David Adjey is known for his cookbooks, TV show and his work as a personal chef for Dan Aykroyd, who was in Moncton this week.
Aykroyd's former personal chef cooks up new book
Famous chef offers the best of his best in new cookbook
THE CANADIAN PRESS Published Saturday December 15th, 2007
KINGSTON, Ont. - If David Adjey hadn't been a chef, he could have been a coach. These days, he spends as much time helping people enjoy cooking as he does cooking.
He can be seen frequently on the Food Network's popular TV show "Restaurant Makeover" coaxing other chefs to spruce up their menus.
And, as the title indicates, his new cookbook, "Deconstructing The Dish," (Whitecap) finds a way to break down complicated meals into manageable blocks.
Adjey lives in Toronto now after having stints as a restaurant chef in New York City and California. But he has a soft spot in his heart for the Kingston, Ont., area.
"One of my best summers ever I lived on a farm in Harrowsmith," he says.
That would be the summer of 1997 when he was the personal chef of Dan Aykroyd and his family. "Aykroyd had been to a restaurant where I was in Toronto and said he and his wife really enjoyed my cooking," says Adjey, who was asked to cook for the Aykroyd family on a couple of special occasions. "Then he said a lot was going to happen one summer, so why didn't I just come out and cook for them. "I loved it."
When Adjey asked Aykroyd to write the foreword for his cookbook, the reaction was immediate.
"I called and left a message with his assistant," Adjey recalls.
"About 12 minutes later, she called to say he'd dictated it over the phone and she'd be typing it up."
Besides being amazed at Aykroyd's recall of what he had eaten, Adjey was flattered by the comments.
"This was a night of gastronomic ecstasy that will be sumptuously rolled over in our salivary memories until the end of time," Aykroyd writes in the book's foreword.
The cookbook should certainly give readers a good idea of what Adjey's cooking style is all about.
"You could say these are my greatest hits," he says. "I looked over everything that I've cooked over my career and these are the 40 entrees that I didn't just cook at the restaurant but also when I went home.
"Cooking has a lot to do with your emotions. So I broke it up into dishes I cook when I feel hot, warm, cool or cold." (And, yes, they do break down to the various seasons of the year.)
He starts the book off by mentioning his 12 rules.
Among the more memorable ones: try something weird on a menu once; cook from a different region in the world at least once a week; never replace butter with anything except butter; and never order off a menu that's bigger than your underwear.
In speaking to the first of those rules, Adjey says, "Every once in a while, you have to get out of the box, expand your palate and learn.
"That's how you get better as a cook."
The book has a large number of fish recipes in it.
"It's probably 50-50 between meat and fish," Adjey says. "Fish makes you smart and keeps you smart although I know at restaurants, the majority of sales are from chicken and steak."
Although Adjey loves to try all kinds of wild ingredients, there are four that are essential to him.
"My pantry is massive and I live five minutes away from every cuisine you could think of," he says. "But I always have great olive oil, fresh peppercorns in the peppermill and a great sea salt. And I'm a bacon junky.
"There's a lot of meat I could give up, but triple-smoked German bacon is what's stopping me from becoming a strict vegetarian."
He appears on "Restaurant Makeover" on an ad hoc basis. "They call up and ask if I'm free on a certain week and if I am, I go," he says. "I don't know exactly what I'm going to do till I get there. Usually, I just go to the nearest market, grab some bagfuls of stuff and say, 'Let's cook.'"
Adjey thinks we should spend more time in our kitchens.
"You should cook something every day," he says. "I shouldn't say this because I'm on TV, but we should reverse the amount of time we spend in the kitchen as opposed to watching TV," he says. "If you did, you'd be eating the best food you ever had."
The cookbook takes you through a dish step by step so that what might seem daunting from afar is fairly simple up close.
For my first shot at the book, I tried the tandoori wild salmon with biryani vegetables and lime pickle.
The recipe called for a big fillet of wild salmon. Not feeling particularly flush that day, I just made mine with four salmon fillets, but I felt quite proud at being able to tie two pieces together with a little boiled leek.
The results were spectacular and even the veggies were amazing.
Wild Salmon With Biryani Vegetables
1 leek, cut lengthwise 1
1 fillet of wild salmon (about 900 g/32 oz) 1
8 kaffir lime leaves 8
50 g ginger, peeled and sliced paper thin 2 oz
50 ml cilantro leaves 1/4 cup
50 ml tandoori marinade 1/4 cup
Tandoori Marinade
30 ml tandoori paste 2 tbsp
30 ml olive oil 2 tbsp
Zest of 2 limes
50 ml cilantro leaves 1/4 cup
Tandoori Marinade: In a food processor fitted with a metal blade, blend all ingredients together into a smooth paste. Transfer to a non-reactive container and refrigerate until needed.
Preheat oven to 180 C (350 F). In a large pot of boiling water, blanch leek until just soft, about 1 minute.
Submerge leek into ice water and cut into 4 equal lengths. Cut salmon fillet in half lengthwise.
Place lime leaves, ginger slices and cilantro leaves on one side of the salmon and sandwich together with the other side.
Brush with tandoori marinade on all sides. Tie together as snugly as possible with the leek ribbons.
Sear salmon over medium heat until lightly caramelized, about 2 minutes.
Flip and continue to cook for another 1 to 2 minutes.
Remove and transfer to a wire rack-lined sheet pan.
Roast until just firm, 5 to 7 minutes.
Serve with lime pickle and biryani vegetables (Chinese long beans, cauliflower, carrots, butternut squash, okra, ginger) sauteed in 30 ml (2 tbsp) each of butter and biryani paste.
Note: Tandoori and biryani paste, Chinese long beans and kaffir lime leaves are available at Asian grocery stores.