Tonight we are highlighting his squash. Tiger eyes, giant patty pans, and rounds.
We hit them on the mandolin, salted them, rinsed, patted dry, and gave them a bath in heavy creamy and egg white. Then shingled them, baked in a water bath while being pressed with cast iron pans. After they came out we put it in the blast chiller with a bucket of water on top of them to press it as the squash was cooling. Pressing is key, there is so much water in the squash if you don't get it out then the terrine will never hold.
After removing from the pan we portion it then roast. Tonight we served it on our tasting menu with wild king salmon, some local swiss chard, then Cody made a puree of sweet basil that we added to some brown butter a la minute and finish with lemon. With great ingredients there is not much else you need to put on the plate.
When you are pressing to firm it up and expel the water, do you have it on a perforated pan or something? Otherwise, where does the water go?
ReplyDeleteWe bake the squash in parchment lined 2in hotel pans. Pressing while baking will force excess water from the squash to push up and out of the pan into the water bath. The same goes for when we are cooling the squash. I put the hotel pan on top of a sheet pan before pressing with a 5 gallon bucket of water. The we put it into the blast chiller this way any liquid will be caught by the sheet pan. Before unmolding the squash I try to squeeze the center of the hotel pans over a sink to remove any liquid remaining. Then we invert the pan onto a cutting board, remove the parchment and cut portions.
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