TGRWT #11: Ginger-Glass bowl of banana mousse with cloves biscuits and lemongrass jelly

I received the following contribution for TGRWT #11 from Alessio Fangano, and since he doesn’t have a blog I post his contribution here in extenso. Enjoy!

Photo: Alessio Fangano

Ginger-Glass bowl of banana mousse with cloves biscuits and lemongrass jelly
All the ingredients are meant for 4 servings.

Cloves Biscuits
1 egg yolk
25g flour
3 tea spoons of groundnut oil
4g whole cloves
Fleur de sel
Groundnut oil to fry

Ground cloves, flour and oil in a mixer. The cloves do not need to be completely pulverized; the little shards will provide sparks of taste when bitten.

In a bowl fold in the flour mixture and the egg yolk (add little bit of water if needed). Knead a bit the dough before rolling it in a thin foil (2-3 mm).

Cut in rectangular strips approximately 7×1 cm, sprinkle on top 3-4 grains of fleur de sel on each strip and let dry for 3h before frying in hot oil.

Ginger Crisp cup
150g egg white
75g fresh ginger peeled
150g water

Peel the ginger, cut it in small pieces and ground very finely in a mixer adding water. Strain the liquid pressing the pulp trough a fine sieve. Add the liquid to the egg white with a teaspoon of the grinded pulp. Mix the whole properly.

Pour some of the mixture on a small no-stick skillet to a thickness of around 2mm. Put on the fire on low heat to let the water evaporate. It does not have to boil.

When the border will be dried out and some part of the interior will start to (ca 30 min), lift the film out of the skillet and place over the back of a bowl you will use as mold. Place a second cup over it to keep the film in shape and put into the oven at 120C for another 30min. After 10-15min take away the upper cup leaving the back of the crisp cup exposed. If at the end of the 30 min the crisp is too clear looking, just unmold it and put it in the oven for another 5-10min keeping an eye on it.

Proceeds this way for the rest of the mixture.

These crisps may be kept for a couple of days in a dry place.

Lemongrass Jelly
40g fresh lemongrass
1 teaspoons lemon zest
170g water
0.17g agar (1%)
Green food color

Put water and the lemongrass thinly chopped in a pot. With the lid on, heat it over low fire to around 70C. Let infuse for 2h away from heat. Filter the liquid with a sieve pressing the liquid out of the lemongrass. Add few drops of the colorant to the infusion to obtain a fresh mint green.

Heat few spoons of the liquid with the lemon zest and add the agar powder. Boil for 2-3 minutes. Away from heat mix in the rest of the liquid and pour in a mould. The resulting jelly will need to be cut in cubes, so use a flat shallow container. Refrigerate until set before cutting.

Chilies Consommé
25g water
2 small green Indian chilies
0.05g agar (0.1%)

Grind the chilies and the water in a blender. Heat up the liquid, add the agar powder and boil for 3 minutes. Put the liquid in a mold (glass for instance) and freeze overnight. Place the resulting iced-gel over a sieve and let the liquid drip on a bowl.

Banana Mousse
150g Ripe Banana
4 teaspoons rose water
1-2 teaspoon(s) chilies consommé
0.7g (0.5%) methylcellulose
1-2 pinch(s) curcuma (optional)

Disperse the methylcellulose in some warm water. Let it hydrate overnight. Purée the banana in a blender. Transfer in a bowl and flavor with the rose water and chilies consommé. If you wish, you can add a bit of curcuma to make the whole looking more yellowish-golden. Mix in the methylcellulose and foam with an immersion blender.

Keep in mind that the banana will darken over time so prepare the mousse shortly before serving.

Presentation
Pour the banana mousse in the ginger crisp bowl. Put over a white serving plate with the cloves biscuits and jelly cubes. Spread over the banana mousse drops of cloves oil made blending cloves with groundnuts oil.

Taste Sensations
The biscuits results fragrant, the salt underlining their consistency. In them cloves appear as a back taste that spikes when biting over a shard releasing a sensation of freshness.

The foam exhales an equilibrated scent of rose water and banana. The sweet banana taste is followed by the rose aroma and the hit of the chili spiciness. The sweetness and sticky consistency of the banana complements quite well the balsamic nature of cloves in the biscuits.

The crisp’s ginger taste fuses very well with the banana foam leaving a whole mouth sensation of light spiciness.

The lemongrass jelly helps cleaning the mouth, leaving a fresh sensation that adds up to the left over spiciness from the crisp.

In the complex, the recipe works quite well though the cloves biscuits need some further development.