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| MAKING
A TOMATO CONCASSÉ |
FOOD
TIPS TALLYRAND |
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 Making
a tomato concassé - the word concassé
(con-cass-eh) is French and means to chop or crush.
Tomato concassé is used in a variety of recipes
and can also be used to thicken a dish. The reason for
removing the skins and the seeds is that they are what
make a tomato bitter - thus you get a sweeter tomato
in your dish.
An example of using tomato concassé is Sauce
Choron. By crushing the tomatoes you make a tomato paste
which in turn can be used to make Sauce Choron. The
sauce is basically a Béarnaise sauce which is
just a Hollandaise
Sauce with added tarragon. To the Béarnaise
sauce you add your tomato paste and you have Sauce Choron.
Choron sauce was created by Alexander Etienne Choron,
a French chef from Caen who was Chef de Cuisine at the
famous Voisin restaurant in Paris during the late Nineteenth
century.
Method
- Remove
the core of the tomato with the tip of a small knife
- At
the other end, lightly score the skin in a cross (score
= just break the surface)
- Plunge
the tomatoes into a pot of rapidly boiling water for
10 seconds (this process is called 'blanching')
- Remove
with a slotted spoon and place into a bowl of iced
water or under cold running water to halt the cooking
process (this process is called 'refreshing')
- The
skins should now easily slip or peel off; if the tomatoes
are not quite ripe, they may need to be blanched and
refreshed again
- Place
the tomatoes on a cutting board with the core side
down and cut in half
- Remove
the seeds with a teaspoon and discard
- Roughly
chop the tomatoes to the desired size
RELATED RECIPE
Food
and Cooking Tips
from professional
Chef Tallyrand
Born
and raised in Plymouth, Tallyrand started his initial
training as a chef at Plymouth College of Further Education.
It was here that he was to learn his love, his passion
for food and the culinary arts. From here he headed
to Germany to complete his apprenticeship as Commis
de Gardemanger.
Germany
gave him his first taste of cooking for the rich and
famous, as half way through his first year, along with
the Sous Chef and a Chef de Partie, he was whisked off
to Cologne to help prepare meals for a political conference,
where amongst other dignitaries they cooked for Mr Brehznev,
the then powerful Russian leader. This was to prove
to be just one of the many celebrities he was to cook
for or get to know over the years . . .
If
you would like to find out more why not visit Tallyrand's
own web site www.tallyrand.info (link in main menu)
Email Hub-UK : info@hub-uk.com
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