Caviar tacos with horseradish and crème fraiche? Spring garlic soup with crunchy fresh peas and poached prawns?
It doesn’t get much yummier than San Diego’s Taste of the Nation event held this week at JBar atop the Hotel Solamar in the Gaslamp Quarter. Organized by Share Our Strength (SOS), Taste of the Nation is the largest coordinated culinary benefit in the county. Every spring, thousands of the nation's top chefs donate their time, talent and cuisine at some 60 events, with the goal of raising money for the fight against childhood hunger in America.
In San Diego, guests paid $95 to sample the fare at more than a dozen mini kitchens where restaurants such as Anthology, Stingaree and Mistral Loews Coronado Bay Resort strutted their stuff.
Damon Gordon, chef at Quarter Kitchen in the Ivy Hotel wowed guests with the Caviar Tacos that have garnered him attention from the national press. The whimsical take on a traditional taco involves a crisp potato “shell,” Tsar Nicoulai domestic sturgeon caviar, a sauce of fresh horseradish, heavy cream and crème fraiche, grated hard boiled egg, red onion and chives.
And chef William Bradley of Addison in The Grand Del Mar, prepared an ethereal Spring Garlic Soup that blew me away. Spring garlic, also called baby garlic, young garlic or green garlic, has a delicate, clean, sweet flavor and can be used raw in many dishes. It has a very short growing season.
For his super soup, Bradley used both spring garlic and regular garlic, along with plenty of shallots and not a little heavy cream. He tucked a piece of olive oil-poached prawn in the bottom of each cup and floated a few quickly blanched English peas in the picture-perfect puree.
SPRING GARLIC SOUP
Chef William Bradley, Addison Restaurant
(Serves 4)
Ingredients:
6 cups spring garlic, peeled and chopped
2 cups shallots, peeled and chopped
1 bouquet of thyme
1 cup garlic, peeled and chopped
4 tablespoons salted French butter
Fleur de sel to taste
6 cups chicken stock
3 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
Method for Soup:
Combine spring garlic, shallots, thyme, garlic and butter to a heavy-duty saucepot. Sauté over low heat for 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Season with a fair amount of sea salt. Add chicken stock and let simmer for 5 minutes. Add heavy cream. Bring mixture to a simmer and cook an additional 3 minutes. Remove from stove and remove thyme from saucepot. Cover the saucepot and let the mixture steep for an additional 5 minutes. Place mixture in a blender and purée until smooth soup consistency. Then add 2 tablespoons sherry vinegar.
Ladle soup into four individual soup bowls and serve.
Upcoming Taste of the Nation events include a “strolling buffet” in Los Angeles on June 1st ($115 per person) and a cocktail party at the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel on June 4th ($75 per person). For information and tickets, see the SOS Web site.
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