"Crudo" is an Italian word meaning raw and usually pertains to any uncooked seafood preparation. Its counterpart in Japanese cuisine would be sashimi. And like the Japanese, I always prefer to eat certain fish raw rather than cooked. Tuna is the biggest example of this. I prefer tuna raw so much that I will never order it at a restaurant unless it is untouched by heat. To me all that cooking tuna does is ruin the outside of a beautiful piece of fish.

This is actually a really simple dish that warrants a really simple paragraph or two only. The only thing that took any effort was puffing the rice and barley which was achieved by tossing the grains into a pan of smoking hot grape seed oil. They were then strained on paper towels and seasoned with togarashi. The onion petals were hot pickled in vinegar, sugar, salt and water. The pear was cold pickled in rice wine vinegar, sugar, salt, water and citric acid.

The radish and jalapeno were simply sliced and served raw. The water cress was arranged around the plate with sea salt and black sesame seeds were sprinkled over everything.  A few drops of wild garlic oil finished off the dish.

There are two things that happen every year, (well, the last three at least). The first is that I purchase a whole beef heart. The second, is that I try to figure out what the hell to do with a whole beef heart. The heart of a grass-fed cow clocks in at well over 3 pounds. And when you're the only half of your relationship that will knowingly consume it, that can be a lot to get through. You'll want some variety in your heart preparation. This year I decided that a large portion of this heart would become hotdogs, which turned out to be amazing. The rest was turned into what you see above, a delicious tartare.

The heart of a cow has the most intense beefy flavor out of every cut of the animal. It's all muscle, almost no fat whatsoever. And it is the one muscle that works constantly, 24 hours a day should the cow not die before reaching the slaughterhouse. With that being said, its very dense and can be very tough and chewy if not handled properly. One solution to this is to simply chop it up, or in this case grind it.

I cubed some of the heart and passed it through the small die of my grinder into a bowl. I seasoned it with salt and pepper and mixed in olive oil, shallot, chopped capers, spicy mustard and some balsamic vinegar. I made a ball of the meat with my hands and set it on the plate. I made a well in the center and poured to liquor into it.

I stole the idea for the egg yolk brandy from Magnus Nilsson. He has a recipe for duck egg liquor in his Faviken cookbook. I used the same technique here. I simply combined an equal volume of egg yolks and brandy along with some honey and stirred it to combine everything. I chilled it before use.

I also stole the next idea from Magnus as well. I boiled some water and poured it over a mixture of whole mustard seed, salt and potato starch. I stirred it well and allowed it to sit for 30 minutes til it became a thick paste. I spread the paste onto a silpat and baked it in a low oven til completely dried and crispy crackers formed.

I passed cloves of black garlic through a fine mesh tamis before mixing in some sweet soy sauce to take the bitter edge off. This is the black puree you see above.

I boiled the fresh horseradish root til soft and pureed it with butter and heavy cream as well as some sugar and lemon juice.

I finished the plate off with some incredibly sweet baby winter spinach. The farmer I bought it from told me that it tasted so good and so sweet because it had to work so hard to keep warm. I think he was right.

I was out walking in the woods a couple of weeks ago, in an undisclosed location, when I stumbled upon some familiar green shoots protruding from the ground. As I was picking a few of them from the ground, making sure I ripped the whole shoot out of the ground, I thought I had found a mother load of ramps (wild spring onions). I was ecstatic. I soon discovered though, that these were not ramps but wild garlic. While a little air had been let out of my sail, I was still pretty exciting to have found something edible in the woods. And I knew that these would go great with the pork cheek I had picked up that same morning at the market.

I braised the pork cheek in chicken stock and apple cider with a splash of sherry vinegar along with onion, garlic, fennel and celery. I cooked the cheek for about 3 hours and allowed it to cool a bit before placing it in a pan, placing another pan on top and weighing it down. I chilled it overnight and then cut out rounds. I then seared the cheek in pork fat before serving.

I slow-roasted some of the wild garlic bulbs in pork fat til they were soft. I also made an oil by blanching the garlic greens, pureeing them with grape seed oil and straining it.

I slow-cooked the potatoes in pork fat and then pan fried them in the same fat along with the pieces of fennel bulb.

The apples were cold pickled in cane vinegar, water, sugar and salt.

I spooned some of the parsnip puree onto the plate and placed the cheek on the one side of it. I arranged the other components around it finishing with the greens, fennel fronds and a garlic shoot. I spooned some of the jus around the cheek and squeezed some dots of the oil into it.



Product:
Pasture Raised Heritage Pork Cheek - Livengood Farms
Organic Hydroponic Green Leaf Lettuce - Gehman Farms
Organic Russian Banana Fingerling Potato - Margerum Herbs, etc.
Cameo Apples - 3 Springs
Wild Spring Garlic - Foraged by Me

The idea behind this dish began when I discovered some beets that had been left for dead, slightly shriveled and soft. They were at the point that they couldn't be eaten raw or roasted and peeled. So seeing as these options were off the table I decided to just burn the shit out of them. I was going to be smoking some meat anyways, so I just tossed the beets in with the wood chips and torched them. I was very pleasantly surprised that the result was a sweet smokiness that really went well with the finished presentation.

After thoroughly incinerating the beets and allowing them to completely cool, I crushed them up with my hands and ran them through my spice grinder to make a fine powder with them. I sprinkled them onto the plate using a cut out piece of cardboard for the line.

The carrots were halfway submerged in melted pork fat and roasted in the oven until completely cooked through. I turned them every 20 minutes to get a nice even caramelization all over. I allowed them to chill before cutting them and reheating them in the pork fat. I finished them with a little smoked sea salt.

I boiled basmati rice with much more water than typically used, cooking the rice beyond the typical point one would cook rice until it resembled a porridge. I pureed the rice and spread it into a thin even sheet on a silpat. I baked the rice at 250 degrees until completely dried out and crisp. I dusted the rice paper with cinnamon and cumin while it was still hot and broke pieces off.

I completed the plating with some crushed pistachios, celery root puree and some fresh micro pea shoots.