Roast quail, puy lentil and parsnip consomme

Woke up a couple of days ago with a need to cook parnsip

humble vegetable adaptable for so many different methods, boiled, roasted, puree, even cereal at a certain favourite restaurant.

sat on the end of the bed thinking if it would consomme, so went downstairs and googled it, found a couple of references where a puree is added to the egg white to create flavour from the 'pack'

recently I have abandoned egg white clarification in favour of agar filtering, firstly with accurate scales it is so much easier, no more stove watching and that small possibility of fried egg running through your stock. secondly I feel the flavour is purer with not so much taste and flavour lost to the clarification, but with picture perfect clarity every time.

during preparation was not sure of the parsnip as the starch contained could affect the final dish, but nothing ventured, nothing gained, I started by roasting.

this was to draw out the flavours, I de-glazed the pan with some simple chicken stock and blast chilled.

Then moved on to vac-packing the parsnips and stock and finished cooking in a pan of boiling water until quite tender, didn't want to stew the parsnips, but was using the veg as a puree.

For the puree, I took all the washed parsnip trim (peelings, tops&tails) and cooked in a bag with full fat milk.

Once tender, passed the stock off and chilled, pureed the veg with a bit of the parsnip milk

Once the liquid had cooled, weighed it and whizzed in 0.2% of agar for the clarification, heated up to >90C and chilled to set in the chiller once more. once chilled cut into rough chunks and froze overnight.

following day, laid the frozen stock cubes to defrost on a holy gastro tray, with a solid one underneath, left to drip through, this took most of the day to get the maximum yield.

Once this was complete, season to taste and heat for each order, We are serving with roast quail breasts, confit quail leg, puy lentils and vegetables bound in a little parsnip puree, thus:-

Great flavour, nice dish but a bit brown. need to sort some colour.....next time!