Matthew Accarrino of Craft Los Angeles shows us how they do it in the back of the house.
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Beet recipe I found on the net Blood on the Snow A successful hunt for the world’s best beet recipe.
Here is the passage that captured said editor’s eye, in its entirety: “The beet is cooked in a crust of gros sel, as duck and lamb have been for centuries, and then the crust is broken with a flourish and the beet is delicately sliced and served, with a light jus, as the main course.”
Thus began my investigations into the beet recipe which I now call Blood on the Snow. Marlena Spieler is a roving food columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, and I had read her recent mouthwatering dispatch from L’Arpege, in which she encountered the famous beet after a course of cauliflower oven-steamed with seaweed. In her response to my note, Spieler confirmed that the beet was indeed buried in a mountain of coarse salt—but not just any salt. Passard uses Fleur de Sel de Guerande, a very expensive hand-harvested sea salt from Brittany.
The beet was buried near the top of the salt mountain, she wrote, “about a third of the way down. To serve it they tapped around the top of the mountain and lifted the lid off, then fished out the beautiful beet, brushed off a bit of excess salt grains, and voila: served it in thin wedges with a drizzle of 50-year-old balsamic.”
Perhaps this all-important aged balsamic is the jus that Gopnik mentioned.
“The beet was so delicious,” continued Spieler, “so deliciously delicious. Like a salt-roasted chicken or fish, it firmed up the flesh so nicely, intensifying the beetroot flavor.”
Buoyed by this key information, my experimentations continued. Every night for a week, it was salt-beet for dinner, salt-beet for dessert, salt-beet for breakfast.
The salty beet-happy editor won’t pay for a trip to L’Arpege for me to confirm my results, but I think I have it figured out.
I’ve tried this recipe with a dark red variety of beet, and with the striped Chioggia style beet. Both taste good, but the dark red is more visually striking against the white salt. I also find that the red beet has a richer and more complex taste, better suited to hold it’s own against the salt and vinegar. Only with the dark red beet does the dish truly earn the title: Blood on the Snow. (And the dish’s name, were we to use a yellow beet…we won’t go there.
Where did you find this? Is there a link to the article? Is there a recipe for doing this, eg. what size beetroots, etc.? This was either too much information, or not enough. Please add a link.
Beet recipe I found on the net
Blood on the Snow
A successful hunt for the world’s best beet recipe.
Here is the passage that captured said editor’s eye, in its entirety: “The beet is cooked in a crust of gros sel, as duck and lamb have been for centuries, and then the crust is broken with a flourish and the beet is delicately sliced and served, with a light jus, as the main course.”
Thus began my investigations into the beet recipe which I now call Blood on the Snow.
Marlena Spieler is a roving food columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, and I had read her recent mouthwatering dispatch from L’Arpege, in which she encountered the famous beet after a course of cauliflower oven-steamed with seaweed. In her response to my note, Spieler confirmed that the beet was indeed buried in a mountain of coarse salt—but not just any salt. Passard uses Fleur de Sel de Guerande, a very expensive hand-harvested sea salt from Brittany.
The beet was buried near the top of the salt mountain, she wrote, “about a third of the way down. To serve it they tapped around the top of the mountain and lifted the lid off, then fished out the beautiful beet, brushed off a bit of excess salt grains, and voila: served it in thin wedges with a drizzle of 50-year-old balsamic.”
Perhaps this all-important aged balsamic is the jus that Gopnik mentioned.
“The beet was so delicious,” continued Spieler, “so deliciously delicious. Like a salt-roasted chicken or fish, it firmed up the flesh so nicely, intensifying the beetroot flavor.”
Buoyed by this key information, my experimentations continued. Every night for a week, it was salt-beet for dinner, salt-beet for dessert, salt-beet for breakfast.
The salty beet-happy editor won’t pay for a trip to L’Arpege for me to confirm my results, but I think I have it figured out.
I’ve tried this recipe with a dark red variety of beet, and with the striped Chioggia style beet. Both taste good, but the dark red is more visually striking against the white salt. I also find that the red beet has a richer and more complex taste, better suited to hold it’s own against the salt and vinegar. Only with the dark red beet does the dish truly earn the title: Blood on the Snow. (And the dish’s name, were we to use a yellow beet…we won’t go there.
Where did you find this? Is there a link to the article? Is there a recipe for doing this, eg. what size beetroots, etc.? This was either too much information, or not enough. Please add a link.
FL, sorry it took so long.
http://www.montereycountyweekly.com/a...
What is the herb that mysteriously appears on top of the beets before he wraps them?
Looked like thyme to me.