Oxtail ragout with celeriac mash

Oxtail - isn't it beautiful? I admit that I blatantly nicked the idea for today's post from the wonderful Jeanne in London, who wrote about a 20-hour sous vide oxtail stew in her award-winning blog, Cook Sister! Here's my oxtail story.


Albarracín at night, March 2008

I still remember my first encounter with oxtail - on a plate, I mean. My dear K. and I were travelling in Spain in March 2008, visiting the lovely Ximena of the Lobstersquad fame in Madrid, and visiting some other off-the-beaten-track cities that Ximena and her also very lovely husband J. had suggested. One late afternoon we arrived in the picturesque Albarracín in Aragon (yep, on the lands of the medieval Kingdom of Aragón). After checking into our hotel for the night, we wandered on the streets of Albaraccín, looking for a tiny restaurant called Rincón del Chorro. Somebody somewhere had recommended it, you see. The night was already dark, but we were obviously too early for dinner, as all we found was a locked door. We returned an hour later, to find a small but busy restaurant. The menu wasn't long - I opted for the pickled partridge (a local speciality, I was told), K. ordered the rabo del toro or oxtail.



Both were brought to the table pretty quickly. While the partridge was lovely, the oxtail was wonderful and although the idea of cooking it myself seemed a wee bit daunting initially, I've become a huge oxtail convert over the years and cook this particular cut of beef regularly.

My favourite oxtail dish takes slightly less time to cook than Jeanne's and as there's definitely no sous-vide machine in my kitchen, it can be cooked in a simple stovetop saucepan. But I guarantee it'll be just as delicious ;) The inspiration for the dish is from a blog written by an Estonian restaurateur, Mme Randrüüt - see here. It's an interpretation of the French classic, mijotée de queue de boeuf et purée de céleri rave or stewed oxtail with celeriac pureé. If you haven't cooked oxtail before, then slowly cooked oxtail has the most wonderful sweet and meaty flavour, which is pretty much universally liked. While we happily gnaw away on the slowly cooked oxtail pieces (there's a link to another oxtail stew recipe here on Nami-Nami at the bottom of this post), it can be intimidating to somebody who's new to oxtail - or if you're wanting to serve oxtail in a slightly more elegant manner. This oxtail ragout is the perfect solution then.



In Estonia I usually get my oxtail cut into chunks and packed neatly on a tray. Very convenient, even if it is only sold in one major supermarket and only on certain days, so one has to pre-plan carefully. If you have a friendly butcher at your favourite market, you can obviously order some whenever you need it.

Oxtail ragout with celeriac mash
(Veisesabaraguu)
Serves two to three (can be easily doubled)



1 kg oxtail pieces
2-3 Tbsp oil
500 ml (2 cups) boiling water
few fresh parsley sprigs
few fresh thyme sprigs
1 bay leaf
3-4 whole black peppercorns
3-4 whole allspice berries
salt, to taste

Season the oxtail pieces with salt.
Heat oil in a heavy saucepan, sauté the oxtail pieces until dark golden brown on all sides.
Add the water, herbs and seasonings. Bring into a boil, then reduce heat and cover the saucepan. Simmer gently for about 3-4 hours until meat falls off the bones easily.
Remove from the heat, cool. Remove the meat off the bones, discard the bones and return the meat into the stew.

(This can be done a day in advance). 

Skim the excess fat from the top of the stew. Re-heat the stew and simmer gently for another hour or two, until the stew has thickened. Taste for seasoning.

Serve with a celeriac/root celery mash - prepare like your regular potato mash, just use root celery instead.

Looking for more oxtail inspiration? Here are some recipes:

Papardelle with oxtail ragu by Skye Gyngell
Oxtail ragout with papardelle by Sammy and Bella (My Kitchen Rules)
Oxtail braised in dark beer by Nami-Nami
Coda alla vaccinaria by Food Lover's Odyssey
Glazed oxtails by Simply Recipes
Korean braised oxtail by Kitchen Wench
Alsatian oxtail stew by Choosy Beggars

Nami-Nami @ El Bulli: the first 10 dishes

El Bulli dining room.
All photos by Pille & K of Nami-Nami

The surprising thing about El Bulli is that despite of their fame and the number of dishes served each night, they still take great interest in each diner's special wishes. While there is no traditional menu to choose from as such, they do want you to be able to enjoy all 30 dishes. When confirming our booking, they wanted to know about any food allergies or dietary considerations (yes, you can order a vegetarian or even a vegan meal). When we were seated, the waiter told us that the Chef has designed a 30-course meal for us, and that each dish will be explained as it is served. He then informed us that some items might be a bit unusual and off-putting - in our case razor clams and veal marrow - and could be changed for something more preferable. (I must confess I wasn't too keen on the razor clams, so I got an alternative dish. Funny enough, they forgot to mention that sea cucumber was on the menu as well. More about it later:)).

Ready? The menu could be split into five parts - savoury snacks, tapas, main tastes, (pre-dessert), desserts and morphings. However, I've opted to split the menu into three posts, explaining the various phases as we go.

Tangerine / Mandarina

The first dish we were served consisted of two parts. On a small black folded square paper were two tiny rose-scented granules. We were instructed to pop the rose granule into our mouth, and then drink the slightly foamy tangerine drink. As a result, the whole tangerine drink tastes strongly of rose :) 

Spherical Olives / Aceitunas verdes sfericas

I was so excited to see this dish! The spherical olives is probably one of the best known dishes on El Bulli's menu, and it was cool to have a chance to try them ourselves. It's an encapsulated pure olive pureé, marinated in olive oil, garlic, thyme and rosemary. We got two olives each, served with a special tiny spoon. You put the 'olive' into your mouth and when gently pressing it with your tongue, it bursts, leaving you with the taste of the best olive you've ever had. Very intense, very tasty. 

El Bulli/Ferran Adria is famous for playing with textures, tastes and temperatures. The spherical olive is a great texture-teaser - you expect it to 'feel' like an olive, and although it tastes like one, it feels totally different.  

Note that many of the dishes were to be consumed with our hands - utensils were rarely seen. Knife, for instance, was only brought to the table once (and I didn't really know how to use it then anyway :))

LYO Fruits / Frutas LYO (Pineapple chips)

Pineapple chips came on a typical plate that looked a bit like crunched sheet of metal. LYO is short for lyophilization aka freeze-drying. The freeze-dried pineapple chips look like your regular chips, but taste like pineapple and have a very fragile and slightly flaky texture.

Salty 'catanias' / Catanias saladas


Toasted walnuts covered in walnut praline and dusted with bitter cocoa powder. These managed to taste sweet and salty at the same time, and were apparently a play on a much-loved Catalonian chocolate-almond bon-bon.

Nori-trias

Lightly salted and creamy black sesame paste filling, wrapped into a fragile-crispy nori sheet.

Tomato cookie / Galleta de tomate

Intensely tomato-flavoured crispy cookie, garnished with a gold leaf and wasabi dot. Very interesting texture.

Beetroot coral / Coral de remolacha



Slightly similar to the tomato cookie texture-wise (a bit crunchier, perhaps), but intensely beet-flavoured. First the crispy beetroot 'coral', then a spoonful of beet juice :)

The above small dishes fell into the savoury snacks category, and were served several at the time. The following few dishes are the tapas-dishes, served one at the time.

Shiso flexia caramel with its own soft candy / Shiso caramelo flexia sus gominolas





This was one of the trickiest dishes to eat. The soft candies were VERY soft, and almost burst between our fingers (our only 'utensils' at this point). The 'flexia caramel' contained flecks of shiso (leaf? flower?) that were prone to fall all over the place when not eaten carefully. But flavour-wise, it was a lovely combination of mildly sour and sweet.

Pistachio sponge cake with acid milk mousse / Bizcocho de pistachios con mousse de leche acida



At first we thought this is the same pistachio mousse dish that Ferran Adria shares in the Foams and Espumas chapter of The Cook's Book (a brilliant book, by the way!) - we had tried that at home. However, it wasn't - the visual similarity was all that was common. This pistachio cake was dry and fragile - as a result of lyophilization - and not moist and sponge-like. The pistachio cake was served with acid milk mousse (photo below) and we were given a tiny spatula for scooping up the mousse.


That red tome? Oh, that's their modest wine list :)

Black sesame sponge cake with miso / Bizcocho de sesamo negro y miso

This was one of my favourite dishes - with a cool texture and lots of flavour. Toasted black sesame seeds have been ground into a paste, mixed with egg and flour, pressed through an ISI Gourmet Whip and then microwaved until cooked and fluffy. (We had tried a similar recipe with pistachios, printed in The Cook's Book: Step-by-step techniques & recipes for success every time from the world's top chefs). We were instructed to devour the sponge in two mouthfuls, starting with the miso paste part. Again, a great combination of textures (remember, we were holding the 'sponge' with our fingers) and flavours.

Nami-Nami @ El Bulli: Prologue

5 April 2008, 

Better late than never, they say.

Yesterday exactly one year ago K. and I had a chance to have lunch at El Bulli. A spectacular lunch. A long lunch. A very tasty lunch. A memorable lunch. I-so-have-to-tell-everyone-about-this lunch. Funny enough, it took me a whole year to actually blog about that. When we got home from our 10-day Spanish road trip early last April, I had several deadlines looming. Some at the University, plus I had been commissioned to write some articles about our visit to El Bulli*. I wrote a short piece (one page) for the biggest-selling Estonian food magazine Oma Maitse (May 2008). Then a whole A3-size spread for the main weekly newspaper Eesti Ekspress (22 May 2008). And then a richly illustrated detailed review of the menu spread over six pages for the other local food magazine, KÖÖK (Summer 2008). But somehow I didn't get around to writing about it on my blog.

Well, until now. To mark the one-year anniversary of our visit to El Bulli, I'm gonna give you four blog posts over the next week detailing what happened when Nami-Nami went to El Bulli :) (I could do one long post, but considering we had 30 dishes that all looked fabulous, it's easier to split the post into four).

Before we got to El Bulli, we decided to 'get into the mood'. Ferran Adrià is from Emporda in Catalunya, which is (in)famous for its harsh tramontana-winds that blow from the Pyrenees. The Spaniards believe that these very tramontana winds make the locals a bit funny. Who knows. The world's best known Surrealist, Salvador Dalí, is from the region as well, so it might just be true. In any case, as El Bulli is just an hour's drive from the Dalí Museum in Figueras, we decided to visit the museum first and set the mood :)



The road from Roses (the nearest town) to El Bulli is a spectacle of its own. It's narrow and high and zig-zags alongside the coastline (I wouldn't want to navigate it after a merry meal at the restaurant, that's for sure!). The restaurant itself  is surrounded by cypress and pine trees, and overlooks a beautiful Cala Montjoi bay.





Over-excited as we were, K. and I arrived in our rented Mini Cooper (the best and cutest rental car ever!) a bit early. We parked the car and wondered around the garden. Spotted a group of young stagés chatting on the back of the restaurant:



And large canisters of liquid nitrogen - giving an indication of the type of restaurant we were about to visit:


Once inside, we were greeted by Señor Luis Garcia (what amazing blue eyes that man has!?!). He confirmed our reservation and asked if we wanted a small tour of the El Bulli service kitchen. Of course we did! Garcia assigned us a young waiter, who led us to the kitchen. El Bulli serving kitchen is large, some 130 sq m. It was divided into two - the hot and the cold section. We spotted Ferran's brother Albert working on some pastry (top left photo), and numerous young stagé cooks doing various prep work. Apparently there are 40 cooks taking care of the 50 diners each night - and given the number of people we saw in the serving kitchen, that's indeed very likely. Remember, each El Bulli meal consists of 30 courses - multiply that by 50 (the number of diners) - and you get 1500 dishes. No wonder they need such a huge number of cooks (plus waiters!). Compared to the tiny restaurant kitchen I've worked in (I've never really told you about my stagé at the top gourmet restaurant in Tallinn either, have I?), El Bulli's was huge, spacious and looked like something from a space ship - all shiny metal and a bit futuristic :)



Furthermore, the your waiter assigned to us asks if we want to take a photograph with The Chef? Of course we did!!! Here's our million-dollar picture (K's on the other side of Ferran Adrià, but he's camera shy, so I've promised not to show his face on the blog here ;))



After the short kitchen tour we were led into the surprisingly traditional-looking dining room. Luckily for us, we were seated at a small corner table just under the window, meaning we'd have beautiful natural light for taking pictures.

But more about that next time..

Back from Spain, plenty to blog about

Well, K. and I got back from our ten-day Spanish trip late last night. We've almost unpacked everything, and are in the middle of sorting out our photos (ca 900 of them!). There's lots to do at work at the moment, so it will be a few more days before I'm blogging properly again. But I'll leave you with a taste of what's to come :)


Click on the photo to enlarge!

Time for a little fiesta

Some lovely pancakes K. made me recently, served with a dollop of homemade redcurrant jelly.

Well, apparently the spring officially began last week. However, it's been snowing in Estonia for two days now, and everything is covered with a thick, white carpet. As K. and I are desperate for some sun, we're heading off to Spain to visit the very lovely Ximena in Madrid, do some sightseeing and have lunch at a very special restaurant about two hours north of Barcelona.

Back in early April!

The King of Spain and the President of Estonia do dinner

The President of Estonia went on a state visit to Spain earlier this month, where he discussed the establishment of a cyber centre in Tallinn, energy policies and the the strength of Europe. And of course, ate a lot and well. Below is the menu served at the official dinner hosted by the King of Spain, Juan Carlos I, and Queen Sophia.

Let me just tell you that I've only got hold of the menu thanks to my 'best contact in Spain', Ximena. She had to mobilise her extended Spanish family and engage in 'espionage worthy of cold war days' in the process!

But here's the menu, for your perusal. Enjoy! Sounds pretty good, don't you think?


Photo by Erik Peinar, courtesy of the Office of the President.

Official dinner at Palacio de Real Madrid on July 9, 2007

Cold melon and raisin cream soup

Confit of sea bass with dill and summer vegetables

Poularde chicken, roasted with thyme and roast potatoes

Cold chocolate soufflé with caramel threads

Wines:

Old Sherry

Martín Codax 2006

Grans Muralles 2000

Cava Freixenet

Here's the menu in Spanish for those of you preferring to read the menu in original:

Cena de honor que ofrecen Sus Majestades los Reyes al Presidente de la República de Estonia y Sra. de Ilves

Crema fría de melón y uvas pasas

Lubina confitada al eneldo con verduras de temporada

Pularda asada al tomillo con patatas al horno

Soufflé frío de chocolate con hilos de caramelo

Fino de Jerez en crianza

Martín Códax. 2006

Grans Muralles. Cosecha 2000

Freixenet. Gran reserva

Palacio Real, 9 Julio 2007

PS Curious to know what the Queen of England or the Emperor of Japan and other foreign dignitaries were served on their official visits to Estonia? Click on the Festive Menus label on the right hand side to find out.