American Regional Cuisine--the last two weeks (continued from previous post)!!

American Regional Cuisine Final!!: Hawaiian Cuisine

Can't believe it's been a week already!
Our final was on Monday, the 14th. So this is how it worked...

• Five people were selected, each of them drawing names out of hats to determine their team member, to make five groups of three.
• Each group was required to make three dishes--an appetizer or soup, an entree (which includes a main/protein, a vegetable, and a starch), and a dessert--with the given Mystery Protein and the Mystery Ingredient (each group got different ingredients). The dishes must be Hawaiian-themed.
• The Mystery Protein must be in 2 of the dishes, and the Mystery Ingredient must in every dish.

My group got to our table and lifted the cover off the Mystery Ingredients.

A HUGE mound of good quality shrimp and one who-knows-when-it-was-purchased can of julienned bamboo shoots.

Oh boy. We were stoked about the shrimp, but bamboo shoots that needs to be in every dish.... including dessert???

The guy who drew our names (I'll call him "Mr. C")decided to put ME in charge. His reasoning being, "...because you're Asian and know more about Hawaii than I do."

My instant thought; So... you're saying that I, a Japanese native/immigrant, know more about Hawaii, an American Territory (last time I checked), than you, born and raised in America??

Alas, I said nothing, just gave him a quizzical look and took out a pen and paper to set our menu.

The shrimp needed to be in two of our dishes. Since dessert is NOT an option for this particular ingredient, it had to be in our soup and entree. Fortunately, we had some dashi-stock on hand, so I decided on a clear broth soup with shrimp. Easy enough. For the main in our entree, I thought about the Loco Moco, a Hawaiian dish which I came across during my online culinary research. This dish consists of a mound of rice, with a hamburger patty topped with a sunny-side up. The entire thing is then drenched in brown gravy. Instead of the hamburger patty, we can use the shrimp to make a shrimp patty, then drench it in teriyaki sauce. The bamboo shoots can be part of the vegetable side.

Here's our menu--

Soup: Shrimp, Tofu, and Bamboo Shoots in Dashi-Soup

Entree: Loco Moco & Stir-Fried Vegetables

Dessert: Coconut Cream Tart with Passionfruit Sauce...and Candied Bamboo Shoots (....*sigh*)

This is where I learned that the people I work with definitely affects the outcome. Mr. C forgot to take the shell off one of the shrimp. He managed to overcook them too, after countless times I told him not to. Otherwise, our soup turned out very tasty. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of it...

Then our entree...our Shrimp Loco Moco needed rice, shrimp patties, and a sunny-side up.

The other person in my group was this quiet guy. He did a great job making and frying up the patties, which turned out crispy on the outside, succulent on the inside and tasty.

Mr. C claims he doesn't know how to cook rice. He made the stir-fries which turned out good. He then said that we shouldn't put too much gravy on it, because in the past, he lost points for putting too much on. So I relented, thinking that this dish is technically a deviation of the traditional Hawaiian dish, so using less gravy would be OK.

I really shouldn't have listened to him.

The executive chef from Hawaii judged our plates, and he said that there's "not enough gravy" on it, that Loco Moco needs to be "drenched" in it...

Bottom: Loco Moco recreated at home

Then the dessert--our dessert did very well, I must say. I made the tart crust with macadamia nuts, and froze it before baking. I used half coconut milk and half heavy cream for the coconut cream, and made passionfruit sauce using the passionfruit concentrate. I had the quiet guy candy the bamboo shoots.

The chef loved the flavor, but said that the tart needs to be anchored to the plate (this can be done with a sauce), otherwise, it can fly off.

Coconut Cream Tart with Passionfruit Sauce & Whipped Cream (minus the Candied Bamboo Shoots) recreated at home.

Despite a few mishaps (and the fact that we just winged the whole thing), we did very well and got a high score. That was crazy and mind-frazzling, but it was so much fun!!

So that was our final. Tuesday, we just cleaned up the kitchen and took a group photo.

That night, I used the leftover coconut cream and the tuile cups I made earlier and made this.

With a month-long vacation before the next quarter, I turned my attention to the beautiful roses blooming in my mom's garden. The pink and the red varieties are the most fragrant, with a sweet, fruity note. And there are a lot of them.

I decided to start off my break by recreating the Rose Syrup I encountered at the NICCO Convention.

After picking the roses in the morning (when they are the most fragrant), the petals were washed, torn into pieces, and placed in a large mason jar. I made a simple syrup with 2 cups of water and a cup of sugar. While it was still hot, I poured it into the jar with the petals, and sealed the lid quickly.

A few days later, I opened the lid. Lovely fragrance of rose drifted out...

But now what to do with it? Make dessert, of course!

Wanting a dessert that will allow the rose scent to really show, I decided on a simple jello dessert...

Strawberry & Rose Jello Anmitsu. The jello turned out good... but it's really hard to describe the flavor/scent--very flowery and sweet, but hard to identify as a rose; its existence almost like a fairy, it's there, but you don't know what it is. One lady I served it to said that it tasted "nostalgic", and reminded her of the flower nectar she had when she was a child. Her husband said that it's delicious, but the scent/flavor is so delicate, it's not for the average "Americans" (from his experience as an Executive Chef at a Japanese restaurant, the "Americans" tend to drench their dishes in whatever sauce they can get their hands on).

But I think this dessert has some potential...

Then lastly... I still had the leftover egg whites from the cream I made last week, so I again, made tuiles. This time, I added sesame oil to half the batter and the rose syrup to the other half. The sesame turned out delicious, with a nutty fragrance, but the rose turned the batter green. Very strange. The scent was gone, too. I think I'll stick with the sesame...

I also played around to see what shapes I can mold the baked tuiles into. Lo and behold...

Origami tuiles! This needs to be done very, very quickly and with a pair of gloves. I'll definitely see what other stuff I can fold with tuiles...