[Serves 4]

INGREDIENTS [Squab Breast ]

2 whole fresh squab

4 Tbsp foie gras fat

Salt and black pepper

METHOD

Carefully remove legs of squab and reserve them. Using kitchen shears, remove the breast with breast bone attached from the squab back. Make sure to keep the skin wholly intact and covering the whole breast.

Using a boning knife, carefully remove wishbone from each double breast. Season each breast with black pepper and place one breast in a sous-vide bag along with 2 tablespoons of foie gras fat. Seal the bag on the highest vacuum. Cook at 59.5ºC for 20 minutes.

Remove from the bag, dry the skin well and season with salt and pepper.
In a hot pan, sear skin of breast with a little oil. Allow to rest for 3 to 4 minutes before carving.

 

[Squab leg]

Squab legs

4 cups duck fat, melted

Kosher salt

2 cloves garlic, crushed

2 sprigs thyme

1 bay leaf

Salt and black pepper

Take legs and generously salt them. After 10 minutes, rinse salt off completely and dry legs with a clean towel. Place the legs in a baking dish so they are all single layered in the bottom of the dish.

Place garlic, thyme and bay leaf in dish. Pour melted duck fat over the legs until they are totally submerged in the fat. Place the dish in a 250ºF oven and slowly cook squab legs. Fat should not bubble as the legs should cook very slowly.

If fat gets too hot, remove dish from oven and reduce oven temperature just slightly. Return dish to oven and continue to cook. Legs are done when they give very little resistance when leg is bent at the joint.

Allow legs to cool slowly in fat. When cool, remove legs from the fat. French legs just slightly with scissors, by trimming off knuckle at the end of leg and removing some of the skin and meat from the bone.

Season the leg with salt and pepper. In a hot pan, sear skin of leg. Remove any excess fat from the pan and deglaze it with veal stock. Add a small knob of whole butter. Glaze the leg with the stock, until it has an evenly shiny glaze.

[Eggplant puree]

2 large globe eggplant

1 Tbsp hazelnut oil

2 oz extra virgin olive oil

Salt

Sherry vinegar

METHOD

Take one eggplant and roast it whole in the oven, poking a few holes in the skin so that steam can be released. At the same time, char other eggplant on a hot surface or over a stove burner. Let the skin get completely black and then finish cooking in the oven.

Once eggplants are completely soft, carefully remove outer skin, leaving only the cooked flesh. Pass flesh through a fine tamis and then add everything to a pot to cook.

Slowly cook flesh until it is fairly dry and place in a blender. Blend flesh until it is very smooth. Slowly drizzle in the hazelnut oil and olive oil and season with salt and sherry vinegar to taste. Pass the puree through a sieve and allow to cool.

 

[Minted garbanzos]

1 lb of fresh garbanzos

3 leaves of fresh mint

METHOD

Peel the shell off the garbanzos, saving the bean inside. In a large pot of heavily salted boiling water, cook the garbanzos until they are tender. Remove them and allow them to cool in an ice bath. Separately, finely chiffonade the mint with a sharp knife. Glaze the garbanzos in a few tablespoons of chicken stock and a knob of butter. Finish the beans with a pinch of mint.

 

[Soy caramel jus]

4 oz squab jus

3 Tbsp port wine

4 Tbsp soy sauce

2 Tbsp granulated sugar

2 grams 72% chocolate

METHOD

Add sugar to heavy bottom pot and allow to caramelize to a dark amber. Deglaze caramel with port and allow to reduce to sec. Add squab jus and soy sauce. Finally add chocolate and allow to melt and reduce to sauce consistency.