' faux MICRO CHEESE BURGER & FRIES .'

 Caramel & Sesame seed macaron filled with Chocolate & Almond patty, Salted caramel slice, Diced Apple and Raspberry ketchup, served with Apple & Arrowroot fries. 

                  This dish is another sweets entry with a straight forward play on food or 'food play'. I've seen this dish or I've seen the macaron burger similar being served on degustation menus but I thought I'd go a step further and try recreate visually something we all are familiar with, that fast food giant. My macaron making experience from scratch was many many years ago and the macarons that I used to make were the traditional plain almond type, not the the modern day colourful types. So sucking in my pride I've used the help of Adriano Zumbo and his macaron mix, I chose the salted caramel variety to get the best resemblence of a seeded bun as I could, for the overall effect. The surprise for me that came from this dish was the apple fries, which upon eating at first I thought tasted like regular french fries. Weather my mind was tricking my taste buds or by-passing my taste buds altogether and operating purely from associated experience but I thought I was eating McDonalds fries and it wasn't until the aftertaste left on my palate that tasted of flavours similar to apple danish and with the raspberry sauce, that I realised this was part of a tasty dessert and how easily your mind can be tricked even if you know the trick.                                      
                 To make this food player I began by making the macaron shells the night before as per the recipe on the packet. As the piped mixture were resting on their trays before backing I sprinkled half of them with sesame seeds and baked them off for 16-18 minutes in a 150 deg. c oven before removing and allowing to cool. The shells were the placed in to a airtight container and stored in the fridge over night. The next day I began with the cheese burger fillings, in a bowl I mixed together melted milk chocolate, melted butter, almond meal and homestyle Orio cookie crumb. After forming the mix into a ball or dough like consistency I formed little patty rounds and placed them on the bottom half of the macaron as these were the meat patties. Next I used the caramel supplied in the kit and rolled some out thinly between two sheets of baking paper. I then cut little squares of the caramel slice to match the size of the patties and these were arranged on top of the patties to resemble melted sliced cheese. The raspberry coulis was from an older preparation but with some of this I added a little balsamic vinegar to cut the sweetness of the sauce and the entire dish and also give the coulis a more authentic ketchup look. The diced onions on the burger are made from really finely diced apple. The last preparation was the fries and all along I wanted to use apple as the potato substitute and I was just going to simply slice the apple julienne and fry them in hot oil. And it wasn't until I was cutting them I thought of the idea of frying them in a starch to give them more rigidness and structure. So I coated some in arrowroot flour and did a test batch and to my surprise they came up looking like a real french fry. I coated the rest and my stumbles through cooking rewarded me and became the final product you see.

  
                                                                           

' BREAKFAST of BLUEBERRIES .'

Breakfast of Blueberry Bagel & Mousse on a Granola of shortbread , rolled oats , chia seeds & honey served with Blueberry coulis & gelee , Creme cheese , Cinnamon myrtle flowers and fresh blueberries.

               At my work a section of the warehousing has recently become a storage facility and north side   Brisbane distributor for a well known bread company. So we pick orders for all sorts of bakehouse products including bread, pizza bases and bagels. Amongst their range of bagels they have a blueberry flavoured bagel of which has often been my breakfast of a morning. Sitting their at smoko with my warm buttered bagel and coffee has lead me to think what would I be wanting with this bagel right now if I could. Which to cut a long story short became the process of thought behind this breakfast dish. The bagels I've been eating for smoko is the bagel I used for this dish.                                                                                            
               The blueberry mousse was the first of the preps for this dish and to make this I heated some cream to the boil before removing from the heat and adding melted white chocolate, crushed blueberries and a little agar agar powder at 1%, this was then brought back to a gentle simmer whisking to dissolve the agar powder. Once the powder had dissolved the mix was then spooned into a greased plastic tube, three quarters of an inch in diameter and 3 inches long, this was then wrapped in clear film and placed in the fridge to set. The granola was made by mixing crushed shortbread biscuit, chia seeds, rolled oats and honey, this was then spread on a flat baking paper lined tray and placed into the oven at 160 deg.c. for about 10-15 until the granola was starting to brown. It was then removed from the oven allowed to cool and crumbled into 5-6 mm pieces. I made the coulis by placing crushed berries, lemon juice, sugar and a little water in a saucepan and simmering until all the sugar has dissolved and the fruit was collapsed. This was then strained and pushed through a sieve and set aside. The gelee is a combination of water, blue and red colouring, blueberry coulis and agar agar powder at 2%, brought to a simmer in a small saucepan while whisking to dissolve the powder. This was then poured on to a flat tray and set in the fridge. Once set using different sized biscuit cutters I cut circles from the blueberry agar gelee.          
                  To plate this breakfast I placed the gelee circles on to the plate, on top of these I spooned the granola which acted as a base for the mousse which was pushed out of its tube moulding using my thumb and cut into serving sized pieces to go on top of the granola. Each was accompanied with creme cheese, fresh blueberries, torn pieces of bagel and topped with blueberry coulis and edible flowers.