From The Menu · 2022 · Reconstructed
The Breadless Bread Plate
Serve when
Set it down the instant Chef Slowik announces there will be no bread — 'you will eat far less than you desire, and what you eat, you will not enjoy' — and serve the accompaniments alone.
In the movie
Theatrical
- 00:22:19 Chef Slowik's provocation course: a bread course with no bread. Only the accompaniments are served — 'unaccompanied accompaniments' — a savory of emulsions and spreads meant to unsettle a room of people who expected to be flattered.
"Bread has, for millennia, been the food of the common man," Slowik tells the room. "You are not the common man." The gag is savage: a fine-dining crowd, primed to be told how special they are, is served the fixings and denied the loaf. It's the film's whole complaint, plated — that the cult of the tasting menu has starved the joy out of eating. Reconstruct the emulsions honestly; the withholding you supply yourself.
Ingredients
- For the smoked butter emulsion:
- For the parsley-garlic emulsion:
- For the confit garlic purée:
Method
- Smoked butter emulsion: warm the cream and butter together, season with smoked salt, and blitz to a glossy, pourable emulsion. Keep warm.
- Parsley-garlic emulsion: blanch the parsley 10 seconds, shock in ice water, then blend with garlic, olive oil, and lemon until vivid and smooth. Season.
- Confit garlic purée: simmer the garlic cloves gently in olive oil until meltingly soft, then mash to a purée with a little of the oil and salt.
- Plate three clean swipes and quenelles of the emulsions on a wide plate. Finish with flaky salt and pepper.
- Serve with a straight face — and no bread. The absence is the point.
Substitutions
- Smoked salt: plain flaky salt with a single drop of liquid smoke, or a knob of smoked butter worked into the emulsion.
- On "emulsions": at home these are really loose sauces and purées, not the stable restaurant emulsions the plating implies — season them boldly and don't fuss the texture.