Roll the Dice

One of the food/cooking Meetup groups of which I am a member has an organizer that is diligent about capturing new and innovative ideas for events. This time, the event was “Foodie Dice.” A few weeks prior to the scheduled evening, each participant rolled a set of dice, each with an ingredient theme. There was a die for protein, spice, vegetable, seasonal ingredient, carbohydrate, fat, and cooking method. There were some additional dice for those who took on the challenge of dessert like sugar type and dessert type (cake, pie, cookie, etc). I rolled the following: Fennel, basil, chicken, polenta, mushrooms, and braise.

As I mulled over my options, it became clear early on that one of the first things I would have to decide is if I would make a composed plate, or a single dish. Considering that the cooking was on-site, potluck, style for the event, I decided that it would be easier to go with the single dish. The next option was creamy or firm polenta. Firm discs of polenta seemed an easier way to plate than a globule, so I went that direction. Polenta is Italian, basil calls to mind Italian, basil makes pesto, and pesto goes great with chicken. What better way to top fried polenta discs than a chicken salad? Chicken salad needs texture, and often celery is used. I added both fresh fennel (the green part) and roasted white bulb for a slight note of char and nuttiness and two additional textures. That just left me to braise the mushrooms in chicken stock to use as a layer in between the polenta and chicken. Now I know what you are thinking, braising is method wherein high, dry heat is used to brown the food to enhance flavor via the Maillard Reaction, followed by wet and slow heat for breaking down fibrous connective tissue (like braised beef short rib or coq au vin). You would be right (and have watched a lot of Good Eats or read Wikipedia), but you can just as easily braise vegetables and fungus (namely mushrooms) as well.

My dish was a hit and in spite of the culinary handicap, everyone else pulled through fantastically too. One attendee made a hot and sour soup with spinach, tomatoes, quinoa, and a Moroccan spiced ground turkey. The red broth gave the impression that the dish was spicier than it actually was. Another member made a lamb curry with halved olives, apricots, tomatoes, onion and garlic, all served over baby kale and topped with chopped pistachios. The apricots gave a sweetness and the black olives provided a briny flavor, allowing the complex spice mixture to come through uninhibited.

Even dessert had its share of complexities. A chocolate Bundt cake had to include mustard and avocado. The baker mashed ripe avocados the point where they served as a substitute for other fat. Only fine green stripes betrayed its presence. I was told that there was only a pinch of a pinch of mustard, just to satisfy the requirement.

After dinner, we voted for most creative and best plated. The lamb (pictured) won for plating, the soup for best flavor. Mine, along with two others, tied for second. The night was so much fun that we all decided that the dice challenge would have to be taken up again.