Read descriptions such as ravioli of octopus with rice and tomato, cured goose breast with chicken liver parfait, poached rhubarb, black pepper and ginger bread or Low temperature cooked hapuka fillet with braised leeks and baby onions, clam beignets, curry and crème fraiche and you can’t help but be impressed.  These dishes all sound amazing and I would struggle to choose between them on a menu.  When reading about these delights I wonder how chefs come up with them.  My mind is stuck in the ordinary, mundane and pedestrian.  I consider steak and chips a good meal.  Do they teach you to think crazy menu ideas in chef school?  I often wish I had this level creativity when it came to food.

Recently at the Taste of Sydney event I was again bombarded with creative brilliance.  I am not going to list of all that was on offer as many great food bloggers with photography skills much more advanced than mine did a great job.  Of the dishes available on the day there was a desert that gained popular acclaim.  It was the pannacotta with pomegranate and lavender honey from Jonah’s on the Beach.  It was so rich and creamy and the pomegranate and honey complimented it perfectly.

In a day dream last week my mind drifted back to the great pannacotta I enjoyed so much and decided I would make my own.  Yes I was going to totally steal the whole idea and plating from Jonah’s on the Beach.  There were two things I required, firstly I needed a viable recipe that was rich and creamy and secondly I needed a plastic cocktail glass so it would get the very distinctive and applauded shape.

I decided on using Justin North’s recipe from his book French Lessons.  This recipe was deliciously simple and worked really well.  The finished result had a great mouth feel and tasted rich, creamy and distinctly of vanilla.  My only criticism is that it was nowhere near as wobbly as conical milky jelly presented at Jonahs.  However, overall this was a very successful dish and extremely easy.

Vanilla Pannacotta
Inspired by Justin North’s Pannacotta in “French Lessons”

Serves 4

Ingredients
200 ml Milk
100 ml Cream
50g Sugar
3 Vanilla pods, seeds scraped
10g Gelatine Sheets, titanium strength
140g Mascarpone cheese
1 Pomegranate, fruit only, discard the husk
Honey, to serve

Method
  1. Put the milk, cream, sugar and vanilla pods in a saucepan and heat gently over a moderate heat until dissolved.  Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool.  Remove the vanilla pods when cool.
  2. Grease the insides of 4 cocktail glasses.
  3. Soak gelatine in ice water until soft.  Drain and squeeze out as much water as possible.  Whisk gelatine into milk until dissolved.
  4. Add the mascarpone to the milk mixture and use of stab blender to ensure it is fully combined.
  5. Pour mixture into cocktail glasses and refrigerate until set.
  6. Turn pannacotta out onto serving plate with pomegranate fruit and a drizzle of honey.
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