Apricot Ice Cream, Compote and Purée | Recipe by sousvidetools.com

Sous Vide Apricot Ice Cream, Compote and Purée

COOK TIME: 2 hours
PREP TIME: 2 Hours
DIFFICULTY: Medium
SERVES: 8

Ingredients

Ice Cream Base

660ml of milk
120g of cream
70g of egg yolk
156g of sugar
2g of salt

Apricot Purée

250g of apricot, ripe
25g of sugar
100g of water
3g of agar agar
0.5g of xanthan gum

Apricot Compote

8 apricots
50g of sugar
50ml of water
1 vanilla pod, seeds scraped

Champagne Jelly

200ml of champagne
1 gelatine leaf, soaked in cold water

To serve

8 Vanilla Pods, dried

Equipment

EQUIPMENT

Method

Recipe courtesy of Steven Smith from www.greatbritishchefs.com

METHOD

Start by making the ice cream base. Combine the sugar and egg yolks together and beat until the sugar has dissolved, before pouring in the salt, milk and cream. Seal the mixture in a vacuum bag and cook sous vide in a water bath for 90 minutes at 68°C, before chilling in iced water and passing through a fine sieve
In the meantime, prepare the apricot purée. Dice the apricots and place in a pan with the water and sugar and cook until completely soft.
Take the apricot from the saucepan and before placing in a blender to purée until smooth.
Place the apricot purée in a pan, before adding add the xanthan gum and agar agar, whisking constantly whilst bringing the mixture to the boil.
Pour the apricot purée mixture on to a tray and leave it to set in the refrigerator. When the mixture has set, move to a blender and blitz again until smooth. Sieve the apricot purée, leaving a small amount for garnish in a piping bag.
Combine the apricot purée with the ice cream base until completely mixed. Use a Pacojet container to store the ice cream and place in the freezer until frozen. Use a Pacojet or ice cream maker to churn before serving.For the apricot compote, make a cut on the bottom of the apricots and blanch them by dropping them in boiling water for 2-5 seconds and then plunging them for 30 seconds into iced water, before drying and de-stoning them.
Using the sugar and water make a stock syrup, before adding the vanilla pod and scraped seeds and bringing to the boil.
Let the syrup mixture cool and compress with the apricots in a vacuum bag. Remove the mixture and chop 4 of the apricots to the consistency of a compote, leaving the other 8 halves to plate later.
To make the champagne jelly, gently heat the champagne and gelatine together until dissolved. Sieve the mixture into a tray and put in the refrigerator in order to set. When the mixture has set, divide the jelly into small pieces and place in a piping bag.
To serve, in the middle of each plate place a spoonful of compote and top with an apricot half. Then, around the apricot, pipe dots of apricot purée and champagne jelly around the apricot halves, alternating between the two. Then top with ice cream before garnishing with a dried vanilla pod.

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Post by Chris Holland

Our Chef Director Chris Holland worked as Head Chef at the prestigious Alderley Edge hotel before joining us. He has a passion for using the best produce and never compromises on quality. Author of our best selling book Sous Vide The Art of Precision Cooking, Chris is a expert on the sous vide technique.During the later part of my school days at Wardle High School Rochdale I always wanted to be a chef . I knew from the very start that my path to work was never going to be academic it was always going to be something practical and hands on.

As a young boy growing up I was inspired to cook with my Grandma who was and still is an inspiration to me . I have memories of helping make the cakes that she always had made for visitors and family alike . She made the most amazing cakes and I loved nothing more than eating the sweet raw cake batter straight from the bowl . We used to fight over who got to lick the bowl/spoon after the cakes were made. My grandma’s philosophy for cooking even on a shoe string budget was always to use fresh and seasonal ingredients either home grown or bought from the market.

School was somewhat of a drag for me as I was itching to learn to become a chef.

I started at Hopwood Hall college as a chef and instantly fell in love with it .To me it was the only real time I excelled in something and this inspired me to really get my head down and put in the hard work. College was the first time I really excelled in something and gave me the opportunity to laugh at the teachers who said I would never make something of my life!!!!

During the three years at college I also took on a part time position in a local hotel working the bar and restaurant first and then the kitchen. These were great days and gave me the opportunity to see how the industry ticks. I learnt a lot from those days both good and bad !! But I have to say I was itching to work only in the kitchen but it was a good insight into the catering world .

After completing college I moved away from Rochdale for a full time roll at one of Cheshire’s most talked about Hotel restaurants The Stanneylands Hotel. This was the school of hard knocks for me as I quickly realised that although excelling at college meant nothing in “The Real World”.

I loved every minute of the 18 hour days 6 days a week on minimum wage . Although difficult I feel that without this grounding I wouldn’t have achieved what I have today. After 18 months of hard graft I left Stanneylands and went with the Head chef to open a fine dining restaurant at Mere Golf and Country Club. The opportunity to work alongside Matthew Barrett was too good to turn down. I learnt so much from the ex-Ritz chef and working in a much slower paced role helped me develop a much better understanding of how to organise and run a kitchen. We were a very small team and teamwork was and still is the only way to go for me.

After 2 years at Mere I got the opportunity to go into The Alderley Edge Hotel as Junior Souschef. The Early days at the Edge were all about learning new styles of cuising which is invaluable in any role as a chef. I got the opportunity to grow and learn all aspects of every section which was inspiring . I was offered the opportunity at the age of 29 (2004) to take the role of head chef. For me this was when I really started to develop my own style of food.

After 9 years at the top winning Cheshire restaurant of the year , Chef of the Year and appearing on GBM amongst many highlights including cooking for many celebrities and famous people I decided to move on into development with Sousvidetools.

The main inspiration for this was to train and educate people . I always had a great passion for education but could never really see myself at a college . The job is super rewarding and I am proud to say we have become the leading light in sous-vide education in the UK . This is something I am very proud of . Food is my biggest passion and this is what keeps me interested the most . I love to travel and try out other countries cuisines. I am constantly inspired by ingredients and the pursuit of getting the best out of them without destroying their natural flavour .It is super important to me to continue to try and be at the forefront of the food scene this is what inspire me and the team to keep driving forward .

Technology is now widely used in the industry and I am super proud to say we have been a big part of spreading that message.

I am very lucky to be in the position I am and the drive to constantly improve our training and links to the next generation of young budding hospitality chefs.

TI feel that my experience over the last 25 years really enables me to get close and educate the “next generation” of chefs .

The industry which I love is really struggling to bring through new recruits and if I can help that process I will be immensely proud.

The food seen in the Uk has improved dramatically over the last ten years and I feel this will continue with the correct education. What happens next only fate will tell us...

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