“The first course arrived before we'd even ordered anything. A potato chip on a tiny plate, heaped with glistening black pearls of caviar, topped with a spoonful of something creamy and white and speckled with something else pale and yellow. I loved caviar. This would be exciting if this single potato chip didn't probably cost, like, twenty dollars. "Bottoms up." Even though I wasn't technically reviewing this place---not my brand---I couldn't help but analyze the bite as I crunched down. The potato chip was one of the best potato chips I'd ever had, and let me tell you, I know my potato chips---it was shatteringly crunchy but not hard, still crispy beneath its layers of toppings, salty and savory and a little oily without being overly so. The white cream on top was rich and sour, the shavings of hard-boiled egg yolk on top softening its tart edges. But the star of the dish was the caviar, and it didn't disappoint. Each little bubble burst on my tongue with the essence of the sea itself.” CaviarPotato Chips Book:Best Served Hot Source: Best Served Hot
“The train of thought went like this: I scribbled down the most "sophisticated" foods I could think of. Foie gras. Truffles. Expensive wine. Caviar. Ibérico ham. The one that struck a chord with my Jewish brain was caviar. Caviar served with blinis, little pancakes hailing from eastern Europe. In Russia they served blinis with caviar and sour cream. But even if I could make a hundred and fifteen blinis in the time allowed (since we had to make a few extras for beauty shots and mistakes), I couldn't just serve them with caviar and sour cream. That wasn't transformative enough. Original enough. What else was served with blinis? I tapped my pen thoughtfully against my Chef Supreme notepad. We were getting to the end of our planning session, and the way the others around me were nodding and whispering to themselves was making me nervous. Sadie, they all know exactly what they're doing, and you don't, I thought to myself. And then I nodded, confirming it. Jam. Blinis were served sweet-style with jam. But even if I made my own jam, that wouldn't be enough. I needed a wow factor. What if... what if I made sweet blinis, but disguised them as savory blinis? Ideas ran through my head as we were driven to the grocery store. I wasn't hugely into molecular gastronomy, but even I knew how to take a liquid or an oil and turn it into small gelatinous pearls not unlike fish eggs. I could take jam, thin it out, and turn it into caviar. Then what would be my sour cream? A sweetened mascarpone whip? And then I needed something to keep all the sweetness from becoming overwhelming. I'd have to make the jam nice and tart. And maybe add a savory element. A fried sage leaf? That would be interesting...” Food For ThoughtJamCaviarGastronomyMolecularBlinis Book:Sadie on a Plate Source: Sadie on a Plate