For 4 people
Ingredients
Beetroot
4 medium-sized beetroots
2 tbsp sea salt
2 rosmary twigs
2 thyme twigs
aluminium foil
400ml beetroot juice
2 pinches of curry Mumbai (mild curry)
1 pinch cumin
some butter
Emulsion
400g bottle tomatoes, ripe
piment d’espelette
sea salt, smoked
3 tbsp rape seed oil
2 tbsp Prelibato vinegar
Basil crème
1 bunch basil
200ml rape seed oil
100g yogurt
30g egg white
sea salt
To serve
1 cup sheep’s sour cream
1 tbsp Piedmont hazelnuts
sorrel
Method
Beetroot
Wash the beetroot thoroughly and put each individually on a square of aluminium foil. Spread the sea salt on the beetroots and place a twig of herbs on them. Properly wrap them and cook on a sheet in the oven at 120C for 3 hours. Test the cooking stages by using a toothpick, the beetroot shouldn’t be too soft, but rather al dente. Take out of the oven, let cool down and peel. With a ball scoop carefully hollow them out. Cook and reduce the beetroot juice with the spices by 1/3 and thicken with some butter. Season to taste with some sea salt or curry Mumbai. Marinade the beetroot in this beetroot reduction.
Emulsion
In the mixer, briefly mix the clean and roughly cut tomatoes with some salt. Place into a cloth strainer and hang in the fridge overnight. Take the resulting tomato water and season to taste with salt and vinegar. Finally, emulsify the oil.
Basil crème
Pick the basil, quickly blanche in boiling water and then place it into ice water. Squeeze the basil thoroughly and mix in the Thermomix together with the oil at 100C for 12 minutes. Pass through a fine sieve, then keep cool. Put the yogurt and egg white into the Thermomix and slowly mix the oil into it until it reaches a creamy texture. Season to taste with salt and white pepper and fill into a squirt bottle.
To serve
Let the beetroot drain and fill with the sour cream. Place the filled beetroot on the plate and squirt some basil crème on top. Halve the hazelnuts and place on the crème. Place the sorrel in between and pour the emulsion around a the end.
Images © René Riis