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Mushroom, Bacon Bisque with beer foam
Ingredients
2 cups dried chanterelle mushrooms, soaked for 30 minutes in hot water, liquid reserved
1 1/2 cups Duck stock (recipe follows)
2 T. unsalted cultured butter
2-3 T. bacon fat (from 2 strips thick cut cured bacon, reserve bacon)
3-4 shallots, depending on how much you like shallots
1 cup heavy cream
For duck stock
1 duck leg and thigh bone
reserved liquid from chanterelle mushrooms
5 cloves garlic, whole, skin on
3 shallots, peeled and left whole
salt, to taste
2-4 cups water
Pour mushroom liquid and 2 cups water over bone from duck leg (I had a leftover leg of duck confit lying around) and add the garlic cloves and shallots. Cook on low heat for an hour, adding water as the water evaporates and reduces. Taste the broth at the end of the hour and cook longer until you've reached your desired taste. Add salt at the end. Strain through cheesecloth.
For Mushroom Bisque
Add butter and bacon fat to medium hot pan, once butter is melted add diced shallots and stir until shallots become fragrant. Add soaked chanterell mushrooms and stir until most of the butter and bacon fat has been soaked up by the mushrooms. Add duck mushroom stock. Simmer for a good 15 minutes. Add the cream and remove from heat. Taste soup and add salt to taste. Blend in high powered blender until smooth.
For beer foam
A teaspoon of Soy Lecithin
250 ml beer (I used Organic Pale Ale from Trader Joes...new favorite)
Heat beer in small saucepan for about 5 minutes to cook off some of the alcohol. Blend Lecithin and Beer in tall glass until foamy.
To plate, spoon bisque in to small bowl, top with beer foam and crumbled bacon pieces.
Thyme Biscuit with Nutmeg Butter
I used this recipe: http://www.recipezaar.com/Southern-Buttermilk-Biscuits-26110 for the Thyme biscuits. I just added about a tablespoon or so of dried thyme. Taste the dough to make sure you've added enough thyme. When you get to the part where you have added the butter - throw it back in the fridge for a couple of hours. The butter will harden back up again - and when you bake it you will definitely notice the difference. Let me just say - I made these ahead of time because we had SO MUCH buttermilk laying around because I made butter. Why do they only sell large amounts of buttermilk in the store? The smallest I can get is a quart. Who uses a quart of buttermilk in a recipe other than Paula Dean??? Anywho - I made 12 buttermilk biscuits using homemade cultured butter and the next day I had to make another batch because we ate them all. And out of the 18 biscuits I made the next day - we had to force ourselves to save 5 of them for Kev and Sonya's meal. They are THAT good.
For the nutmeg butter, grate a bunch of fresh nutmeg into a small bowl with a few tablespoons of room temp butter. Mix together and throw in the fridge to slightly harden while your biscuits bake.
