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What should I have in the pantry?

seijoed

I'm just starting out with the hydrocollids, spheres and more magical stuff.

-- What should I have in my pantry - where should I source it, what does it do?

I have things in my pantry like

* Citric acid and rennet for cheese making

* Activa RM for playing with proteins

* Xhantan gum

* Guar

* Tapioca

* Sodium algienate

Some of this stuff is expensive, some of it can be sourced really easily - what would be a good starter kit?

I've found that the really small bags of everything are pretty useless, it is too many possibilities and a bit overwhelming.

* Do I need a caviar kit

* Do I need molds

* Would I be better off buying a good mat for my feet?

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Comments

seijoed

Well, it is interesting from a perspective of just seeing how it works

plus I always liked the idea of serving classical dishes in new ways too.

michaelnatkin

Agreed, making spheres just to make spheres is kind of a party trick that you don't need to do very many times at home. For restaurant use in composed dishes it can be a different story, but even then it can often be pointless.

Like anything else, you want to think in terms of the dish you want to create, and then see what techniques support it rather than the other way around.

To give an example of a situation where it does add value, @Grant does this incredible dish where a quail egg shell is filled with lemongrass "whites" and a passionfruit spherified "yolk" that will blow your mind. (I think I'm remembering that right.) In that case, the spherification is serving the purpose of mimicking the yolk so that you think you are being asked to eat a raw quail egg until the last possible second.

Mason_Perry_34060

Ya I used filtered fridge water from my fridge dispenser and it worked fine, I have done reverse sperification as well, and it is a lot of work that I would most times rather use that time to make something else (that usually yeilds in more flavor and happier diners)

seijoed

Well, just the comment that alginate mutes flavor was a gellan winner for me, thanks @Michael and @Brendan. I did caviar once and came to the conclusion that it was a lot of work for home if it isn't stable enough to store for any time.

Brendan_Lee_56950

I grew bored of spherification and caviars pretty quickly simply because they're a lot of work.

I just got my first batch of gellan and i'm becoming more and more interested in things like fluid gels and heat stabilization as a means to an end as well as for production value. I'm very interested in textural changes and I've tried to focus my pantry items around that idea rather than the technique these days.

I also just stocked up on sodium citrate for stabilizing sauces. The cheese sauce you can make with that is life changing!

michaelnatkin

(But you can do reverse spherification with alginate too.)

michaelnatkin

@seijoed yep - others may have there own choices, but I'd put gellan up there as one of the first white powders I'd invest in.

BlvCook_25591

@Mason: Try using a neutral distilled water, rather than tap or filtered water.

seijoed

@Michael, those are using gellan -

This is exactly why I posted the question, now we have a discussion going.

michaelnatkin

@Mason if you are having trouble with spheres gelling on the iside, you should try reverse spherification instead, where the alginate (or other gelling agent) goes in the bath and the calcium goes in food. If you have access to Modernist Cuisine the details are in there, otherwise let me know and we can post some tips - you need to sequester any calcium in the bath, and be careful what type of calcium you use (some taste awful). Here's are a couple of posts from Aki & Alex at Ideas In Food that shows you basically what to do:

http://blog.ideasinfood.com/ideas_in_food/2008/12/encapsulation.html

http://blog.ideasinfood.com/ideas_in_food/2012/03/encapsulated-balsamic-vinegar.html

Besides avoiding over-gelling, the flavor release is much better - alginate tends to greatly mute the flavors of anything it is mixed with.

Mason_Perry_34060

On a side note I sourced some syringes from work buy I have even used a turkey baster to form the caviar, not sure about an expensive toy to make many at once, I guess it would depend on how often and how many you are serving....

Mason_Perry_34060

I have been playing with spherification with sodium alginate and calcium chloride. My wife really likes the dessert spheres I have made but they all seem to completely gel instead of staying liquid inside, I know my hard tap water played a part in the beginning but it's taking practice to figure out what's what. I would also like a few go to recipes, I think flavored spheres in a cream soup would be one of my first go tos...

seijoed

That's 5!

seijoed

Hmm I want to do a hovmastar-sauce as a sphere as well.

seijoed

If there are color enhancers and blanching tools, I'd like to learn that.

seijoed

I really would like to do a steak frites with a quail egg large sauce bearnaise sitting on the steak, like a nice maitre'd but then coming out.

I'd like to have go-to ideas for making gels / garnish

I want to learn more about bonding fruit and veg - I peek a lot at Ideas in food.

Chris_Young_80640

Easier question: What do you want to be able to do? Everything isn't helpful, so give a top 5 recipes or techniques I wish I could do. This will keep the list focused and manageable.