From Mayonnaise to Sabayon – Day 7

TODAY’S TIDBITS

• The average restaurant guest takes 10min to eat each course.
• The average restaurant guest gets antsy if they have to wait more than 7 minutes between courses
• Woody Allen used to play clarinet at Elaine’s, where they introduced the strawberry Sabayon. Elaine’s wasn’t a great restaurant, but was very popular because of Woody. Within two years, every restaurant in New York was serving the Sabayon, that is…until the Salmonella scare.
• Do not use the word Sabayon more than 5 times in a blog post, or it becomes obnoxious.

Today was more sauces, starting with Mayonnaise (whisked egg yolks, red wine vinegar, mustard, veg oil, salt and white pepper), through Hollandaise (yes its from Holland), then Bearnaise, and ending with a sweet Sabayon (egg yolks, marsala wine, sugar). The mayo tasted better than Hellmans, but it wasn’t “blow you away” flavor. Neither was the Hollandaise…..and vwhat for all dat vwhiskingk …oy vey! But the Bearnaise was real nice (egg yolks whisked with a white wine/shallot/tarragon reduction over warm water bath, and then clarified butter is added drop by drop, with parsley and chervil added to finish). I definitely want to try that over the steak.

The winner of the day though was the sweet Sabayon. “Sabayon” basically means egg (yolks) mixed with a liquid and whisked over a warm bath. This slightly cooks the eggs and foams them up. It can then accept clarified butter (i.e. in a Hollandaise), and makes a nice sweet or savoury sauce. We poured the sweet Sabayon over semi-sliced strawberries, and then torched them to brown a bit. I ate our whole bowl of left over Sabayon and the dessert of course.

We were assigned new co-workers today. I’m teamed up with Miyako, who is much more organized than me, but I can hold my own in the chopping and slicing department. Her parents own several restaurants in Tokyo and Kyoto, but her interest is in Spanish cooking.

We have our exam tomorrow, so I’m off to study, we also have potato homework, as well writing tomorrow’s recipe cards and reading the lesson… the day is over and is only half over! Poppy seed bagels from the bread class today.