Where there’s smoke
Let me introduce you to my latest cooking addiction—smoking. In the pursuit of exploring smoking for the home cook, I now have a metal smoke box, a battery-powered indoor smoker, a cloche (a clear dome for food) with an opening to be able to direct the smoke to the food and not to myself, plus several kinds of wood chips. But novel as this technique is to me, the process of smoking food to flavor and preserve it dates back to ancient times.
Smoking consists of using the smoke from burning wood to dry the surface of meats, seafood, cheese and other appropriate food items, which inhibits microbial growth. In the days before refrigeration, it was one of the best ways to preserve food because it also lent color, flavor and aroma. Here in the Philippines, smoking fish results in delicious tinapa. Bangus, for example changes in both flavor and texture when smoked, from a mild-tasting fish to one that’s appealingly savory.
What started this interest in smoking for us was the recent demise of a favorite French restaurant, Somm’s Table, through no fault of the restaurant’s delicious offerings. Some of the outstanding dishes there, a smoked Caesar salad and a couple of spectacular egg dishes, were served under cloches that were lifted at the table to dramatically release the smoke that was trapped inside. Apart from the drama, the smoky taste lingered on the salad greens and was quite delicious.
A number of chefs have been including smoking as a means of adding depth and dimension to their dishes. I am still dreaming of a meal prepared by chef Aaron Isip of Kasa Palma. The meal he prepared at a four hands dinner at Solaire’s Waterside restaurant featured the smoked kakanin dish tupig topped with mascarpone-flavored with tinapa and smoked caviar. The crab pinangat had smoked gata and the seafood was topped with smoked yogurt. It’s a good thing you can sample his smoky fare at his restaurant on Palma Street in Poblacion.
We were happy to discover that chef Tatung Sarthou’s Lore, located at One Bonifacio High Street, features his specialty piyanggang manok. This Tausug dish from Mindanao is outstanding for its burnt coconut sauce which, together with a mix of spices, gives it an incredible deep and smoky flavor. Although the coconut halves can be burnt over coal, the husk becomes the woody component that adds the smokiness. It is highly addictive, and so is his dessert inutak, a kakanin of white and ube sticky rice that also has a smoky flavor, courtesy of the bruleed salted egg cream on top.
I recently ran into chef Josh Boutwood who is reopening his Savage restaurant in BGC. His “pre-industrial” cooking for Savage involves cooking over wood, charcoal or coal. It was a challenge to himself and his team to cook in an unorthodox way that is still rooted in the past.
“Smoke is a dimension, I don’t like to call it a flavor because if smoke becomes a flavor, then you’ve gone too far with the smoke,” says chef Josh who uses oak, tamarind and santol wood. “If you think about cold smoked salmon, you can still taste the salmon, but after three seconds of consuming the first slice, you get the hint of smoke. So, it’s adding an extra layer, a dimension.”
Practicing at home, we used a battery operated portable smoker to impart a smoky flavor to a salad of grilled prawns with a Caesar salad dressing. We soon found that the croutons absorbed the smoke best, and that the salad greens needed to be coated with the dressing in order to absorb smoke. The gadget is available online; you add a few wood chips, light them, and in three minutes you have your smoky salad! The cloche is needed for both the drama in presentation and to prevent the smoke from going all over the kitchen.
This method is called cold smoking because at low temperatures, the salad is not cooked. Apart from the salad, I cold smoked chocolate chips to make a deliciously s’mores-like chocolate tart for dessert.
But you need hotter temperatures in order to cook food and that’s where the metal smoke boxes come in. Again, these are inexpensive and available online. Remember that this is best used in an outdoor, covered barbecue grill. If you use it inside your kitchen, when you open your oven door, the smoke will go everywhere.
To use the metal smoke box, first heat up your coals. The pre-soaked wood chips failed to catch fire, as we were shown in videos, so we improvised and put a couple of pieces of coal inside the box and closed it. The smoke escapes through the holes. We also sprinkled some of the wood chips, cherry in this case, because that’s what Somm’s table used, directly over the coals. Then we set a slab of salmon that had been lightly coated with olive oil, salt and pepper on the grid, and closed the lid. Thirty minutes later, we had a deliciously moist salmon, tinged with golden color and tasting delicately of smoke. Success! And even if dinner consisted of the smoked salad, the salmon and that lovely chocolate tart, the smokiness was just a dimension, as chef Josh put it.
Excited by this easy method, I am hieing off now to buy seafood and veggies to smoke for lunch. In the meantime, here are the recipes for this meal.
Smoked cesar salad
Whisk together:
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 crushed garlic clove
- Slowly whisk in to make a mayonnaise:
- ½ cup olive oil
Season with:
- 1 anchovy fillet
- ½ tsp. mustard
- 1 tsp. lemon juice
- Salt and pepper
- Use this to dress your salad greens lightly.
Top with:
Bacon, grilled shrimps and croutons
For the croutons, toss bread cubes with olive oil, salt and pepper and dried oregano, then toast them in the oven or in a dry frying pan.
Follow your smoker’s instructions.
Smoked chocolate tart
For the crust, work together until it forms fine crumbs:
- 1 cup flour
- 1/3 cup butter
Add a couple of tablespoons of water, just enough to bind the dough together. Press unto an 8- or 9-inch pie plate, prick all over with a fork and bake at 375F about 20 minutes or till lightly browned.
Whisk together in a saucepan for the filling:
- 1 egg
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 2 tbsp. cornstarch
- ½ cup milk
- 1 cup cream
- ½ tsp. vanilla
Cook until thickened and add, stirring until melted:
- 1 cup smoked chocolate chips
- Set aside to cool then pour over the crust.
- For the Italian meringue, place in a saucepan and cook to 240F (do not stir once it starts boiling):
- 12 cups sugar
- 1/4 cup water
- Beat to soft peaks:
- 2 egg whites
- ½ tsp. cream of tartar
Slowly pour in the sugar syrup while beating the egg whites and continue beating until stiff. Spread or pipe on top of the chocolate filling and brown with a blow torch or under your oven’s broiler.
My husband said the tart tasted better than s’mores!
