'How to cook like Heston' challenge: Simon Harding

The final entry in our challenge sees photographer Simon snapping up the chance to make a two-course meal from Heston's recipes

Having been a fan of Heston’s since I first saw him use dry ice to make Fizzy Fruit (on a TV show I’ve long forgotten the name of), and being interested in the science as well as the art of cooking, when I saw the opportunity to win a tour round his lab, and all I have to do is cook a dish from How To Cook Like Heston, I thought "I have to give this a go". However, when I started thinking about which dish to cook things came unstuck. I just couldn’t decide, until a little memory hit me.

Back when I was 16 or might have been 17 (I am now 33) my mother invited a great family friend, Mr Gibson (who is a retired science teacher and headmaster and is now in his 90s) round for a meal and I offered to cook it. Having only cooked the occasional spag bol for our family tea or cooked cakes, scones and jam with my grandmother (who worked with Mr Gibson as a home economics teacher and then started a haberdashery shop with him in their retirement), a whole meal was quite a challenge. So I decided on a roast chicken Sunday dinner.

Whenever I see Mr Gibson now he still reminds me of this meal and how impressed he was with it, so I thought to myself – why not recreate this meal, the first I ever cooked for guests? But this time do it the Heston way.

So this is my story of cooking a roast chicken Sunday dinner Heston-style: roast chicken, roast potatoes, honey-roasted parsnips, cauliflower cheese and glazed carrots with an exploding chocolate pudding over two days of cooking.

Day 1 - chicken stock

Normally I use stock cubes but as both the cauliflower cheese and gravy needed chicken stock I thought I had better do it properly, so the first step was to create the chicken stock. Into the oven went three chicken carcasses and associated wings I had previously removed the meat from (I recently discovered that it is cheaper to buy a whole chicken than buy chicken breasts!) along with the magic ingredient of milk powder.

By the time the bones and the carrot and onion base were ready to meet each other in the (new – bought for this meal) pressure cooker, the smells that were already starting to form told me this effort would be worth it. After two hours in the pressure cooker I strained the liquid and quickly cooled it before putting it in the fridge for the next day.

Exploding chocolate pudding

As I was planning on sharing this meal with my girlfriend I quickly realised that pudding had to be chocolate and when I saw that the additional ingredient was passion fruit it was a no brainer which dessert to cook. However, having failed miserably to purchase the required ingredients at my local supermarket and greengrocers first thing in the morning, I decided that I would have to take the mile walk to my 'local' Waitrose in the hope that they stocked the knobbly round things or I would just resort to using orange.

A mile walk is of course not exactly a chore but I had to choose the day when the snow came down so I had to walk in freezing slippery conditions all the way thinking that they had better have them in and, if they do, it had better be worth it!

Of course with it being Waitrose I needn’t have worried and I walked back relieved thinking I must be mad – two days of cooking for one meal. Blitzing the shortbread and mixing with the butter followed by the surprise addition to create the base was relatively simple, although I was a bit concerned when I started hearing the pop rocks popping.

Thinking there was nothing I could do I quickly put the base in the freezer and forgot about the popping as I infused the cream with the hard-won passion fruit and slowly melted the chocolate before mixing together and adding to the now very chilled base. Continuing to hear popping as I placed the tin back in the freezer I wondered if there would be any crackle or pop left for the next day.

Chicken step one

The last thing to do on Day 1 was to untruss the chicken, place it in brine and put it in my second fridge overnight. I had played with brining before and found the results too salty for my tastes, so leaving a full chicken overnight in brine I couldn’t help but wonder if my faith in Heston would pay off.

Day 2 - chicken step two

Having enjoyed the delights of Sous Vide chicken (I even have my own waterbath and vacuum sealer), I know how good the results from 'low and slow' cooking can be. But this would be the first time I had tried to cook 'low and slow' in the oven. Placing my trust in Heston once more I set the oven to 90c and set out to prepare the chicken for roasting.

Having taken the chicken out of the brine and dried it off, I removed the wish bone and filled the cavity with thyme and a pricked lemon before smothering it with butter and placing the beast into the oven for what seem like ages.

Cauliflower cheese

My girlfriend is a big fan of cauliflower cheese and I can clearly remember discussing this on our first date so I knew that cauliflower cheese simply had to be on the menu!!

Only the previous weekend I cooked cauliflower cheese using my usual roux method but this time I would be cooking it the Heston way so I was a little concerned whether she would like it. But, as with everything for this meal, I was going to do it “properly” or not at all!

In preparing the liquid base I quickly discovered that reducing liquids is not as simple as it first seems; it is all too easy to reduce too much. My first attempt at reducing the wine from 300ml to 30ml resulted in under 10ml remaining, my second attempt was much better (although I still went a little far). Reducing 500ml of stock down to 200ml went much better and when I tasted the result I could not believe how much flavour was in the reduced stock.

Preparing the three types of cauliflower was a painful experience as I slipped while separating the florets and clumsily drove the heel of my newest and possibly sharpest knife into my index finger. After bleeding, swearing and finding the plasters (thank god for my wedding photographer’s emergency bag) I continued.

As I was a little unsure whether either of us would like all three different types of cauliflower I decided to reserve the smaller florets for the pickling bath, the medium florets for the deep fat fryer and keep the larger florets for boiling so at least we could identify the method of cooking from the size.

While the pickling was underway in the fridge I prepared the cheese sauce using a mature cheddar and parmesan. I think in retrospect I should have stuck to just cheddar as I think the different melting points of the two types of cheese caused clumping in the sauce, although I could also have been a little cautious following Heston’s instruction not to stir too much.

Chicken step three

This is where I made quite a serious error: I left the chicken in too long as by the time I took the bird’s temperature it had gone well above the target 60c and even above the recommended safety level of 75c. It reached a full 82c and if I am honest I was a little concerned I may have overdone things and wasted the last two days' efforts.

However, following a full 45 minute resting before returning the chicken to the now very hot oven and basting regularly I was pleasantly surprised that when I started to carve the chicken it was still surprisingly moist.

The results

So after two days of cooking I finally sat down to eat and what did I think?

Well, the chicken was a revelation; there is no way I will go back to cooking chicken at 180c ever again and I am now converted to making homemade stocks. The cauliflower cheese is a mixed story. I don’t think I will pickle cauliflower again and if I am honest I think the picked florets somewhat spoilt the dish for me. However, I did find the cheese sauce packed with flavour and despite it being completely different from what I am used to I will be doing it again, although with just boiled cauliflower.

Having filled up on roast dinner it was an hour or so later when I served the exploding chocolate cake and when I served my girlfriend her slice on the sofa and went out to take the photograph of my slice all I could hear from the lounge was little surprised squeaks as the crackle crystals did their work. I personally loved the combination of the passion fruit and the chocolate. It's something that I will definitely be doing again and as the final crackles popped at the back of my head all I had left to do was wash up.