Monday, January 14, 2013

"Famous Paintings" Chef's Table: Gail's work of art.

On January 13, 2013, our little ragtag group of foodies took on the theme of "Famous Paintings".  Here is Ms. Gail's contribution:

The work of art I had to draw upon for inspiration was "The Watermill with the Great Red Roof" by Meindert Hobbema, a 17th century Dutch landscape artist.  





Looking at the painting, I put myself in the shoes of the little fisherman in the bottom left hand corner.  What would he like to eat if he were to take a little nosh break on this delightful day?  I began to research Dutch foods and quite honestly, I wasn't impressed.  All the dishes seemed rather bland and I simply could not bring myself to even taste pickled herring.  I decided to put together a little picnic combining a number of dishes I found recipes for and I wanted to recreate the painting, in an abstract manner on my plate.

I used triangular shaped Gouda cookies to build the structure.  The mortar was Heksenkaas, a surprisingly tasty Dutch sandwich spread of cream cheese, leeks, celery root and garlic.  Instead of pickled herring, a traditional Dutch treat, I used smoked salmon.  For the "red" element, I made a little slaw of roasted red beets and red onion dressed in peach red balsamic vinegar.  Snipped chives garnished the plate as well as a small triangle of Gouda cheese.

I was quite pleased with the results, even though I was kind of flying by the seat of my pants.  I never did a test run, but in the end, it all worked well together.  Below are the links for the recipes I used for my creation.




No comments:

Post a Comment