On Taste, Dreaming and the Subconscious

Passport & Plate - Soft Baked Fennel, Mascarpone, Parmesan

Worldwide | Monday, February 24, 2014 | 5 photos

This dish is a starter with crunchy bread for mopping, or a side to sole and salad or Italian sausages and salad.

Ingredients

4 medium sized fennel bulbs. (Large bulbs have less flavour, small bulbs wont be substantial enough)
150g Mascarpone
100ml Double Cream
Butter & Olive Oil
Dry, Dry White Wine
Salt Flakes
Parmesan

Tools:

Heavy-base pan, Ovenproof dish, Tongs are helpful for arranging the fennel

How to prepare this recipe

Preheat your oven to 180°C. Top and tail the fennel. Be careful not take too much off the base – you don’t want the bulb to fall apart. Halve each bulb.

Melt about a tablespoon of butter in a pan with some olive oil; the butter shouldn’t burn. Sear the fennel halves with a few splashes of wine until they have softened a little. Wait for the wine to evaporate before turning off the heat and adding the mascarpone and cream to the pan with a few cracks of salt. When the creams have melted in the warm pan, tightly arrange the fennel in a baking dish. Use some tongs if the fennel is hot, and try not to leave too many gaps. Then, pour the cream over the fennel, but don’t submerge it. This is not a potato bake with a substitute. Cover with grated parmesan, enough to get a brown crust in the oven.

Bake for 30 minutes and take straight to the table.


The story behind this recipe:

Do you ever dream of a single flavour? Walking around with it all day, wondering what it could be, where you first had it, how you can find it again? It’s different to a craving. A craving comes from your stomach and looks for comfort; it’s something you can find. Well, hopefully.

Sensory memory is incredible. There’s a piece of music I listen to when I want to re-feel the first time I really traveled – to Japan. If you’ve ever been on the Shinkansen you’ll know that feeling: the seemingly free speed of the train, but with an equally strong pull to the ground, as if by magnetic force.

Taste memory is the same, and even more distinctive. From the same trip I still dream of a hint of pork in a bowl of ramen, the nourishing salt after a late night with sake. I can still taste the tarragon in the mayonnaise on a plate of pork skin at St John in London and the exact spice in a mushroom soup I ate in Seoul when I lived there; it was served in a big stone pot on a gas burner, we filled it with rice after and it crisped over the flame with the last juices.

But it doesn’t need to be a visible memory – I taste-dream flavours I can’t identify, later trying to recreate or track them down. Marsala wine was one – for veal, with mushrooms, chicken and cream. Finding it felt like a triumph!

This recipe is another. It had been puzzling me for months - in the car, in meetings, walking on the street. It would hit me out of nowhere for a few minutes at a time and I was desperate. I couldn't write it down, I couldn't phone anyone and tell them - all I could taste was uniquely rich and liquorish, but subtle, and strangely validated by cream and cheese. It took me a while, and I still can't recall the original dish - the cook who I believe planted this flavour in my subconscious died many years ago.

My philosophy on cooking has always been about making sure that one or two basic components are just right. There's no need to overcompicate or substitute - you will only be rewarded for making an effort to find the right ingredients, and respecting them.