The Pro Chef Middle East - January Issue, 2015 by The Pro Chef Middle East

MIDDLE EAST ISSUE 35 JANUARY 2015

HAVE FISH HAD THEIR CHIPS? | CRAZY FOOD, CRAZY PRICES | ISLAND HOPPING | GULFOOD

Contents

UP FRONT

FEATURES

CHEFS

LEISURE

EDITORIAL Examining the latest menu trend - the ‘without’ concept.

PIMP MY PLATE MLA’s Chef Tarek Ibrahim reinvents a classic.

TRAVEL Food in the land of the long white cloud - a culinary trip around New Zealand.

EDITORIAL BOARD Our industry colleagues to whom we turn to for advice and guidance on the market for The Pro Chef ME.

MY FOOD A look at the food of Chef Antonella Ricci from the celebrated Al Fornello da Ricci.

THE LAST WORD You know molecular gastronomy has gone mainstream when consumers are offered a grown-up Christmas chemistry set for enhancing the ﬂavours of their food with artiﬁcial aromas. Is this a sniff too far?

OUT AND ABOUT Looking ahead to both the Dubai Food Festival and the 20th edition of Gulfood, both coming shortly. IN MY VIEW Guest column on the need for risk management strategies in the kitchen.

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THE EGGS FACTOR Chef Izu Ani from La Serre in Downtown Dubai’s Vida hotel reveals what’s in his fridge at home. MARKET FOCUS Shocking new reports from the scientiﬁc community reveal how close we are to empty oceans. Is this the end for seafood specials?

FACE TO FACE Talking to Chefs Renato and Dalila Cunha from Portugal’s Ferrugem restaurant, Akmal Anuar from Zengo and Massimo ‘The Trufﬂe Man’ Vidoni.

MY MENU Chef Pierre Gagnaire explains.

RECIPE CORNER Dishes from Elle & Vire, Frankie’s and Chef Valentin Néraudeau.

MARKET FOCUS We examine some of the world’s most expensive dishes.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

UP FRONT / editor’s letter

The vanishing foods... When was the last time you saw entrecote or steak tartare on a menu? Classic dishes like this are slowly slipping out of our consciousness. I seem to spend more and more time on each trip to Paris tracking down somewhere, anywhere that still offers Iles ﬂottantes, my idea of the perfect French dessert.

CHAIRMAN AND FOUNDER DOMINIC DE SOUSA

It’s even happening at the three-star Plaza Athenée, Alain Ducasse’s legendary restaurant within sight of the

CEO NADEEM HOOD

iconic Champs Elysées. It now features what is becoming known as a ‘without’ menu - in this case, without meat. We all would align I’m sure with the intentions - organic produce, locally sourced - but who would have thought such a temple to Gallic gastronomy would have made such a 180 degree turn? However, chefs worldwide are on the ‘without’ trend - without foie gras, dairy, gluten, whatever. Not that the trend is without merit. Whenever a chef makes such a statement about a type of ingredient, it opens the

COO GINA O’HARA ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER DAVE REEDER dave@cpidubai.com M: +971 50 450 6745

possibility of intelligent debate about our food, which is surely a good thing. In conversations with chefs, most despair of the current ‘fashion’ for food intolerances, but the reality remains that for paying customers

GROUP DIRECTOR OF EDITORIAL PAUL GODFREY

such complaints are real or at least driving their food spend. In the US in 2013, restaurants with gluten-free menus were the eighth fastest growing restaurant category, building on a 275% boom from 2009 to 2012. It

EDITOR DAVE REEDER

would be a foolish F&B Director and Executive Chef who did not at least have a serious discussion about the opportunities there. So gluten-free menus demonstrate a changing clientele lost in the mist of food intolerance but still wanting to dine out. ‘Without’ is key here. It’s also critical in the increasingly heated debates about ethical farming, from foie gras to battery hens to pig gestation crates. So ‘without meat’ feeds both an ethically minded community plus those who believe a vegetarian, vegan or raw diet is heathier than the traditional one.

SENIOR GRAPHIC DESIGNER, HOSPITALITY DIVISION CHRIS HOWLETT PHOTOGRAPHER, HOSPITALITY DIVISION ANAS CHERUR GROUP DIRECTOR OF SALES CAROL OWEN carol.owen@cpimediagroup.com M: +971 055 880 3817

However, Ducasse hasn’t been completely won over by the ‘without meat’ movement. He’s currently busy trying to lift the ban on hunting ortolan buntings, a long prohibited French delicacy...

PRODUCTION MANAGER, HOSPITALITY DIVISION JAMES THARIAN WEB DEVELOPER, HOSPITALITY DIVISION LOUIE ALMA DISTRIBUTION MANAGER ROCHELLE ALMEIDA SUBSCRIPTIONS www.cpievents.net/mag/magazine.php PRINTED BY Printwell Printing Press LLC, Dubai, UAE PUBLISHED BY

Head Office, PO Box 13700, Dubai, UAE Tel: +971 4 440 9100 Fax: +971 4 447 2409 A publication licensed by IMPZ © Copyright 2015 CPI, All rights reserved. While the publishers have made every effort to ensure the accuracy of all information in this magazine, they will not be held responsible for any errors therein.

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UP FRONT / editorial board

Meet the board The Pro Chef Middle East is keen to serve its readership by addressing those areas of key interest, To help that task, we have invited a number of respected and experienced members of the F&B world to form an editorial board to help guide us into the future.

BOBBY KRISHNA TM PRINCIPAL FOOD STUDIES AND SURVEYS OFFICER FOOD CONTROL DEPARTMENT DUBAI MUNICIPALITY Indian-born Bobby Krishna brings a real passion to his job enforcing food hygiene and safety regulations to the F&B sector in Dubai.

MARC GICQUEL Regional Director of Food & Beverage, Arabian Peninsula Hilton Worldwide Born and educated in France, Marc Gicguel has wide experience of different parts of the F&B sector, from Disneyland Resort Paris to Jumeirah Restaurants and Nestle Professional before joining Hilton Worldwide.

CHRISTIAN GRADNITZER Corporate Director Culinary Jumeirah Group German-born Christian Gradnitzer moved a couple of years back from kitchens to management and is now a key element in Jumeirah RnB’s plan to establish Jumeirah Group as a leading operator of successful restaurants and bars globally.

MICHAEL KITTS Director of Culinary Arts and Executive Chef The Emirates Academy of Hospitality Management UK chef Michael Kitts’ career has combined distinguished work in kitchens, global competition success and a major focus on mentoring younger chefs, all of which make his currenty job an ideal ﬁt.

UWE MICHEEL Director of Kitchens, Radisson Blu Dubai Deira Creek President, Emirates Culinary Guild German chef Uwe Micheel is a highly visible member of the regional F&B scene with two decades of experience in the Gulf and a key role in driving the success of UAE-based chefs at culinary competitions worldwide.

MARK PATTEN Senior Vice President, Food & Beverage Atlantis, The Palm Dubai In place at Atlantis since pre-opening in 2007, Australian native Mark Patten has had a highly successful and celebrated career across the world. He now oversees more than 400 chefs and numerous outlets at the resort.

SAMANTHA WOOD FooDiva A distinguished ex-Hilton PR executive, British-Cypriot Samantha Wood now combines food journalism, hospitality consulting and the highly acclaimed FooDiva food blog.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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UP FRONT / out and about

Festival time again The Dubai Food Festival is returning with an expanded three week programme of foodrelated events, activities and promotions during through most of February. This city-wide culinary celebration is planned to showcase the Emirate's standing as a gastronomy destination through new concepts and a feast of local and international celebrity chefs.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

For this year's World Travel Market (WTM) in London, Dubai Tourism commissioned an art installation depicting the Dubai skyline and landmarks made entirely out of food. Created by UK-based food artist Paul Baker, it will be shipped to Dubai and displayed as part of the Dubai Food Festival, which takes place 6th-28th February. According to Baker: "To be asked to create a foodscape model of Dubai was an honour and a huge challenge. We had to incorporate as many landmark buildings and geological features as possible, all made from food that wouldn't deteriorate. The challenge was to design and construct interesting and recognisable buildings from organic-looking shapes." He headed a team of six, who spent three hard weeks creating the spectacular foodscape, problem solving. One of the big initial questions was how to make the world's tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, which Baker describes as "the lynchpin of the whole project". He eventually decided to use sweet corn along with baby corn. After that, the rest of the buildings quickly fell into place. Other famous landmarks within the model include the Burj Al Arab (tubular pasta, lasagne pasta, tortilla wraps, cheese biscuits, diced barbecue chicken, dried herbs and shortbread biscuits) and Jumeirah Emirates Towers (white bread, pretzel sticks and roasted seaweed).

FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS Emirati cuisine: authentic local cuisine and cultural experiences that showcase both traditional as well as up-and-coming Emirati concepts and chefs. Home-grown: celebrating the emerging scene of independent restaurants and concepts influenced by the diversity of the 200 nationalities in Dubai. Multicultural dining and street food: showcasing the range of diverse, high quality restaurant and café experiences in Dubai, across all budgets throughout different parts of the city. International chefs and restaurants in Dubai: highlighting the influx of restaurants conceived or owned by world leading chefs who increasingly are choosing to open in Dubai. Already confirmed are Silvena Rowe, Sanjeev Kapoor, Jason Atherton and Manal Al Alem.

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UP FRONT / out and about

20 years young! The 2015 edition of Gulfood, the world's largest annual food and hospitality trade show, will mark the 20th anniversary for one of the most important international platforms for the global food trade. Taking place from 8th-12th February at Dubai World Trade Centre (DWTC), Gulfood will play a pivotal role in connecting nations and suppliers, open distribution channels for industry-related business and highlight Dubai's strategic role as a key trading hub for the global food industry.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

With the 2014 edition of the show breaking its own participation records and generating show ﬂoor and year-round legacy sales numbering in the billions ofdollars, Gulfood 2015 is expected to attract more than 4,800 international companies from 120 countries and more than 85,000 visitors from over 170 countries. Accordingly, to accommodate the meteoric growth and tens of thousands of participating brands, Gulfood 2015 will span 127,000sqm of exhibition space - including a 23,000sqm purpose-built temporary structure, the largest of its type regionally. A unique trade and sourcing platform for ﬁnished food suppliers, bulk commodity wholesalers and exporters across the spectrum of fresh, frozen, dry and processed food and beverage products, Gulfood 2015 will also facilitate substantial global transactions for foodstuff commodities such as meat, cereals, grains, rice, coffee and tea. Driven by a fast-growing population, burgeoning hospitality and tourism markets and its prominent position as a re-export hub, the UAE's demand for food staples is increasing at a rate of 30% every year, according to the Ministry of Economy. With imports accounting for between 80-90% of GCC food consumption, Dubai is best placed

to cater for increasing demand in regional food trading. Gulfood 2015 will host an increasing number of international heads of state, ministers and government ofﬁcials, as national trade associations ink lucrative bi-lateral trade agreements and debate food industry trends at industry-shaping conferences and summits scheduled during a series of Gulfood Conferences. The exhibition is also a major contributor to Dubai's growing reputation as a global events destination and a key pillar of Dubai's 2020 tourism vision, which aims to double the Emirate's annual visitors numbers from ten million in 2012 to 20 million in 2020.

“If home markets slow down then either manufacturers can accept a lower level of business or they can seek new markets. And Gulfood is a proven driver for that.”

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out and about / UP FRONT

VIEW FROM THE TOP Every day, an app on the desktop of Mark Napier, Gulfood’s exhibition director, counts down the days to the oopening of Gulfood. When we met with him, it had dropped below the 60 day mark - “Just a bit of pressure,” he joked. Although the Gulfood team is used to the scale and complexity of putting together an exhibition and conference of this size, the extra denand for the 20th anniversary Gulfood is clearly ramping up the difficulty. What makes the show such a success? Well, it’s a bit of a business cliche, but Dubai’s excellent position as a trading hub means that the show has a ready audience - in fact, always has done. As it’s grown, it becomes a big like a virtuous circle with success breeding success. Now with our scale, our breadth and width of offerings, it’s hard to see how any other food show, certainly in this region, could even begin to have a significant impact. Is it sold out then? Oh yes, we’re having to turn potential exhibitors away, although the team is constantly trying to rearrange the floor plan to see if we can accommodate any more companies. It’s a massive juggling act - do we, for example, create mini shows focused on particular areas of the industry? This year, we’re erecting a large temporary extra hall on what is really the Trade Centre’s last available space. According to a recent report by Euromonitor, the number of F&B outlets in the UAE is expected to double in the next four years, making food service and hospitality equipment a key sector at Gulfood 2015. Thousands of food and beverage products and services are introduced every year at Gulfood and the Gulfood Awards - in its sixth edition this year - present an opportunity for best-in-class excellence to be recognised and rewarded. The Awards celebrate both people and companies behind the region's leadership and innovation in the food and drink industry. Judged by an international panel of independent industry experts, they will be divided into six categories and ten different awards. Key for the region’s top professional chefs, pastry chefs, cooks and bakers every year is the annual Emirates Culinary Guild International Salon Culinaire - a showcase of the region's best culinary talent and expertise. Held in Za'abeel Pavilion, the 2015 Salon will see more than 1,300 professional chefs evaluated by a panel of 25 renowned experts, mandated by the World Association of Chefs Societies (WACS) to judge culinary events across the globe. Expect some familiar faces led by Chef Uwe Micheel, the Guild's President and Director of Kitchens, Radisson Blu Dubai Deira Creek.

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Will that become permanent in time? It will, but the timing just wasn’t right to get it built in time for the show.

seafood or manufacturing, do you see the opportunity to do the same for some of those topics? We have no plans but, of course, it’s one of the things we discuss. I’m struck, for example, about the way supermarkets back in the UK market and stock such a range of halal foods. Here, of course, it’s taken for granted but maybe there’s an opportunity to focus on the halal export market - for instance, halal meat processed here into different products and then exported from the UAE. Do you see Gulfood slowing down in the future? No. Our challenge is to keep it fresh and relevant Already we have pavilions from more than half the countries in the world! When you have the size and momentum of a Gulfood. things will just continue to grow. It’s an exciting project to work for.

Are you seeing more demand from countries whose economies are in trouble? That has been a trend for some time, with countries like Greece and Portugal, for example. I think it’s natural - if home markets slow down they either manufacturers can accept a lower level of business or they can seek new markets. And Gulfood is a proven driver for that. What are the hot areas this year? Meat is big, as is dairy especially for Eastern Europe, for some reason. Rice and grains are always huge. We’re also seeing more focus on equipment for F&B. In terms of geography, Africa is generating a lot of interest. For the Conference, we’re continuing to focus on those high-end areas that represent the major changes and opportunities such as food security, franchising and halal. In the same way that you spun out some segments into separate shows like

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

UP FRONT / in my view

If you canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t stand the heat... Kitchens are dangerous places, where an unfair burden can often be placed on the chef to protect the lives of colleagues who may be using risky or dangerous working practices, or faced with inherently perilous and uncertiďŹ ed appliances. Introducing some basic risk management can save lives, reduce costs and supercharge efďŹ ciency.

etâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s start with the basics. If you are in charge of a kitchen, then you are responsible. If, through negligence or worse, harm comes to any member of your brigade, then you could face prosecution. Do not assume that senior management or your hotel will take the ďŹ&#x201A;ak. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the reality. According to the US Fire Administration, 29.3% of all non-residential fries start in the kitchen. They are also the most lethal types of ďŹ re, accounting for a disproportionate 34% of all deaths by ďŹ re. And it's estimated that about 80% of these could have been prevented by good risk management and a few sensible safety checks around the kitchen environment. Consider these examples: t .BOZ SFTUBVSBOUT BOE IPUFMT VTJOH -1( IBWF inadequate storage facilities, susceptible to IFBU BOE FYQPTVSF UP PUIFS HBTFT 4UPSJOH -1( cylinders in a lockable steel cupboard conforming to DIN EN 14470-1 (international quality standard) will reduce risk by about 90%. t *G ZPV UIJOL LJUDIFO SJTL DPNFT GSPN TP DBMMFE 'hots' or 'sharps', guess again. About 40% of all kitchen ďŹ res result from faulty electrical wiring or gas connections. Receiving a severe electrical shock is also a virtual death sentence, with a recovery rate of about only 19%. t 4JNQMF LJUDIFO BDDJEFOUT TVDI BT DVUT CVSOT BOE abrasions have one of the highest infection rates, since the focus is on ďŹ nishing the shift before seeking medical help. This can prove to be a dangerous choice leading to disďŹ gurement and loss of a limb in extreme cases. But won't insurance help? Insurance will certainly help you pay for damage or settle claims after the event, but it won't stop UIF BDDJEFOU IBQQFOJOH JO UIF mSTU QMBDF 1MVT if you have repeated claims, your premium will be sky-high - up to eight times higher than an environment with a no-claims bonus. The secret is to make it far less likely for an accident to happen at all. This need not be expensive. The core of good risk management is developing awareness for potential risks and then dealing with them proactively, even if you do so yourself. Here are three key tips for introducing an effective risk management protocol into your kitchen: t " RVBSUFSMZ SJTL BVEJU &WFSZ UISFF NPOUIT BTTFTT storage facilities for gas cylinders and chemical cleaners - and never store them together. Are gas cylinders kept in direct sunlight? Are they

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

The core of good risk management is developing awareness for potential risks and then dealing with them proactively, even if you do so yourself. next to a heating vent? Will they rust in extreme humidity? These are all questions that need the answer 'no'. t " NPOUIMZ SJTL BVEJU $POEVDU B WJTVBM DIFDL PG BMM electrical and gas connections every month. Is a connection on a gas cooker rusted or corroded? Are electrical sockets threadbare or taped? Avoid the potential deathtrap and replace then now. t " XFFLMZ SJTL BVEJU &WFSZ XFFL hXBMLh ZPVS kitchen. Where do you see potential threats and risks? Are there uneven ďŹ&#x201A;oor surfaces where staff can fall or trip? An overhang where staff can bang their heads? A risk of burns from the unprotected edges of oven doors - a concern with pizza ovens in particular? A loose handrail next

to the staircase leading to your kitchen? Fix these faults immediately and avoid the accidents before they happen. (PPE QSBDUJDF JT UP LFFQ XSJUUFO SFDPSET PG UIFTF inspections, partly to record your proactive management and partly to act as a follow-up reminder to get potential problems ďŹ xed. If issues are beyond your control, then put your concerns in writing to senior management - such action will be useful if any prosecution results. Finally, always liaise with restaurant or hotel management if you have any suspicions about hazardous leaks, mis-routed gas piping or risks from other parts of the premises. You might highlight a bigger risk that operational staff are blithely unaware of. Follow this simple rule of thumb: when insurance takes over, it's already too late!

Paul Godfrey is Senior Editor of SME Advisor ME magazine - also published by CPI Media Group - and a Member of the Institute of Risk Management.

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UP FRONT / the eggs factor

North London boy makes good (food) From discovering cooking at school and catering college, Chef Izu Ani has carved a career that led via Spain’s most cutting edge restaurants to a key role in propelling La Petite Maison to one of Dubai’s perpetual favourites. He’s now doing it again, at La Serre in Downtown Dubai’s Vida hotel.

ccording to La Serre’s Head Chef Izu Ani, “You can’t be a seasonal chef in Dubai. Instead, you have to grasp the essence of what you’re doing. Keep it simple and let the quality of the produce shine through - food should emerge from its environment and what I’m trying to do now is strip things away so that people are close to the produce and have a cultural understanding of where it’s from and how it’s best prepared.” What is his key driver? “Taste. So many chefs just go for the look on the plate but taste is always with you and it’s vital.” Born in Nigeria and moving to North London when he was young, Ani has come a long way. Finding an interest at school in food, he trained initially as a pastry chef before his first real job at a high level at The Square, Phil Howard’s Michelin starred restaurant in London, initially specialising in amuse-bouches before, at age 20, made Chef de Partie running meat. After a brief spell in Alsace, he got taken on at Le Chambard, a one star in Kaysersberg, for a six month period when Chef Olivier Nasti, a meilleur ouvrier de France, taught him all the classics. A short spell as a private chef in London and then back to Alsace for a year, when the restaurant gained its first star. He then turned down an offer from Michel Bras, choosing instead Grasse and the two-star La Bastide Saint Antoine, where he gained his passion for Provencal flavours. After a year and despite an opportunity to work with Pierre Gagnaire, he returned to The Square as Sous Chef for three years. He then worked for free at Mugaritz as Chef de Partie and then headed to Figueres, near Roses to work in a very simple restaurant cooking classic Catalan food. Finally, he shifted to Dubai to help open La Petite Maison and, finally, La Serre. But what’s in his fridge? "My kitchen is full of fruits - I love cycling so I go for bananas when I come back from a long ride. Also vegetables, I buy from Spinneys which are

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

a bit more expensive but the quality is better. I always have broccoli, I just love it, even on its own, just cooked and seasoned with salt. "Every morning I have room temperature water with fresh lemon followed by freshly squeezed orange and grapefruit juice. I try to be as healthy as possible because the hours I work in the kitchen are so long and hard and the body needs sustenance. "I buy meat from my supplier, Simply Gourmet. We love to make burgers at home. I have a semiprofessional kitchen at home so it is kitted out almost as good as La Serre's kitchen is, including my prized Josper oven. "My guilty pleasure is homemade ice cream! I create a plain vanilla base out of cream, milk, eggs and vanilla and then we like to add all kinds of things - chocolate, fruit. My son Kai likes banana and snickers and my other son Theo likes M&Ms. "Yoghurts - I like to eat the healthy ones with ﬁbre, the children have the Petits Filous and ones with compote. My wife has the little pots of crème caramel or crème brulée, so we all have our own favourite yoghurts. My other guilty pleasure is a full English breakfast at the weekend with bread from La Serre!"

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the eggs factor / UP FRONT

“You can’t be a seasonal chef in Dubai. Instead, you have to grasp the essence of what you’re doing.”

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January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

FEATURES / market focus

Just over a quarter of a century is all the time that scientists are now giving us before the world’s oceans are empty of fish. That’s Expo 2020 plus two decades and a bit. The earth’s waters have survived millions of years but now we’re balanced on the cusp of extinction for hundreds of species of fish, thanks to the double whammy of climate change and over-fishing.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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market focus / FEATURES

ime is running short. In fact, according to a new study led by the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO), time may already have run out. Best case scenario at present levels of knowledge and human activity is that the oceans will be devoid of marine life by 2048. in fact, it may already be too late to slow or even reverse the collapse of coral reefs or the spread of low oxygen ‘dead zones’. “We now face losing marine species and entire marine ecosystems, such as coral reefs, within a single generation,” states the study by 27 experts which will be presented to the United Nations. It claims that “unless action is taken now, the consequences of our activities are at a high risk of causing, through the combined effects of climate change, over-exploitation, pollution and habitat loss, the next globally significant extinction event in the ocean”. Previous ‘significant extinction’ events over the past 600 million years include the disappearance of dinosaurs some 65 million years ago, apparently after an asteroid struck. “The findings are shocking,” wrote Alex Rogers, scientific director of IPSO, wrote of the conclusions from a workshop of ocean experts staged by IPSO and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) at Oxford University. The reason why the study is so serious in its implications is not just

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Here’s the problem. In less than four decades, fish has gone from being a cheap protein to a very expensive one. That trend will continue and accelerate as species start to vanish from the oceans. that fish are the main source of protein for 20% of the world’s population but that the oceans cycle oxygen which helps absorb carbon dioxide, which is the key the main greenhouse gas derived from human activities. Add to that the lack of ocean clean up by fish and we’ll also face the widespread growth of uncontrolled algae. According to Professor Dr Jelle Bijma from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany, our seas face a “deadly trio” of threats - higher temperatures, acidification and lack of oxygen (anoxia). Excessive carbon dioxide from use of fossil fuels is both heating the planet and causing acidification when absorbed by the oceans. Anoxia is caused largely by pollution and the run-off of fertilisers. and pollution stokes anoxia. “From a geological point of view, mass extinctions happen overnight, but on human timescales we may not realise that we are in the middle of such an event,” teh Professor explains.

And the good news? Well, over-fishing is reasonably easy for governments to reverse and countering global warming simply means a shift from fossil fuels towards cleaner energies such as solar and wind power. As Dr William Cheung of the University of East Anglia points out, global warming, “unlike climate change can be directly, immediately and effectively tackled by policy change”. Meanwhile, over-fishing is now estimated to account for over 60% of the known extinction of marine fish. We’re used in this region to discussions about hammour being over-fished but it is a worldwide problem - the two metre long Chinese bahaba, for instance, has a swim bladder reputed to have medicinal properties and over-fishing is now so extensive that the price per kilo in the 1930s of a few dollars has now swollen to up to $70,000! Another report by an international team of

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

FEATURES / market focus

THE REALITY Since 1978, the UAE has seen an overall decline of 80% in the average stock size for all commercial species. Recent studies show that fish of many species are caught beyond sustainable levels in the UAE. In the case of the hammour, for example, the current fishing rate is over seven times higher than the level that would maintain a healthy population. There are clear signs that fishing is affecting several species. Some consequences that have been observed: Low maximum age. The fish that are caught keep getting younger. We no longer find the same number of older fish that would normally be found in a healthy stock. Hammour can live up to 30 years, but today, the oldest fish that can be found is only 11 years old. High juvenile retention. Most fish we find on the market today are small juveniles. These fish have not had a chance to mature and produce eggs. In the case of kanaad or kingfish, 95% of landed fish are immature. Similarly, for zuraidi fish, 71% of the catch comprises of fish smaller than the size at which they reach maturity. Lower numbers of males. For some species, more females than males are naturally present in the population (eg hammour). However large individuals are heavily targeted by fishing. Since these are usually male, the sex ratio becomes even more imbalanced. This interferes with the species’ ability to reproduce. ecologists and economists led by Dr Boris Worm from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, comes to the same conclusion, although it also adds habitat loss to the pressures that marine life faces. This study was an attempt to understand what the loss of ocean species would mean to the world and saw the researchers analysing several different kinds of data. Apparently, even to battle hardened and eco-committed scientists, the results were an unpleasant surprise. “I was shocked and disturbed by how consistent these trends are beyond anything we suspected,” Worm said as the report was released. And just to make the point clear, Dr Nicola Beaumont, of the Plymouth Marine Laboratory in the UK, stressed that “this isn’t predicted to happen. This is happening now. If biodiversity continues to decline, the marine environment will not be able to sustain our way of life. Indeed, it may not be able to sustain our lives at all.” 29% of edible fish and seafood species have already declined by 90%. That’s a drop from which they cannot recover and these species will collapse and become extinct. And the fewer fish, the more

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

toxins will build in the oceans, the less shorelines will be protected and the morealgae blooms such as the red tide will become common. “A large and increasing proportion of our population lives close to the coast. Thus the loss of services such as flood control and waste detoxification can have disastrous consequences,” states the report, which analysed data from 32 experiments on different marine environments, plus the millenium history of a dozen coastal regions around the world, including San Francisco and Chesapeake bays in the US plus the Adriatic, Baltic, and North seas in Europe. In addition, they also analysed fishery data from 64 large marine ecosystems and studied the recovery of 48 protected ocean areas. Their ‘cut to the chase’ conclusion? Everything that lives in the ocean is important. In fact, it’s the diversity of ocean life that is the key to its survival and those ocean areas with the most different kinds of life are also the healthiest. The bad news? Species loss isn’t gradual. In fact, it’s happening fast and, worse, it’s speeding up. They also dismiss claims that essential measures such as sustainable fishing, pollution control,

All these effects are a result of overﬁshing, which stems from high demand for a small number of popular species. We have unsustainable consumption and exploitation.

EWS-WWF is a national leading environmental NGO. EWS-WWF works at the federal level to conserve biodiversity and promote sustainable living through education and conservation initiatives.

habitat maintenance and ocean reserves should not be viewed as costs, but rather as investment. Such investment will pay off with a sustainable ﬁsh industry, fewer natural disasters, human health and more. According to Worm, “It’s not too late. We can turn this around.” The problem is that, currently, less than 1% of the global ocean is effectively protected. We have a long way to go.

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FEATURES / market focus

It costs how much? What’s the most you’d spend on a dish? How about almost $4m? Too much for you, even though it comes with a diamond ring? Restaurants worldwide are constantly competing to deliver wallet cringing dishes, piling on expensive ingredients like gold leaf and foie gras or pricey cuts of meat and rare wines as part of the package. Here’s a number of the most expensive dishes we could ﬁnd, worldwide.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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market focus / FEATURES

ost expensive menu items tend to be high-quality steaks or esoteric burgers, but chefs from all over are stretching the imagination in the kitchen and the credit card at the dining table. How many of these would you go for? $100 for a hot dog? That’s what the Dragon Dog from DougieDog in Vancouver will set you back and there’s not even a trace of caviar in it. Instead, the foot-long dog is infused with century old Cognac and then topped with fresh lobster and Kobe beef seared in truffle oil. The same price will get you a cheesesteak at Barclay Prime in Philadelphia, should you decide you want Wagyu ribeye, foie gras and truffled homemade fontina cheese. The accompanying glass of Dom Perignon 2000 is on the house. Now it starts! The world’s most expensive soup ($170 a bowl) is available at Kai Mayfair in London. The Buddha Jumps Over the Wall soup used to contain shark’s fin but now it’s noodles that accompany abalone, Japanese flower mushroom, sea cucumber, dried scallops, chicken, Huan ham, pork and ginseng. We know ingredients are king in Japanese cuisine but even so a tab for $240 for eight maki rolls takes the breath away, even for New York. Bar Masa’s toro with caviar roll does come with a crispy, buttery brioche bun. Prices are rising now with the $350 A5 Kobe served NY Strip-style in a 12-ounce steak from New York’s Old Homestead Steakhouse. Apparently, the restaurant sells around two dozen of these every evening! Of course, imported high quality Japanese beef could be expected to have a hefty price tag, but $750 for a cupcake? Who do Sweet Surrender in Las Vegas think they are? Created by Chef Olivier Dubreuil of the Venetian and Palazzo, the Decadence D’Or cupcake uses chocolate made from Venezuela’s rare Porcelana Criollo bean, topped with Tahitian Gold Vanilla Caviar and edible gold flake, alongside a serving of Louis XIII de Remy Martin Cognac that comes in a hand blown sugar Fleur-de-Lis. But would you pay a third more for an ice cream sundae? Yes, $1,000 is the price tag of the Golden Opulence Sundae at New York’s

Serendipity 3 - three scoops of Tahitian vanilla ice cream infused with Madagascar vanilla beans, topped in 23K edible gold leaf, then sprinkled with two expensive and rare chocolates, plus candied fruits, gold dragets, chocolate trufﬂes and - of course - a bowl of caviar... All in a Baccarat Harcourt goblet with an 18K gold spoon. You don’t have a sweet tooth but you do still have $1,000 burning a whole in your pocket? Then head over to Nino’s Bellissima in NYC for a pizza topped with four types of caviar plus lobster tail. And while we’re talking lobster, Norma’s in NYC offers a $1,000 Zillion Dollar Lobster Frittata topped with ten times as much caviar as the $100 for those watching ﬁnances. In there somewhere as well is a pound of lobster. If you like pizza and happen to be in Malta,

The $1,000 Golden Opulence Sundae at New York’s Serendipity 3 three scoops of Tahitian vanilla ice cream infused with Madagascar vanilla beans, topped in 23K edible gold leaf then make sure you have $2,420 to spare before heading to Margo’s for its White truffle and gold pizza, only available October to May during the truffle season. That’s only a guide price as the truffles are flown in from Piedmont and you’ll be charged market rate. The water buffalo mozzarella used is organic and the gold leaf 24K. What can you do with those crazy chefs! When Chef Hubert Keller saw that Chef Daniel Boulud had a $100 burger on the menu, he decided to outdo him at his Fleur in Las Vegas. The FleurBurger uses Kobe beef topped with seared foie gras and truffles on a brioche truffle bun, accompanied by a bottle of 1995 Chateau Petrus

wine and the two crystal stemware glasses. So far, in nine years, Fleur has sold over 25 of these $5,000 hommages to excess. Add another $100 to that price and Gleneagles Hotel in Scotland will serve you a killer cocktail: Stolichnaya Elite vodka with a twist of lemon and an 18K white gold ring as a garnish with a baguette and pave diamonds. At a more reasonable $4,315 you can settle for No3 gin, maraschino liqueur, Parfait Amour and lemon juice to go plus a white gold diamondencrusted pendant from Florence. Salvatore Calabrese at London’s Playboy holds the world record for most expensive cocktail at $8,630. Salvatore’s Legacy contains 1788 Clos de Griffier Vieux Cognac, 1770 Kummel Liqueur, 1860 Dubb Orange Curacao and early 20th century Angostura Bitters. So far, just three have been sold. Maybe other cocktail lovers have been heading instead to the Algonquin in New York City for a $10,000 martini that comes complete with a customisable diamond. Of course, if you’re in Vegas, the same bar tab will net you an Ono at XS Nightclub, Las Vegas - this one has a base of Charles Heidsieck Champagne Charlie 1981 and Louis XIII de Remy Martin Black Pearl cognac, together with a pair of silver cufflinks and a 18K white-gold chain with a black pearl pendant. Another step up finds us in Sri Lanka at the Fortress Resort & Spa dropping $14,500 on its Stilt Fisherman Indulgence Dessert complete with gold leaf Italian cassata and flavoured with fruit-infused Irish cream and a Dom Perignon champagne sabayon and topped with an 80K Aquamarine gemstone the size of a soup spoon. One has to wonder how long it takes a stilt fisherman to earn $14,500... In the dessert stakes, Lindeth Howe Country House Hotel in England offer a $35,000 chocolate pudding shaped like a Faberge egg and stuffed with high-end chocolate, gold leaf, champagne, caviar and a diamond. It is also layered with champagne jelly and laced with edible gold. Finally - and we’re in crazy territory now $3.95m dropped at Arnaud’s in New Orleans will get you a portion of Strawberries Arnaud and a 7.09K pink diamond. It is, apparently, the restaurant’s ‘worst selling dessert’.

Arnaud’s Strawberries and Arnaud pink diamond.

Lindeth Howe Country House Hotel chocolate pudding.

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Margo's, Malta, White trufﬂe and gold pizza.

Chef Daniel Boulud burger.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / pimp my plate

MEAT & LIVESTOCK AUSTRALIA Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) is a producer-owned company whose mission is to deliver world-class services and solutions in partnership with industry and government. Promoting the quality, safety and nutritional value of Australian red meat both domestically and internationally, on behalf of the meat and livestock industry, MLA manages and operates a portfolio of marketing activities aimed at maintaining and increasing demand for Australian meat and livestock. MLA in the Middle East North African region works with retailers, foodservice operators, importers, manufacturers and Australian exporters to maintain and increase the demand for halal red meat and livestock to the region.

SPONSORED BY

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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FEATURES / my food

Antonella Ricci Antonella Ricci was born in Ceglie Messapica, in Puglia. Her family owns the celebrated restaurant Al fornello da Ricci that has been open for almost half a century and has held a Michelin star for two decades. Ricci took over the restaurant and made it a landmark. Dishes prepared by her are distinctively healthy and traditional, with most of the ingredients harvested from her own garden.

ruly Italian cuisine and its excellence are her passion: a mosaic made up of of ingredients and recipes, traditions and habits. Ricci and her husband, chef and business partner Vinod Sookar met in his country of origin, the Mauritius Islands, almost 20 years ago. Together they deliver the true taste of Italy.

Cubo di coscia di agnello

Rigatoni dedicato semola pugliese

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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my food / FEATURES

Calamaretti farciti di ostriche

Coda di rospo pescatrice

Cappello di prete di manzo

Filetto di spigola arrotolato

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Trilogia di tiramisu

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / face to face

Quantas receitas tens para bacalhau?

Eight years after giving up their careers to deveote themselves to food, self-taught husband and wife team Renato and Dalila Cunha’s Ferrugem restaurant consistently hits ‘best of’ lists in Portugal with their modern take on traditional ﬂavours. Dalila Cunha answers for them both.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

hat makes the produce of Portugal so special? Portuguese explorers were some of the most adventurous the world has ever seen. They sailed the world’s oceans, discovering ﬂavours and recipes that they brought back home and this exchange made Portugal's cuisine one of the most interesting in the world. Today, Portugal continues exploring the world with agro-food and beverage products that combine this sea-faring tradition with a geographic location by the Atlantic sea. Much of the country’s land is fertile, with a fusion of an Atlantic and Mediterranean climate that makes it possible to grow a large variety of products with genuine quality.

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face to face / CHEFS

In their mid-30s, self-taiught chefs Dalila and Renato Cunha gave up their professional activities in 2006 to dedicate themselves body and soul to gastronomy, making real their dream of opening a signature restaurant in the Minho - the Ferrugem Restaurant, in Vila Nova de Famalicão. It has been a stunning success, winning a place in 2012 in the Top 10 choices of the blog Mesa Marcada, both for the restaurant and the two chefs, as well as being awarded, in 2013 and 2014, both Comfortable restaurant and Bib gourmand by Michelin, 1 Sol by the Repsol Guide 2014 and the Golden Fork by the Boa Cama Boa Mesa Guide published by the Expresso. Aware of what is happening in Portugal and

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beyond, Dalila and Renato seek a wide base for their work, building on both traditional recipes and haute cuisine. The cuisine they promote values genuine products, with a Portuguese identity and, preferably, coming from sustainable agriculture (biological or biodynamic), a cuisine of clearly traditional roots, but at the same time creative, innovative and technically rigorous. Wine also has an important place in their work. In 2012 they won the Wine Sidewalk Restaurant of the Year category in W Aníbal's choices for that year and were chosen as the best Kitchen Chefs of 2012 by Wine magazine. In 2013 they received the Golden Diploma in the Port Wine Gastronomy Competition. The menus they created for the ﬁrst ﬁve Gastronomy and Vinho Verde Competitions earned them a silver diploma and four golden diplomas, underlining their role as ambassadors for Minho gastronomy and Vinho Verde. Dalila and Renato now regularly appear at events and guested at the Hyatt Capital Gate in Abu Dhabi earlier this year. Chefs, oenophiles, gastronomers, teachers and creators, these are also the inventors of the cod cream tar, a delicacy created in 2010 which is now produced industrially and exported all over the world. When you were children, what were your memories of food? Where did you grow up? Which family member cooked for you? The two of us grew up in the North of Portugal, one of the richest regions in culinary diversity. Renato is natural from the region of Minho, Vila nova de Famalicão, near Braga; I grew up on the outskirts of the city of Porto. There are many memories stored, mostly at family reunions, where they prepared all the traditional dishes. In my case, I learned to cook with my father, for it was he

LOVE AT FIRST BITE A number of Portugal's leading food and beverage producers put on a small trade exhibition in Abu Dhabi at the Hyatt Capital Gate, giving anopportunity not only to taste the products, but also to do business with the producers of a wide range of foods from seafood to pasta, from sausages to olives. Portugal has integrated EU food safety standards to assure the highest level of food safety, animal health and welfare as well as plant health through a coherent farm-totable measures and adequate monitoring. Portuguese companies also comply with quality and food safety certiﬁcations like BRC and IFS, meaning that we are able to export to the most demanding markets.

who did this task back home. Renato rarely had occasion to get close to the stove because he is the youngest of four children and the only boy! He lived surrounded by women, who traditionally ﬁt the task of taking over the kitchen. When did you realise you wanted to be chefs? When we started with our project the restaurant Ferrugem, it was never our purpose to be chefs, because we never imagined that a restaurant situated in a village of the interior could achieve the visibility and recognition that we did in such a short time. We just wanted to put into practice a passion that was cooking! Being chefs was a consequence resulting from our commitment and

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / face to face

passion for what we do. Before 2006, what work were you doing? We were working in completely opposite areas to the world of gastronomy. Renato was a trainer in computer science and I was working in the administrative area. How did you know that you would be successful as self-taught chefs in the competitive world of cooking? This is something that you can never know. Something that only time will tell. But we were aware that it’s a dog-eat-dog world, and that to win we have to work and study hard. Being a self-taught chef can be seen by some people as a disadvantage. We view it differently. We are not linked to any gastronomic current and allow us to risk, to do our work without being glued to any school or trend. As we say, the kitchen are 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration - nothing happens by accident and luck is hard work! What cuisines influence your food? Does your cooking include traditional dishes from all parts of Portugal? Do any of your cooking influences come from Portugals former colonies? Our gastronomy is 100% Portuguese! We seek to always work the traditional products and preferably biological. Our inspiration comes from North to South of Portugal. We want when the customer experience our cuisine, it refers to the memories of yore. All Portuguese cuisine has some influence of our colonies, as it is a very rich cuisine at spices and aromatic. Is any of your cooking influenced by the new cuisine of Spain? If, when you mention the new Spanish cuisine you refer to the great mentor of molecular gastronomy Ferran Adrià, we can say that we use some techniques that were driven by him. But all over the world Ferran Adrià is the face of modern cuisine. However, we must not forget that the technique should be at the service of gastronomy and not the other way around. Why do you think Portuguese cuisine is not known very well outside of Portugal? Especially in England, where Portugal is our oldest ally. Things are changing. Today people talk about Portuguese cuisine all over the world. It is not by chance that we have a Portuguese restaurant in the 50 best in the world! Even in England, some Portuguese chefs have been highlighted,

“How many cod recipes we have, I cannot say, but there are many. Cod can be prepared in a 1,001 ways. In all of our menus, which change four times a year, we have a dish of cod.”

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

for example, Chef Nuno Mendes at the Chiltern Firehouse in London, which has a Michelin star. Portuguese gastronomy needs above all to be supported by its governmental structure, which has not yet realised that this is one of our biggest ﬂags. If our food hadn’t been recognised across borders, we would have never had the opportunity to show our work in Abu Dhabi! You have a lot of interest in wine, do you see any opportunities to partner with the Port trade? Wine and gastronomy go hand in hand. The wine has an increasingly important role in a meal. We know that when it comes to Portuguese wines, everybody associate immediately to port wine, but Portugal has a lot more. We like to see ourselves as ambassadors of Portuguese wines, but in particular the wines of our region: Vinho Verde. And here we think we play an important role in its dissemination. Whenever we have a visit from specialty journalist we try to accompany the meal with these nectars so special. And it is with great satisfaction that we receive their feedback, that better is impossible. How many recipes for bacalhau do you have? How many cod recipes we have, I cannot say, but there are many. Cod can be prepared in a 1,001 ways. In all of our menus, which change four times a year, we have a dish of cod.

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face to face / CHEFS

Strait faced Working in conjunction with modern Mexican master Chef Richard Sanoval, Chef Akmal Anuar is ﬁrmly at the helm of Zengo, a new fusion concept at Le Royal Meridien in Dubai. However, as he explains, the step up to a 300 seater restaurant has brought its challenges.

ast year, two Singapore chefs helmed restaurants in British trade magazine Restaurant’s annual world rankings - Reif Othman and Akmal Anuar. Othman was firmly at the helm of Zuma Dubai and Anuar at Iggy’s in Singapore, widely hailed as the best restaurant in Asia. Now both are working in Dubai. Anuar never planned the move. He was finishing a lunchtime shift at Ziggy’s when in wandered a man in Bermuda shorts and flip flops, the chef Richard Sandoval. Sandoval had gone to Singapore to find out more about the cuisine for a future Mexican-Asian concept he was working on, having been inspired by a Singaporean cook who worked for him in the US. Intrigued by Iggy’s reputation

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but with a very small window in his schedule, he chanced his luck and turned up. Anuar nearly threw him out - after all, this was not how he expected guests at a ﬁne dining establishment to act. However, he put dishes in front of the chef, they got talking and didn’t stop for two hours. The die was cast and the end result is Zengo, an exercise in cross-culinary co-operation. Both chefs worked on developing the menu, teaching each other their respective cuisines, although the end result is more Asian than Latino.

it being such a small city. The main problem is that most produce is imported though we have 15-20 local ﬁsh that are used and there’s some hydroponic veg like lettuce grown. So, in a sense, it’s similar to Dubai but diners there are very picky and the food scene is 24x7. It’s hard there for chefs to do anything new and there’s a kind of old school control for comfort food. Some young chefs are doing pop-ups but they have to build the trust of diners, who always think they can go down the street and eat much more cheaply. So it’s hard.

What is the restaurant scene like in Singapore? It’s very competitive, which I think comes from

Were you always interested in food? Yes, both my grandmothers were very good cooks. My father ran a food business and, when I was 12, I

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

used to help out - washing dishes, chopping onions. I didn’t do well at school so I had to work. My original career choice was a precision engineer but I didn’t do well at it so I thought I’d try culinary school. I didn’t understand cooking but I loved food! Really, I didn’t care how it was made. And your first restaurant job? I found work in a small gastro type pub 6am to 2am solid on the fryer! Eventually I realised that I was doing nothing, going nowhere in the job so, in 2000, I went to Les Amis, Singapore's top French restaurant. The first time I saw the chef, all in his whites, I got a real shock but I asked him if I could work there. He said I could be a dishwasher but I told him I wanted to cook. ‘What can you cook?’ he said. Anyway, he took me in and I was there for two years, working my way up to appetisers. Justin Quek was a great chef - he’d worked with Michel Roux Jr and it was a great time for me, although I’d no experience of fine dining and I really had no clue. Then I had to do my military service - as a firefighter! And after that? I had the chance to run a restaurant in a luxury hotel in the Solomon Islands. I did that for a year without a break but it was hard - apart from fresh seafood, we had virtually nothing to work with nand I had to cook with the least ingredients. Still, I learned how to pickle, how to cook undergound for 24 hours and so on. Native skills. Then I went back to Singapore to the acclaimed Saint Pierre run by Chef Emmanuel Stroobant. I lasted a year there. Frankly, I like to commit to a job but it didn’t really work out. Then you moved to Iggy’s? I started as Senior Chef de Partie and got promoted all the way uop to Head Chef. It was amazing to see the place grow to gaining a place in the top 100 and to be the best restaurant in Asia. That was a very, very big achievement. To be honest, we had no idea it was coming, no word in advance so it was a total shocker. Does that level of fame bring pressures? Of course. People have raised expectations and you become part of a bucket list, even though it was just a 40-seater, very plain with no windows. The problem is that taste is very subjective and, trying to create new things all the time, we became obsessive in checking every plate ten or 20 times. It was very stressful. If there was a bad review, for example, then the owners would stress out and demand to know why. Then, in 2013, Richard came on a scouting trip to

Singapore, wandered in at the end of service and said he only had 15 minutes to spare. That must have pleased you! I had no idea who he was. We started chatting and 15 minutes became two hours. Finally, he offered me the chance to come to Dubai and I said I wasn’t interested - I mean, I already had offers in London and Moscow - but I would think about it. He convinced me to come and have a look and then I spent two weeks working in the Zengo in Washington. I saw the potential of Dubai and now I’ve been here a year. How has the collaboration worked? Very well. As a chef, I’m very hands on - I can’t let go. Richard is very generous and we’re really shared and taught each other. He insists on the best ingredients, the best equipment and the latest techniques and we’ve both been applying new ﬂavours to classic dishes. I think it’s worked really well. And sourcing? I’ve had great support from my suppliers in Singapore. The original Latin-Asian theme has, I think, turned more into recreated Asian but that’s partly because the hotel wanted us to be ‘uncomplicated’ at the start. So we’ve created a very approachable menu where the ingredients are key. For example, the Chef’s 30 vegetable chop suey changes daily depending on the season and what best produce is available - it’s a mix of ﬂowers, grains, herbs, roots, tubers, sprouts and vegetables. Most places would offer a vegetarian a Caesar salad, but i wanted to do something special! We’ve not been open long but already we’re getting regulars which is great - some people are here three times a week! To be honest, I’m waiting for people to trust me enough to be more experimental - when they tell me to do more, then I’ll go crazy! What do you make of the Dubai F&B scene? It’s just so saturated. To be honest, very little really excites me, there seems to be a general lack of quality and I would expect more for such a well-travelled population. I think passion is missing and there’s almost no gastronomy in my view. There’s nowhere iconic - that’s my mission, to become the iconic restaurant. What’s on your horizon? My longterm agenda is to be a teacher, a mentor, to contribute in some way. That’s why it’s such fun working with Richard - we have no egos between us and we go for whatever works. To me, good food is good taste.

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face to face / CHEFS

“To be honest, I’m waiting for people to trust me enough to be more experimental when they tell me to do more, then I’ll go crazy!”

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January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / face to face

Trufﬂes are the most expensive edible fungi around and an ingredient that chefs love to use. We spoke to Massimo ‘The Trufﬂe Man’ Vidoni of Italtouch to learn his story and why he is so passionate about this delicacy.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

t’s undeniable that the attraction of truffles is partly down to their rarity, but taste and aroma are equally important. Whilst many people rave about them, a minority find it hard to understand why a scent that has been described as a toxic blend of dry mushroom, hummus, wet forest and earthy hazelnuts should be so appealing. There’s a muskiness and strange sensuality about truffles that is reminiscent of pheromone - a chemical secreted by humans that attracts. It’s also very effective on pigs, which is why traditionally they were used to forage for them. Now, however, dogs are much preferred - they can be taught to search for the scent and, more importantly, not to eat the truffles! Technically, a truffle is the fruiting body of a fungus that grows in symbiosis with - in general oak and hazelnut trees. A good truffle is firm and never spongy and the size varies from the size of a marble and golf ball, to a tennis ball or grapefruit. Outside, they are slightly bumpy, while inside they are smooth. They are valued so highly because they are only available a couple of months per year - with white truffles being available mostly from one part of Italy - and grow in very specific land and climatic conditions, making them a rare

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face to face / CHEFS

commodity. Foraging also plays a big role, as truffle harvesters (also known as trufolau in Italy) who use a narrow spade with a long handle, have to dig it out without damaging it. There are around 2,600 species of truffles, which are found worldwide. However, only a small number of those species are used in cuisine. One man who is more than passionate about truffles is Massimo Vidoni, known by chefs with affection as The Truffle Man. Where are you from originally? From the Friuli-Venezia-Giulia region in the North East of Italy, a small town about 30 minutes from Venice. My parents ran a hunting/fishing shop and my father would take me hunting. Of course, my grandmother and mother were great cooks - they gave me the feeling for food and nothing was ever pre-packed. So food was important? Yes, like most Italian families we were close to it. Pigs were always there. We’d go and see cheese being made. I’ve always loved food. And school? No, not good. I was really into computers and computer games, taught myself to program and so on. In fact the first money I ever made was selling software from a magazine on cassette tapes. After school, I did my military service in the Navy for three years and visited both Lebanon and the UAE. Then I saw Wall Street and decided to go to New York - the place seemed like a dream to me but when I arrived, it was a real shock! So there I was, age 21, studying Business administration and Sales & Marketing at NYU with guest speakers like Dionald Trump coming in - it was amazing! My parents paid for my accommodation but for the courses and to live, I got work as a busboy and then a waiter at Da Silvano Restaurant in Greenwich Village. I did weekends and was making $6-700 a shift! Did you find American-Italian food a shock when you arrived? Oh yes, the food was so heavy, so different to what I’d been used to back home. And that was when I started to sell truffles. I volunteered to work Christmas and New Year’s - to thank me, my boss flew me home first class and I brought back half a kilo of truffles for him as a thank you. He told me to go straight back and get a couple of kilos! Were truffles big then in New York? No, not really. This was 1990 and probably only half a dozen Italian restaurants had the kind of clientele who appreciated them and would pay. It was just at that time that you began to see a split in the Italian restaurant scene with Northern Italian chefs serving different food from what Southern Italian chefs had traditionally cooked there. Da Silvano, for example, served Tuscan food. Anyway, truffles then were very expensive and people were used to paying $5-6,000 a kilo - I began to sell to more and

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more places. It was all a bit like an intrigue - I’d go in with a bag and chefs would trust me that I had real trufﬂes. Then I brought in collateral products like trufﬂe oil as the restaurant scene split more and more from checker tablecloth places to little proper trattoria run by younger chefs. Of course, the US food scene has matured a lot over the last couple of decades... Sure, chefs started to raise the level of food, the Food Network made celebrity chefs, magazines fed the whole thing. The problem with Italian chefs is that for a long time we were always undermined

WORLD’S LARGEST That month, the world’s largest white trufﬂe sold at Sotheby’s in New York. The size of a cauliﬂower, the 4.16 pound monster was found in Umbria and was sold at auction for more than $61,250 including the auction house’s premiums. The buyer wishes to remain anonymous, but lives in Taiwan.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / face to face

by the French and Italian American chefs just took traditional dishes and gave them a twist. It was the arrival of chefs from North Italy that made a difference - suddenly they wanted truffles and the best olive oil , caviar and foie gras and so on. However, after 18 years of it, I felt things were changing. Chefs I had known for years like Daniel Boulud or Thomas Keller had grown their empires so much that they never had time. I mean, nobody can get a minute with Jean-Georges any more! You know, I used to run a small cafe just 50 metres from Le Cirque at the Bellagio in Vegas. So, if things had changed so much, you felt it was time to move on? Yes, I sold up in 2008 and the family went to live in Italy for a couple of years. It was good to go home and then it was time for the next challenge. My wife and I talked - should it be Dubai or Shanghai, where she had worked. Dubai won! It was a good move and the standard of F&B is always going up, though I think levels of service are killing us. How did the truffle business start here? I’d been to Australia and found 4kg of black winter truffles - this was the week before Eid, I remember. I just went to DIFC, walked into Zuma and sold

“I volunteered to work Christmas and New Year’s to thank me, my boss flew me home first class and I brought back half a kilo of truffles for him as a thank yiou. He told me to go straight back and get a couple of kilos!” Reif a kilo for Dhs 8,000 - my first sale! Round the corner and Izu bought a kilo at LPM then another at Roberto’s. Three kilos just like that - for cash! Since then it’s just grown and grown. I think chefs here are more adventurous and someone like Colin at Qbarar just takes truffles and incorporates them with everything else he’s doing - great for a multietnic customer base. Why do you think you’ve been so successful? It’s the personal touch I have with chefs, hence the name of the company. This isn’t a product that you buy via your procurement manager. When I go to see a chef, the whole kitchen stops and all the chefs crowd round and talk about the truffles. They need the best and I deliver those.

How do you source? I have four guys in Italy who work as my middlemen and I’ve known them for 20 years. They do what they’re best at and supply 50kg a week. Then I have other people in France, Spain, Croatia and Australia. You’re clearly passionate about trufﬂes They’re my babies! I check them every day, making sure they’re in good condition. Nobody else does that, but me. The problem we have here is that, for the import, the trufﬂes have to be clean of earth - that’s what helps protect and preserve them, so we do get a 4-5% shrinkage every day. Every shipment I have I have records so I can pinpoint any problems, though my suppliers would not provide me with less than the best.

TRUFFLE TYPES Italian white truffles (Tuber Magnatum Pico) These are the most expensive kind, available from October to December from Alba. The most sought after are found in Italy's Piedmont region. It is off-white or beige in colour and has the strongest flavour and aroma, when compared to other truffles. Summer white truffles (Tuber aestivum) These are less powerful and less expensive about one twentieth the price - of the black winter truffle.

to September. These truffles can be re-produced, unlike white truffles - they are farmed in Yugoslavia. Burgundy truffles (Tuber uncinatum) These are somewhere between the winter and summer truffles, both in terms of intensity and price. Chinese truffles (Tuber sinensis or Tuber indicum) Winter black truffles harvested in China and often

exported as inferior-quality substitutes for the French black truffle, sometimes soaked with extracts from authentic truffles and then sold as Tuber melanosporum for a higher price. Fagga A desert truffle that can be found in Oman and Hatta after rain and thunderstorms. The Emiratis call it a gift of god and cook it with slow-cooked meats.

Black winter truffles (Tuber Melanosporum Vitt) Also known as the black diamonds of Provence, though these can also be found in Norcia in Italy. These are grown under oak trees and are black or dark brown outside and black on the inside with white vein-like lines. November to March is the harvest season. Black truffles have a slightly nutty texture and flavour profile. Black summer truffles (Tuber Aestivum) These are the most common and affordable truffles, with a black exterior and light beige or cream flesh. They aren't as perfumed as black winter truffles and are found in Italy, Spain and the south of France from May

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

Black trufﬂes

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FEATURES / my menu

Pierre Gagnaire Acclaimed French chef Pierre Gagnaire shares some of his thought processes in creating a new menu that reﬂects the integrity of produce as well as demonstrating the ﬂair and imagination of the chef.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

he starting point is always the produce. It appeared to me at an early stage that the analysis of what you find on the market is the foundation of all actions that follow. A menu has to be coherent, with products that make you comfortable using them. In a professional environment, these products have to be available for a little while in order to give you a chance to make your dishes evolve and give them a chance to live and improve. The research of the right balance between originality and reliability of what you buy is something important. It actually is a beautiful thing to create a story with seasonal ingredients. They are all here, ready to be used and paired - the combinations are endless. For example, in France, because the fishing of scallops is particularly regulated, everybody uses them at the same time! So many chefs can cook them to perfection. What will make the difference is what your interpretation will be. In order to broaden your possibilities, you have to look around constantly and never miss a seasonal opportunity, like the beautiful cep mushroom, for example. A good menu should push you to exploit all types of cooking techniques available. Poached, grilled, braised, roasted, the raw material will open up a world of textures. It is here that resides the key to pleasure. Once the ingredients and their interactions are decided, it is the capacity of a chef to juggle with these different tastes, temperatures and textures that will create an emotion. Even different ways to cut can provide different feelings. My aim is always to generate pleasure by the use of little tricks that I have learned over the years and that you will learn along your own journey. The final result should value quality over quantity, don't accumulate cream and butter, several broths, only powerful sauces. And we have not talked about density of liquids and plays on colour yet! Good luck!

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my menu / FEATURES

â&#x20AC;&#x153;One of my strengths is that I tend not to duplicate my recipes in my restaurants. I try to have as much information as possible on the ingredients available in the country, the ones that are fresh and the ones that need to be imported and then I adapt the menus...â&#x20AC;? - Pierre Gagnaire.

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January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / recipe corner

Elle & Vire A new product from the French dairy giant is Sublime Cream with Marscapone. This innovative blend is made with 30% mascarpone and 70% Excellence Whipping Cream, making it easy to work and ready-to-whip for indulgent chantilly creams and precise decoration. We bring you two recipes using this product from top French patisserie chefs.

SAINT HONORE RECIPE BY CHEF FREDERIC CASSEL, SALON DU THE IN FONTAINBLEAU AND PRESIDENT OF RELAIS DESSERTS SERVES 6-7 PASTRY Ingredients 250g puff pastry (22cm diameter) 250g choux pastry METHOD ∙ Using a pastry rolling machine, roll out the puff pastry to a thickness of 2mm. Leave to rest for six hours, then pipe on a choux pastry circle, the same size as the puff pastry base. ∙ Create about twenty little choux buns on a baking tray and cook the base and the buns together at 200C for approximately 40 minutes. SAINT HONORE CREAM WITH TAHITIAN VANILLA INGREDIENTS 500g crème patissière with Tahitian vanilla 250g Elle & Vire Excellence Whipping Cream 250g caramel 500g Elle & Vire Sublime Cream with Mascarpone METHOD

∙ Mix the vanilla crème patissière gently with the prewhipped Elle & Vire Excellence Whipping Cream.

∙ Fill the choux buns with the mixture before dipping them in the caramel. The caramel can be ﬂavoured and coloured as desired. ∙ Once the little choux buns have cooled down, stick them round the rim of the choux pastry base. ∙ Fill the middle of the pastry base with the rest of the Saint Honoré cream. ∙ Whip the Elle & Vire Sublime Cream with Mascarpone and apply it in curling ripples using a Saint Honoré piping nozzle. You can also ﬂavour the cream with pistachio, caramel, etc.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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recipe corner / CHEFS

EXEL’MANS DESSERT RECIPE BY CHEF ANDRE CORDEL, MAITRE CHOCOLATIER AND PATRON OF AU PALET D’OR IN BAR-LE-DUC SERVES 8 POLENTA Ingredients 200g Elle & Vire Sublime Cream with Mascarpone 25g Valrhona cocoa powder 25g ﬁne semolina 10g Elle & Vire Salted Gourmet Butter 100g whole eggs 40g sugar METHOD Boil the cream and add cocoa powder and ﬁne semolina. Allow it to swell as you stir and, when the polenta has dried out a bit, add butter. At the same time, use an electric whisk to beat whole eggs with sugar, as if you were making a sponge cake.

Mix with the polenta which should be nice and smooth, then spread it in a 1.5cm deep frame on a silicone tray and cook in a low oven at 165C for between 38 and 40 minutes.

1 Bourbon vanilla pod (infused) 180g sugar 200g egg yolks 80g poudre á crème

EXEL'MANS CREAM INGREDIENTS 400g chocolate mix (including for the salambos) 500g vanilla crème patissière

TO ASSEMBLE INGREDIENTS 150g chocolate buttercream gold leaf

METHOD ∙ Use the ﬂat paddle attachment to combine 300g of the chocolate mix with 375g of the vanilla crème patissière. CHOCOLATE MIX INGREDIENTS 1.2kg Elle & Vire Sublime Cream with Mascarpone 50g Elle & Vire Gourmet Butter 130g sugar 230g Valrhona chocolate (Extra 53%) 400g Valrhona Caraque couverture VANILLA CREME PATISSIERE INGREDIENTS 1l full-fat milk 150g crème ﬂeurette

METHOD

∙ Assemble in an oval cake ring. Coat the ring with the chocolate buttercream. Place a polenta biscuit base inside. Pour 80% of the Exel'Mans cream over the biscuit and cover with another polenta biscuit. Smooth over with chocolate buttercream (about 100g). ∙ Leave to cool in the chiller and ﬁnish with a chocolate mirror glaze. ∙ Fill the 16 salambos with Exel'Mans cream, then top with the remainder of the chocolate mirror glaze (about 120g). Place these round the edge of the dessert. ∙ Make a light ganache (about 100g) and add use a star piping nozzle to place stars between the salambos like on a vacherin. ∙ To ﬁnish, add a light ganache twist on top of half of the dessert and add a few touches of gold leaf.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / recipe corner

TOMATO TARTARE, LANGOUSTINE AND BURRATA INGREDIENTS 80g tomatoes 60g burrata 90g langoustine 20g cherry tomato datterino 2g fresh oregano 2g basil 3ml extra virgin olive oil 1g Maldon sea salt

Frankie's Italian Bar & Grill Fabio Nompleggio, Executive Head Chef of Frankies Italian Bar & Grill, was born in a small town near to Rome and developed his passion for food watching his grandmother cook. Age 16, he was already working in a small restaurant in Anzio, before moving on to San Lorenzo in Rome, Unico in Milan, Andre (ranked 33rd in the world) in Singapore, as well as one Michelin star Acetaia in Munich and Armani Milano, among others. He joined Frankie's in 2013.

Pacchero Napoletano, with cherry tomato, code and oregano

METHOD ∙ Blanch the tomatoes for a few seconds in boiling water, then immediately cool them down in an ice bath then strain, remove the skin and seeds and cut into big pieces, seasoning with EVOO, Maldon sea salt, basil and oregeno. Keep in a strainer for ten minutes to lose the extra water. ∙ When tomatoes are done, peel the langoustine, keeping only the body without the head. Sear it with olive oil, salt and fresh herbs. ∙ With the help of a cutter make a circle of the tomato tartare, then place the seared langoustine on top. ∙ Finish the dish with burrata, olve oil and Maldon sea salt, basil and marinated cherry tomato.

PACCHERO NAPOLETANO, WITH CHERRY TOMATO, COD AND OREGANO INGREDIENTS 100g pacchero Gragnano 100g cod 50h cherry tomatoes 10ml milk 50ml cream 25g salt 12g pepper 10ml sparkling water 5g basil 5g oregano 10ml extra virgin olive oil 1g xantana METHOD ∙ Blanch the pasta in salted water for five minutes, remove and place in tray with olive oil. ∙ With the cod start evrything from cold. Prepare milk, cream and unsalted cod then bring to a boil on slow heat for approximately 15 to 20 minutes. Drain and mash the fish flesh, then transfer to a Kitchen Maid and start to whip it with the cooked cream, olive oil, salt and pepper. Mix until the texture is soft and smooth. ∙ For the sauce, blanch the tomatoes in water and salt, then immediately cool down in an ice bath. Then skin and blend with the sparkling water. Strain and season with sugar, salt, basil leaves and xantana. ∙ To plate, put the cherry tomato sauce in the bottom of the plate and fill the paccheri with the fish mixture. Finish with oregano, basil leaves and olive oil.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

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recipe corner / CHEFS

Panettone, hazelnut pastry cream and black trufﬂe ice cream

Tomato tartare, langoustine and burrata

PANETTONE, HAZELNUT PASTRY CREAM AND BLACK TRUFFLE ICE CREAM

METHOD

∙ Whisk egg yolk and sugar together then sprinkle ﬂour and corn ﬂour together slowly into the mixture.

∙ Warm the milk and hazelnut paste on a slow fire. HAZELNUT PASTRY CREAM INGREDIENTS 80g panettone 20g hazelnut paste 175ml milk 55g sugar 45g egg yolk 5g flour 12g corn flour

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When the milk starts to simmer, pour the egg mixture into it. With a whisk mix slowly to avoid lumps and, when thick, take it off the heat and put in a cold place. Blend when cold and use.

BLACK TRUFFLE ICE CREAM INGREDIENTS 250ml milk 150ml cream 37g egg yolk

65g sugar 12g stabiliser 12g milk powder 0.5 vanilla pod 5g black trufﬂe METHOD

∙ Warm the milk, egg yolk, sugar, milk powder and vanilla pod. When the mixture starts to thicken, start to add the cream and stabiliser mixture which you have boiled in another pan. ∙ After cooking for a while on slow ﬁre, take off the heat and transfer to a Pacojet, adding slivers of black trufﬂe. Freeze and blend.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

CHEFS / recipe

∙ Invert the cakes in a cake rack soon after taking out of the oven, place a bowl under the grill, drizzle the cakes three times and let the cakes drain and cool. ∙ Using a small fine sieve, sprinkle a thin layer of green tea powder over the cake. BOMBE PREPARATION FOR CREAMY LIME TIRAMISU INGREDIENTS 1l 35% whipped cream 1kg fresh mascarpone 280g fresh egg yolks 4 gelatin leaves (thick bronze) 1 vanilla pod 1 lime 200g sugar 60ml mineral water 180g brown sugar 180g high quality butter 180g almond powder 160g flour (type 45) 1g fleur de sel METHOD

∙ Mix the brown sugar, almond powder, ﬂour and ﬂeur de sel. Cut the cold butter into small cubes. Add butter and mix with batter with the foil until making small balls. ∙ Spread regularly the streuzel on a silicon baking mat (Silpat). Bake at 150/160C.

Valentin Néraudeau Valentin Néraudeau was fascinated by cooking since his childhood thanks to his grandmother Louise, his granduncle chef and his father baker. Disciple of master chefs such as Michel Guerard, the Pourcel brothers, Bernard Bach and Philippe Legendre, he earned himself the award for best apprentice of France in 2001. He opened three restaurants in Toulouse and now splits his time between there and Paris, where he runs the revived Bermuda Onion. MATCHA GREEN TEA CAKE WITH YUZU, AS A LIME TIRAMISU, EXOTIC CHUTNEY AND CREAMY GANACHE CAKE DOUGH WITH MATCHA GREEN TEA AND YUZU CAKE DOUGH INGREDIENTS 255g ﬂour (type 55) 8g baking powder 20g matcha green tea powder 310g caster sugar 1 pinch ﬂeur de sel 4 large eggs 45g thick cream 90g butter 90ml yuzu juice or lime juice

powder, powder matcha green tea, sugar, salt and eggs in a food processor fitted with a blade and blend for five minutes. Add the cream, butter pieces and yuzu juicethen blend again for five minutes, before folding into the flour using a spatula to mix gently by lifting the dough. ∙ To bake, brush the pans with 100g butter and 100g flour, line them and pour in the batter. Place in oven and bake for 35-40 minutes. SYRUP INGREDIENTS 70g caster sugar 40ml yuzu juice or lime juice 90ml mineral water METHOD

METHOD ∙ For two cake tins of 19x8cm, mix ﬂour with baking

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

∙ Prepare the syrup by mixing water, sugar and yuzu juice.

EXOTIC CHUTNEY INGREDIENTS 60g caster sugar. 1 pineapple 20 mint leaves 1 lime METHOD

∙ Peel the pineapple, remove the inside core part, cut into large pieces, add sugar, zest, a squeeze of lime and the mint leaves. Grind in the food processor and keep in a cool place.

GANACHE ALAMBRA INGREDIENTS 520ml whole milk 140ml cream 35% METHOD

∙ Boil milk and cream then pour the liquid over 1kg of Valrhona 53% cocoa and 200g butter cut into small pieces. ∙ Mix well in a large stainless steel vessel to create a smooth mixture without lumps. TO FINISH DECORATE WITH THE FOLLOWING 1 barquette of blue agastaches ﬂowers 1 bunch of peppermint 200g whole green pistachios 1 small jar of brilliant green powder 1 ﬂask of kirsch 1 sheet silver leaf

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recipe / CHEFS

"Je me suis lancé dans la cuisine car je suis un passionné. J'aime l'art de transformer. J'aime les légumes. J'aime sublimer. J'aime les grandes choses et j'aime manger rires. Mais c'est surtout l'art de transformer, de sublimer un produit, de rendre quelque chose de brut en un produit ﬁnal extraordinaire."

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January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

LEISURE / travel

Winner of the 1014 Taste New Zealand competition, Chef Prabakaran Manickam was taken by New Zealand Trade & Enterprise on a tour of the country and some of its leading food producers. Also on the trip was Sudeshna Ghosh, editor of our sister magazine BBC Good Food Middle East. Here is her report.

lades of grass. That's how detailed the conversation got, when we were at a cattle farm, investigating exactly what type of grass these happy cows, gazing benevolently at us from their lush pasture, were grazing on. Clover and rye, apparently, if you want to know. This was the first day of my trip to New Zealand with chefs Roy Soundranayagam, Group Executive Chef of Food Fund International (the firm behind The Meat Company and other successful restaurant, so they know a thing or two about their meat) and his protege Prabakaran Manickam, Area Head Chef, Food Fund International - winner of last year's Taste New Zealand cooking competition held in Dubai. I've been to cattle farms before, but never had I learnt so much about what goes into, at the grassroots level - literally! - making a good steak. I'd only just seen the inside of airports and a bit of sleepy Christchurch after dark so far, so our first glimpse of the famed New Zealand countryside was impressive. It's beautiful! Everything is so green all around - the two chefs gushed like excited schoolboys on a field trip as we cruised through the picturesque Canterbury countryside on the South Island, past miles and miles of rolling green farmland dotted with fat furry sheep and grazing cattle. Seeing the landscape firsthand really brought home the fact that it is for good reason that New Zealand has earned a reputation for high-quality, healthy produce - it is a truly clean, green, pristine environment and there is a sense of abundance everywhere - you can just feel that the chances of having a lot of nasties put into your food are a lot slimmer here than most other places on this planet. Why would you, when everything tastes so much better when it's natural and fresh? Back to those cows. After listening to Farmer Andy - owner of one of several family-run farms that produce New Zealand beef - wax eloquent on exactly what type of grass his cows enjoy eating and how he monitors their diet to ensure optimum health - apparently too much of one type of grass can cause indigestion - as Chef Roy peppered him with questions, we made our way back to ANZCO, who market this beef, to enjoy a steak lunch. When travelling with a chef, the question of who does the cooking isn't usually even an issue.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

the produce coming from New Zealand and kicked back on the ﬂat-bed seats for the long-haul ﬂight.

So Roy happily manned the BBQ in the balcony and got to work as the sizzling aromas wafted through the boardroom, even as he observed how cooking the meat on a flat cooktop on high temperature gives a good caramelisation and seals the meat. I usually like my steak with sauces and lots of accompaniments, but this simple meal of tender, juicy, just-grilled slabs of meat, accompanied by a homemade coleslaw, turned out to be unbelievably delicious! This particular kind of Angus cattle enjoys a free-range life on the pastures, followed by about 120 days on a grain-fed diet - on feed that comes from neighbouring farms, completing a highly sustainable cycle - on a sea-facing feed lot, drinking artesian water that comes directly from the Southern Alps. Their entire life cycle is free from hormones, antibiotics and, most importantly, stress. I was sold! Over lunch, the conversation revolved around everything from global meat prices to off-cuts and everything in between. As we left, the chef asked to try their long-fed beef (200 days of a grain diet), which he reckons might pack in even more flavour. In fact, throughout our trip, our chats never steered too far away from food, cooking, eating - whether it was swapping stories about the most unusual things we'd eaten, or chef telling me about the menus and new restaurant concepts he'd been planning on his flight in, even as the rest of us feasted on gourmet menus on the Emirates A380 business class cabin with much of

Farm life Just when I thought I'd got as in-depth as I wanted to when it comes to meat, we were whizzed over to our next stop - the home of Merino sheep. Now, they may be better known around the world for their temperature-regulating wool, but more recently, their meat has become a prized commodity as well, being distributed globally by Silver Fern Farms. Benmore Station, set in the stunning Mackenzie Basin region of the South Island, is one of just a handful of farms producing the unique, premium lamb, one of New Zealand's best kept food secrets. Nestled at the foothills of the southern Alps, this region is wild country at its best - towns are few and far between, the sky is definitely bluer (it is also a prime astronomy spot) and the rolling plains overlooked by majestic snow-capped mountains come together to make a serene, postcard-perfect landscape - and the perfect habitat for the Merino lamb to grow healthily and happily. I felt like I'd walked straight into one of Enid Blyton’s Shadow, the sheep-dog books, as I wandered around the pasture on a blustery spring afternoon. Merino lamb grow free-range on the high country slopes, grazing on native herbs such as wild thyme and tussock, tended to by the kindly farmers and their friendly dogs, usually grow to a mature 18 months to two years, before making it on to the plates of a privileged few. This unique diet and environment - Roy had pointed out to me earlier that only Mediterranean lamb enjoys a similar sort of natural diet - create a meat that is tender and succulent yet not fatty and deeply flavoursome, as we found out later that evening over dinner at the Omarama station farm-stay. Richard and Annabelle Subtil run this familyowned farm and open up their home to visitors, allowing a rare glimpse into life in a working farm, while being couched in comfort. The 19th century homestead has been carefully restored to offer luxurious yet homely accommodation, both within the main house as well as in a gorgeous stone cottage on the grounds, equipped with all the mod cons one would need. After settling into our respective rooms, we gathered round the fireside for a social meal with some of Richard and Annabelle's friends, with

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LEISURE / travel

WHO’S WHO ANZCO Foods is one of New Zealand’s largest exporters. A dynamic multinational company, it markets and guarantees yearround delivery of premium beef and lamb products to more than 80 countries around the world. Silver Fern Farms is a processor, marketer and exporter of premium quality lamb, beef, venison and associated products. It exports to more than 60 countries. Mount Cook Alpine Salmon is a producer, processor and exporter of Chinook (King). Its farms are situated in the Southern Lakes area of the South Island of New Zealand at an altitude of approx 600 metres. The actual farms are in hydro canals used to carry water into the Waitaki River system for power generation - these continually ﬂowing canals are fed directly from mountain lakes, fed in turn by glaciers and alpine rain. There is only alpine wilderness between the salmon farm and the mountains. Felton Road Winery is located in Central Otago, the most southerly wine growing region in the world. The latitude of 45 degrees south is similar to the Willamette Valley in Oregon and some of the ﬁnest wine regions of France. Peregrine Wines’ quest for quality is present in all aspects of the business, evidenced by the global acclaim for their wines, the highest international architectural accolades for the beautiful wing spanned winery and the excellence of customer service programmes. Omega Seafood is a family owned manufacturer of cooked gourmet greenshell mussels and clams. The Marlborough Sounds, where most of its mussel farms are located, provide isolation and strong tidal currents making for ideal, grit free growing conditions.

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

Roy, ably assisted by Prabhakaran, taking over the kitchen for the evening. On the menu were mouthwatering Merino lamb chops - simply grilled with a cumin-ginger spice rub - lamb loin with wholegrain mustard, salad and roast potatoes. The chefs also tossed up a quick pasta with pesto and pan-fried salmon, while dessert was a light Kiwi fruit sorbet that Annabelle had made. "The lamb has a lot of flavour," opined Roy, who'd really liked the farm operations. "Even though I did very little with it, it was still juicy. I'd eat it again!" As we lingered over our lovely dinner, washed down by fine New Zealand wines, enjoying the warm hospitality of our friendly hosts, I couldn't have agreed more. If that evening was memorable, then the view and soundtrack I woke up to the next morning was even more so - a babbling brook that the stone cottage overlooks, was being visited by a family of sheep nibbling at the grass, kept me company as I sipped on my morning cuppa. After a quick visit to a sheep mustering session - where the sheep are brought in to be weighed and checked up on - we hit the road again, this time to go from turf to surf. Fishy adventures I don't often eat fish for breakfast, but the quaint little café, Wrinkly Rams in Twizel, down the road from the Omarama station, specialised in the seasonal whitebait - it is a small fish only available for two to three months in the year and widely available in restaurants around New Zealand when in season - so we didn't hesitate to tuck into some. The traditional way to eat it here is in the form of omelettes, which definitely prepared our palates for all the fish we'd be trying later in the day. Salmon, to be precise. One of only a handful of regions in the world to farm King salmon, this untouched end of the planet, nestled at the foothills of the majestic Mt Cook, New Zealand's highest peak, offers a picturesque setting for the fish to grow. The fish at Mt Cook Alpine Salmon, the world's highest altitude salmon farm, enjoy pure glacial water from the Alps, a chemical- and antibiotic-free hand-fed diet and high standards of aquaculture to emerge as one of the most delicious ones around - as we found out at our impromptu salmon picnic after the farm tour. Tucking into the delicate, subtly flavoured fish from the back of our cars, Roy wondered out loud about how it would taste in a hot-smoked avatar. Luckily, just then another pack containing the smoked version was whipped out and the unanimous answer was that it tasted delicious! "It's interesting to see salmon being farmed as fresh water fish," said Roy, as these salmon are farmed in hydro canals offering swift currents to offer a healthy habitat for the fish. "They don't taste as 'fishy' as some other salmon and are also lower in fat. I think they'd be great lightly panfried, medium rare." If I thought that was the freshest fish I'd get to taste, I clearly hadn't seen anything yet as, within a couple of days, I found myself out in

the breathtaking surrounds of the Marlborough Sounds - a network of fjords on the northeast tip of the island - on a boat, eating just-caught mussels. But more on that later! Vintage affair On this day, we were en route to wash down our fish with some biodynamic wine. This stretch between the two towns of Christchurch and Queenstown is one of the country's prettiest and, therefore, a popular weekend or holiday destination for the locals. The landscape is ever-changing, going from turquoise alpine lakes, green meadows and rolling hills to drier, shrub-filled plains in the space of less than an hour - making it an Instagrammer's delight. It's a good idea to save some camera memory space for Queenstown, however, which is one of the prettiest towns I've ever been in. We took the scenic route to Queenstown via Felton Road winery, a boutique winery specialising in organic, biodynamic farming. A tour of the vineyards proved to be hugely informative, and even if some of their farming practices might seem a bit unusual - planting and harvesting according to lunar cycles, for example - their natural, minimal-interference approach to winemaking was revelatory. And the proof is in the pudding, or in this case, the Pinot Noir to be exact, which they specialise in; they also produce a good Chardonnay and Reisling. This informal, family-run winery doesn't normally do tours for visitors, but private tours can be booked if you ask nicely. It's worth getting an education before forking out the dollars for their wine, which is truly exceptional. Another exceptional winery that we visited, also in the central Otago region - one of New Zealand's up-and-coming wine regions, enjoying a continental macro-climate of hot, dry summers and cold winters, thanks to its unique geographic location - is Peregrine. Having won several awards, not just for its wines, but also the architecture the contemporary winery building is designed to represent a peregrine falcon in flight - Peregrine offers a sophisticated option for visitors to experience New Zealand wine in style. Producing an array of organic wines, Peregrine also specialise in premium Pinot Noir, but they make a fabulous Pinot Gris as well, plus Reisling, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. There's no better way to enjoy their offerings than with a tasting; bespoke tours can vary from a tasting in their stylish modern 'cellar' area, to a full-on tour of the vineyard hosted by a sommelier, followed by tasting of up to eight wines, accompanied by a gourmet 'Viticulturists Platter' lunch -think a selection of local cheeses, pear and fig chutney, quince paste, roasted nectarine chutney, smoked salmon, New Zealand salami and chorizo, with locally made breads. Clearly not just an authority on food but a wine enthusiast too, Sri Lankan-Australian Roy not only soaked up all the information, asking plentiful questions along the way, but his choice of purchase, an expensive vintage, proved to be

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something the winemaker personally approved of! Our consumption of fine Otago wines and good food - continued that evening at Queenstown's smartest restaurant, Rãtã. Helmed by celebrity chef Josh Emett, the restaurant is tucked away in a quiet by-lane away from the tourist town's busier streets. With a daily changing menu representing modern New Zealand cuisine, the restaurant combines gourmet, Michelinstar worthy food showcasing local produce, in a relaxed yet stylish setting with an industrialmeets-natural vibe. As a table of food lovers, we managed to order almost everything on the compact menu - from the smoked warehou croquettes with black sesame and soy mayonnaise; seared Wakanui sirloin with pickled shitake; Moko smoked eel with heirloom beetroot and confit lemon; and rose veal carpaccio with ox tongue, pink onions and smoked oyster cream; to roasted Cervena venison loin with braised cheek, parsnip cream and roast yams; pink fir potatoes with black rye and shallot crumble; and another taste of our favourite Merino lamb with spiced aubergine and broccolini. Throughout the meal, the professional's critique of the restaurant continued - Is the butter soft enough, or straight out of the fridge? Should a croquette be coated in béchamel sauce? - and towards the end, when head chef Chris came out to say hello, little did he know we'd end up having a nearly hour-long conversation about produce sourcing, New Zealand cuisine and everything in between. But here, the chef rocks up not in a stiff white jacket, but in a t-shirt rather. The menus aren't formal leather binders, but straightforward printouts on thick paper. Little things like this really summed up the New Zealand culture for me - it's low-key, fuss-free, fresh, modern, and

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genuinely hospitable, with a focus on quality. Freshness and quality were two things that we found in abundance at our final pit-stop on the trip, on that afore-mentioned mussel farm. Having travelled from Queenstown - stopping over for a quick bungee jump on the way at the world's first bungee spot, as you do! - to the picturesque Marlborough Sounds region, we were about to be taken on a rare trip to a mussel farm. The chef's enthusiasm was visible the next morning - "I love fishing!" he'd revealed to me on the boat ride - as, while the rest of us staggered out bleary-eyed for a 6am start, he was already conjuring up what he'd like to do with mussels. "Just a few shallots, garlic, tomatoes and a splash of white wine can turn fresh mussels into a beautiful dish," he said. The drive to the tiny fishing village of Havelock, past dramatically changing landscapes from pine-clad mountains and rolling green valleys to pastoral plains and Hobbit-esque hamlets with names like Woodchester and Rossdale, followed by a bracing boat ride out on the Balaena, a 120-year old whaling boat, watching the mist lift off the glistening ocean as the multitude of fishing boats bobbed about at the pier, was all the waking up we needed however. By the time we reached the mussel harvesting boat anchored in the midst of the spectacular fjords, we were all eyes and ears. This was a first-time experience for all of us, so we were intrigued with how the mussels were farmed on thick, moss-laden ropes to closely resemble their natural habitat (they naturally grow on seaside rocks). After feasting our eyes, we then treated our palates to these large, fleshy mussels, crudo-style on the boat - simply pluck from the rope, unbeard and slither into mouth, much like oysters! It didn't

even need seasoning, with the natural sea salt offering all the ﬂavour needed. We also tried some mussels, lightly steamed, on the boat, and cooked classic-style with white wine and lemon juice later at the pier-side café on our way out, but when they're this fresh, you need do very little with it. The good news? You can buy these mussels here too, thanks to Omega Seafood, who retail these sustainably farmed mussels (and clams) in cleaned, pre-cooked and vacuum-sealed form at your friendly neighbourhood Spinneys or Waitrose. I tried their clams in a spaghetti vongole, a simple concoction with pasta and white wine a few days later and it was one of my most memorable meals. I had not only a lot of memorable meals, but experiences on this trip. I learned a lot. Not least that in New Zealand, things like provenance, farm-to-table and sustainability aren't just trendy buzzwords being bandied about - it is the actual way of life. They take a real pride in taking care of their land and sea, their produce - that's how it's always been. Chef Roy couldn't agree more. "New Zealand produce really seems to be more ethically raised than most other source markets," he said. "And it's important for us as chefs to get to see this. It's a story to tell, that we get to share with our customers."

Getting there - Emirates offers daily ﬂights to Auckland and Christchurch from Dubai via A380s. The perfect way to travel for a longhaul destination such as this is business class, featuring ﬂat-bed seats, Bulgari amenities and gourmet cuisine.

January 2015 / The Pro Chef Middle East

LEISURE / last word

Smell the fork You know molecular gastronomy has gone mainstream when consumers are offered a grown-up Christmas chemistry set for enhancing the ﬂavours of their food with artiﬁcial aromas. Is this a sniff too far?

emember what your mother said? “Don’t play with your food!” That’s clearly a message that never stuck with the people behind Molecule R, a Canadian company that’s been turning out a range of DIY molecular gastronomy sets that lets amateur cooks - and maybe a few professional chefs - turn out pearls, noodles, foams and emulsions willy-nilly. Now it’s gone into science fiction territory with the Aromafork, which is being marketed as a fun way to play with flavours. The basic set up is simple: the pack contains four metal forks, disposable white cardboard tabs and a selection of flavour vials, covering spices, herbs, fruits, beans, umami and nuts. Drop some flavour on a tab then breathe in as you eat food off the fork to see what happens - remember that The idea is that, using the pipettes provided, you drop some flavour on to a tab, then inhale as you eat with the fork to see what resuts - remember, flavour perception is 80% smell rather than taste. Whilst it has all the makings of a party game for adults, the kit is rather counter intuitive in an age in which we seem to be embracing strong, real foods with taste of their own. Combining those flavours with a whif of coffee or peanuts may result in interesting creative ideas for future dishes but we suspect that most people will end up disappointed as their taste plus aroma mash-ups result in less than successful forkfuls. Jane Parker, founder and director of Reading University’s Flavour Centre agrees. “I find it very strange. People don't want flavourings. Everyone's got different receptors, so trying to make a flavouring that matches for everybody is very, very hard. The same compound that to me

The Pro Chef Middle East / January 2015

smells faecal, to you smells like lillies.” A further problem is that, of course, by their nature the vials of flavours are artificial and, as we know, an artificial fruit smell rarely captures the freshness of the original. The flavours of a strawberry, for example, have notes of fruit, mushroom, green, grass and honey - flavour scientists use so-called ‘nature identical’ compounds but end up with a variety of ‘strawberry’ variants such as creamy, jammy, fresh and so on. In fact, we’re so used now to certain flavour compounds that they have replaced the original taste in our sense memory - almond flavouring is the chemical benzaldehyde which is why almond liqueurs and marzipan taste nothing like the fresh nuts! So, in the end, is the Aromafork a product worth investigating? Possibly, but we suspect it may end up in the back of a drawer rather than a part of your daily activity.

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