Rotting Tropical Fruit

Yesterday the school decided to give me money, because I satisfied the dual criteria of "generally good resume" and "lousy future job prospects." Approximately 50% of the school satisfies those categories, but I'm not going to say I don't deserve it because for once in my life I think I do. So now that we're going to possibly maybe but not really break even next semester provided we don't go on a massive shopping spree, we had to celebrate. And I celebrated by making TANGERINE BAVARIAN. I don't know why it's two colors...but it is...

I made the cake with the sauce and I actually did it correctly and the free trade sugar acted almost like normal sugar* but the dish was really disappointing! The recipe itself is just a glorified version of orange jello garnished with whipped cream only it's not deconstructed (Anthony Boudain tells me deconstructed food is in now). Tangerines are great by themselves but here with the cream and eggs emphasizing its flavor, it takes on that flavor of rotting tropical fruit. Now, I don't know if tangerines are tropical, but it's got a flavor a little bit like durian. In fact I'd call it durian light, it's even the same color and if you added in vanilla extract... It's light and creamy for about 1second, then the 8 eggs kick in and the aftertaste is sick sweet.

I think it's better with cranberry or pomegranate juice, skip the eggs, put in a crust, cut into little squares, top it off with rum. The sauce is gold though, but that's just orange flavored caramel. Oh another thing, the recipe takes longer than 25min if you skip the ice bath. And you need good kitchen gear. That's my experience with melting sugars - you need good kitchen gear or the sugar'll burn.

*Whole Foods free trade organic sugar. It tells me it's just sugar, nothing else, but it's sweeter than normal sugar. And when I heat it up it tastes just like high fructose corn syrup, it coats your tongue and stays in your mouth even after you brush your teeth. I may go back to mass market kill gorillas and small towns sugar.

*Free trade coffee on the other hand . . . store brand free trade organic coffee > Tully's > dunkin donuts > starbucks.

Tomorrow => attempt at roast beef w/ port sauce after 36hrs of dry brining.