Recipe

Strawberry Fourplay

by Johnny Iuzzini

I love seeing how much can be done with a single ingredient. This tasting is a playful experiment in textures, with each dessert capturing the essence of strawberry flavor in a different form.

Serves 12

Strawberry Soda ˜ Birch Beer Cream
Strawberry Ice Cream ˜ Strawberry-Lavender Leather
Strawberry Shortcakes ˜ Slow-Roasted Strawberries ˜ Vanilla Whipped Cream
Strawberry Gelée ˜ Coconut Cream ˜ Crispy Chocolate

Strawberry Soda ˜ Birch Beer Cream

Serves 6 on its own or 12 as part of a fourplay

Recently, I've become infatuated with bubbles and carbonation, and I've been on a mission to find ways to introduce bubbles as a texture in desserts. So adding a soda to the menu was a natural. With the help of David Arnold, Director of Culinary Technology at the French Culinary Institute, I've built a carbonation rig for the pastry kitchen at Jean Georges.

Don't let that scare you from trying this recipe, though. All you need at home is a soda siphon. Using a half-size hotel pan and perforated hotel pan (which you can buy online from BigTray) ensures that the strawberry water freezes and defrosts evenly during the clarification process.

For the Soda
Makes about 3 cups

17 ounces (500 g) fresh strawberries, hulled
2 cups plus 1 tablespoon (500 g) water
1/2 cup (100 g) sugar
1 1/4 teaspoons powdered gelatin (or 5.5 g sheet gelatin; see page 270)

Put the strawberries, water, and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Remove from the heat and puree with an immersion blender.

Ladle out about 3/4 cup of the strawberry puree into a small heatproof bowl. Sprinkle the gelatin over the surface and let sit for about 1 minute. Microwave for 45 seconds or heat gently in a saucepan until melted. Stir the gelatin into the rest of the strawberries and pour into a half-size hotel pan. Let cool to room temperature. Cover with plastic wrap and freeze overnight.

Line a perforated hotel pan with several layers of cheesecloth and turn the frozen puree out into it. Wash the hotel pan, set the perforated pan into it, and refrigerate to drain for 2 days.

Discard the solids. Load the strawberry water into a soda siphon and charge with a CO2 charger. Shake vigorously for 1 minute. Refrigerate until you're ready to serve or for up to 3 days.

For the Birch Beer Cream
1/2 cup (120 g) heavy cream
2 teaspoons (6 g) confectioners' sugar
1/2 teaspoon ( ? g) birch beer extract (see Note) or vanilla extract

Put the cream in a chilled bowl with the sugar and birch beer extract and whip to soft peaks.

To Serve
Diced fresh strawberries

Put a few diced strawberries in the bottom of each glass and fill with the soda. Top with a dollop of the birch beer cream.

Strawberry Ice Cream ˜ Strawberry-Lavender Leather
Serves 6 on its own or 12 as part of a fourplay

In this dessert, you get the same flavor twice but with different textures: creamy ice cream and slightly chewy strawberry leather. Fruit leathers are an ideal way to incorporate secondary flavors, like herbs, and making leathers is really easy.

For the Strawberry-Lavender Leather
Makes 12 pieces

13 ounces (370 g) fresh strawberries
3/4 cup (75 g) sugar
5 sprigs fresh lavender, buds only (see Note)

Note: Make sure your lavender hasn't been sprayed.

Heat the oven to 150°F. Line a 9 x 12-inch rimmed baking sheet with a Silpat.

Hull the strawberries and process them in a food processor to a fine puree.

Put the puree and sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to low and simmer until reduced by a bit more than half, stirring and scraping often with a heatproof rubber scraper. Work the puree through a fine strainer and stir in the lavender. Spread into a thin layer on the Silpat.

Dry in the oven until leathery, about 4 hours. It will still be slightly tacky and flexible. Let cool.

Alternatively, set a dehydrator to 130°F. Line trays with acetate and spray with acetate. Spread the puree into thin layers and dry for 3 hours.

To make curls, cut 2 x 4-inch-wide strips as soon as you take the leather out of the oven, roll them loosely, and place them in something to hold the shape as it sets. I use baguette forms in the restaurant. You could use something similar at home, or wrap the leather around a rolling pin. It will take about 1 hour to set.

If you are not serving right away, peel the strawberry film off the Silpat and lay it on a piece of parchment. Roll it up and wrap in plastic. It will keep for a few days.

To Serve
Strawberry Ice Cream (page 230)
2 sprigs fresh lavender, buds only

Scoop the ice cream into dessert bowls. Garnish with a curl or piece of the leather and some lavender.

Strawberry Shortcakes ˜ Slow-Roasted Strawberries ˜ Vanilla Whipped Cream

I'm not a fan of angelfood cake or sponge cake for shortcakes; I prefer the texture and bite of biscuits, which I like to shape into small squares instead of large rounds. And I love gently roasted fruit. The long, slow roasting eliminates a lot of the water content of the fruit, concentrating the flavor and opening it up. The tangy crème fraîche in the whipped cream rounds out the flavors on the plate.

Serves 6 on its own or 12 as part of a fourplay

MAKE IT SIMPLER
You could replace the biscuits with refrigerator biscuits. Brush them with an egg wash (an egg and an egg yolk beaten together) and sprinkle them with sugar and salt before baking. Fresh berries or stone fruit is another option in place of the roasted berries.

For the Shortcakes
Makes twenty-four 1 1/2-inch squares

2 1/4 cups (290 g) all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons (16 g) baking powder
1/2 teaspoon (3 g) baking soda
1/2 teaspoon (2 g) coarse salt
6 tablespoons (70 g) vegetable shortening, cut into pieces and chilled
2/3 cup (156 g) milk
1 large egg and 1 large egg yolk, beaten

Put the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a food processor. Pulse a few times to combine. Add the shortening and pulse until the texture resembles fine crumbs. Whisk the milk and beaten egg together and pour through the feed tube, hitting the pulse button until the dough comes together evenly.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface and form into a square. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

To Serve
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
Coarse pink salt
Slow-Roasted Strawberries (page 247)
Vanilla Whipped Cream (page 186)

Set the oven rack in the top position. Heat the oven to 450°F or 425°F on convection. Line a baking sheet with a Silpat or parchment.

Flour the work surface lightly and roll the dough into a square about 1/2 inch thick. Cut into twenty-four 1 1/2-inch squares and place on the baking sheet. Brush the tops with melted butter and sprinkle with pink salt. Bake until risen and lightly browned, 4 to 5 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through baking.

Serve the shortcakes warm, with the strawberries and vanilla whipped cream and some of the berry maceration liquid drizzled on the plate.

Strawberry Gelée ˜ Coconut Cream ˜ Crispy Chocolate
The flavor combinations here—particularly the strawberry and coconut—remind me of some Caribbean cocktail, the kind with an umbrella in it.

Serves 12

For the Dough
1/2 recipe Chocolate Salt Butter Shortbread dough (page 205)

Roll the dough between two sheets of parchment until 1/16 inch thick. Slide onto a baking sheet and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Cut the dough into twelve 2 1/2-inch squares or 1 x 3-inch rectangles and separate them on the parchment, giving them room to spread. Refrigerate on the pan while you heat the oven.

Heat the oven to 375°F or 350°F on convection.

Lay a Silpat (top side down) on the squares to weight them down. Bake until just crisp, 12 to 15 minutes. Let cool on the baking sheet.

To Serve
Strawberry Gelée (page 255)
Coconut Cream (page 258)
Fresh strawberries, hulled and cut in halves or quarters
Chocolate Décor (page 267)
Strawberry Sauce (page 274)
Coconut milk powder (optional, see note)

Cut the gelée into squares or rectangles to match the pastry and set onto the pastry.

Fill a pastry bag with the coconut cream and pipe two dollops on top of the gelée. Fill the remaining spaces with strawberries. Top with the chocolate décor.

Spoon some strawberry sauce onto dessert plates, set the desserts on top, and garnish with strawberries and, if you want, a few pinches of coconut milk powder.

MAKE IT SIMPLER
Though it will change the dessert a lot, you could replace the pastry with a thin, crumbly shortbread from the store. Or substitute all-natural strawberry preserves for the gelée. Or top the dessert with shaved chocolate instead of the décor.

Note: Coconut milk powder is available online from Terra Spice Company.