Tartelette Mikado ►
These pretty vegetable tartelettes are topped with bright orange carrot slices and black truffle slices. Inside is a creamy puree of salsify, also called oyster plant. Turnips or parsnips may be substituted for the salsify, an old-fashioned vegetable now difficult to find on grocery shelves.
Ingredients
- Salsify Puree
- Salsify - 12 ounces (4 to 5 whole salsify), peeled and roughly chopped
- Milk - 1/2 quart
- Unsalted Butter - 1 tablespoon
- Heavy (Whipping) Cream - 2 tablespoons
- Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
- Sauce
- Carrot - 1, diced
- Celery Stalks - 1, diced
- Onion - 1 small, diced
- Shallot - 1, chopped
- Salad Oil - tablespoon
- Bay Leaf - 1
- Thyme - 1 sprig
- Madeira Wine - 1 ounce
- Veal - 1/2 to 1 cup, demi-glace
- Unsalted Butter - 1 tablespoon, semi-soft
- For Assembly
- Carrots - 6 ounces, blanched and sliced 1/8-inch thick
- Truffles - 4 large, thinly sliced
- Clarified Butter - 2 tablespoons
- Tartelette (Pie Crust) Shells, - 8 small, precooked
Instructions
To prepare the puree: Cover the salsify with the milk in a large saucepan and bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium, cover, and cook 20 minutes, until tender. Drain off the liquid; puree the salsify. Pass the puree through a fine-meshed sieve into a small saucepan and add the butter and heavy cream. Stir together over medium heat. Season to taste. Set aside; keep warm.
To prepare the sauce: Brown the vegetables in the oil. Add the bay leaf and thyme. Add the Madeira and cook, stirring up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Cook over medium heat until reduced by half in volume. Add the demi-glace, reduce the heat to medium-low, and reduce again by half, about 3 minutes. Strain the sauce and return it to the pan. Add the butter and swirl to blend. Set aside; keep warm.
To assemble: Briefly warm the carrots and truffles in the clarified butter. Put the salsify puree in a pastry bag and pipe into the tartelette shells, completely covering the bottoms of the shells. Overlap sliced carrots on top of the salsify in half of the shells; overlap truffle slices on the other half.
To serve: Spoon sauce into the warmed plates and turn the plates until the sauce coats the insides. Place one carrot- and one truffle-topped tartelette on each plate in a “V”. Garnish with remaining carrot and truffle slices.
