Steemit-Ironchef Round 6 ~ Secret Ingredient ~ A creamy snow white Soup and a Hirsotto

in #steemit-ironchef6 years ago (edited)

This is week is a very special week for #steemit-ironchef, the very popular foodchallenge hosted by @progressivechef. (STEEMIT IRON CHEF 2018 Act 01 Round 06).

It is so special because the chef gave us the creative freedom to choose a ingredient at our choice. The only condition was that this ingredient had to be local and one of your favorites.  I made it a little bit harder for me. I limited myself to only take ingredients that are local AND in season! Plus it should be something unknown for at least some parts of the world! That was a tough one!

After a short time of thinking I got it! I don't know where in the world this vegetable is known but I am pretty sure our dear @progressivechef might have heard of it as a chef already but he won't be able to buy it on his local market! My choice is Schwarzwurzel (Scorzonera hispanica) or Back Salsify.

Black salsify is native to Southern and Middle Europe, Nothern Africa and Near East. It's a plant that belongs to the sunflower family and it is cultivated as a root vegetable. The black salsify is a very nutritious plant. It contains proteins, fats, asparagine, choline, laevulin, as well as minerals such as potassium, calcium, phosphorus, iron, sodium, and vitamins A, B1, E and C. It also contains the polysaccharide inulin which is good for diabetics but can also cause bloating in sensitive digestion. In Germany it is also called the "poor man's asparagus" though it is no cheep vegetable. But it can be cooked and used exactly the way asparagus would be and it looks similar - at least when prepared already! It's a very unimposing, almost ugly vegetable. You wouldn't buy it when you see it on the green market. There is this box with these long, dirty, black  - uhm - sticks. You wouldn't even touch it but it has a heart of gold. I adopted one kilogram of the ugly dirty roots and took them home with me ...

These were the ingredients I mainly used for my two dishes:

No beauty at all, is it?

I tried to keep it as local and seasonal as possible with all my ingredients this time.

The tricky thing is to prepare the black salsify is firstly that you have to get rid of all this dirt and ... don't touch them when peeling. Since the root contains an extremely sticky latex it is useful to wear kitchen gloves. After peeling put every piece in a pot with water and lemon juice immediately. Otherwise it would turn dark quickly.

 But look how beautiful the roots are now: 

For the Black Salsify Soup I also chopped an onion and some really cute potatoes called Bamberger Hörnchen, an old franconian sort of potatoes.

I stirfried the onions in some vegetable oil for a moment until they started to soften and then added the pieces of the roots and the potatoes. After five minutes I poured some vegetable broth, some plantbased cream and plantbased milk (my favorites are oat-cream and oat-milk) and let it cook for 20 minutes. 

When the vegetables were soft I pureed the soup (kept some of the pieces of the veggies for decoration) and flavoured with salt, pepper and nutmeg. The Black Salsify Soup has a very delicate and creamy taste. So I used only a small quantity of spices to keep the flavor intact.

The soup got a sophisticated topping: an incredibly green parsley oil. To make it I mixed half a bunch of parsley with some sunflower oil and seasoned with salt and fresh ground black pepper. There is a lot of this green beauty left over but I think I can use this for many other things ...

For my Schwarzwurzel-Hirsotto (Hirse = millet, Risotto => Hirsotto) I also chopped one onion and one glove of garlic and stirfried both together with the Brown Millet in some vegetable oil like you would do it with rice for a risotto. Brown millet is the cereal richest in minerals. It contains a bigger amount of nutrients like iron, calcium and silicium than the golden version. Therefore it is a very interesting ingredient for me. And it doesn't have to get shipped in from far away ...

I added 100ml of white wine and let it cook until the wine dissolved.

Then I continued with vegetable broth. I added like a cup of the liquid, stirred and cooked until it dissolved and so on. It's a little bit time consuming because you shouldn't do something else inbetween. If I would do other things I would forget my grains on the stove and burn it! The brown millet has a relatively hard skin so it took quite some time until it started to soften (next time I will take the golden millet again). When the Millet started to soften I added the pieces of the black salsify and cooked for another 15 minutes. Finally I added some baby spinach leaves and ...

... some of my vegan parmigiano (made of cashews, almond butter, nutritional yeast, garlic, salt and pepper) ...

and served my Hirsotto topped with chopped hazelnuts, some Rosebud Brussel Sprouts (I've never seen a vegetable more beautiful!) and the stems of the parsley (leftovers from the parsley oil above) that I cut in small pieces. The hubby got a version with sunflower seeds because he is allergic to hazelnuts.

Thank you for reading and watching my post. Please feel free to tell me your thoughts about it. I am always grateful for suggestions and ideas for improvements!

All the other contestants good luck with their contributions. Now I am going to watch all of them ... or maybe tomorrow because it's late already! 😴

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Haha! Very well played my friend! You are right, it is impossible for me to find salsify on my local market stalls! It has been so many years since I last used them in my cuisine...back in 2007-2008 if i am not mistaken! The only way to get them was to import from France.
You again delivered a very high class entry in the contest and made so many of us discover this awesome roots!
ps. your hirsotto is such a creative name btw, simply love it!
Thanks so much!

Never heard of that!! It sounds interesting... very nice dish!!

Thank you! 😊

When I went on vacation to Spain in Andalucia near Seville a long time ago that hahaha I remember that at Aunt Abuela's house she made a salad with the leaves and with the tender buds of the plant she put them to boil and then she put them on to a salad that she made and she said that the root also ate only that I never eat the root and the aunt called the plant "escorcionera" that was everywhere and as I went in summer everything was I saw yellow.
Beautiful memories definitive to remember is to live
Thank you very much and I will look for the root I think if I have seen it in the super market and I will make your recipe.
Have a good night and again thank you @pusteblume

I am happy, this brings back good memories to you! The fully latin name Scorzonera hispanica suggests that escorcionera is originated to the Iberian Peninsula. The name means black adder because it was considered efficacious against snake bites. If you find it then try it out. But please take care of your hands! The gluey white chyle sticks on them and turns brown and ugly. You could also cook the roots before peeling to avoid this.
Thank you for your kind words and your support!

Thank you very much for the advice when I find the root I'll do what you say, because really if I'm interested in making this recipe, I really owe it to my happy days to spend with my family.
Thank you
Have a nice weekend ☀️

You too! 😊

I have heard of salsify, and even read about it in gardening magazines,, but I have never cooked with it, or even tasted it Now I am wondering.if it is even available here!

I wish you good luck finding them! You really have to try them! Otherwise you have to come to Europe in Winter ... 😉

Unbelievable @pusteblume ............I was thinking, what the heck is she doing with wood??? Silly me!!! LOL!!!

This is an incredible creation, good luck my Dear 😊

😃 😂 🤣 😅
Yeah wood! The secret ingredient this week because it's a typical ingredient in the german cuisine! Yummy! 😋
Thank you my dear friend!

I had no idea, I was born in Slovakia where German food was very common.

seems like its a new dish 😊

Do you mean like nobody else made something like this before? Here in Germany I heard the name 'Hirsotto' - a kind of Risotto but made of millet instead of rice. But maybe nobody ever cooked the combination with black salsify yet. Who knows!

Yum this looks fantastic, good luck for the contest ♥

Thank you so much! 😘

My grannny used to make Schwarzwurzeln for me. Have not eaten them in decades. Your recipe presentation is art. I love it.

Congratulations @pusteblume this really delicious

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