables
Vegetables should be cooked until the crunch has just gone but the resistance remains. No more and no less.