Chef Rick Stein's son releases new cookbook, World on a Plate

We all have an earliest food memory. Mine is oysters! I was three or four years old and on holiday with my family in France. My elder brother Ed was given a fresh oyster and swallowed it whole. So I had to have one – peer pressure works not only for games and dares but also for exploring the wonders of shellfish.

This book is in part a collection of culinary and gastronomic memories built around growing up in a prototypical foodie household with parents who spent three months of the year searching out new ideas and unexpected flavours for their restaurant back in Cornwall.

As a child I loved observing my parents' passion for exploring the food markets of the world and the way that they delighted in experiencing new ingredients and exotic sauces and spices. Bit by bit the world they discovered began to come back into their restaurant kitchen and many of the classical rules went back out.

They, and we, became food travellers. Every December bags were packed, passports assembled and travel arrangements confirmed and off we set, Jules Verne-like, around the world in 80 days. My parents, who for nine months of the year were so busy that they were virtual strangers to their three offspring, were for the next three months our constant companions and fellow adventurers. Our way was usually east to Australia via India, Thailand and Hong Kong, then on to the Americas and home. By which time, it has to be said, we were fairly sick of each other and eager to get back to the reassuring normality of our Cornish fishing village.

My parents repeatedly advised me not to become a chef. I think they feared that the long hours and harsh and sometimes brutal conditions weren't for me and that the fragile and delicate creature they had brought into the world deserved a life of study and contemplation. So after finishing school I set off to Cardiff University to read psychology. But during this time away in academia I discovered that I could not only cook but also had a passion to learn more about the physiology and psychology of taste and smell. It was the time of food academics like Harold McGee and chefs such as Heston Blumenthal and Ferran Adria.

I was hooked – at least in theory.

I was immensely proud of my dad's book Rick Stein's Food Heroes, which came out in the early 2000s because it was a rallying cry to the British public to "use or lose" bespoke and artisan. It has helped enable my generation of chefs to have the best raw ingredients with which to build our dishes. Its influence has also ensured that the general cooking public has the same building blocks as the professionals when it comes to creating wonderful dishes in the kitchen.

Jack Stein
Cornwall, 2018

Charred broccoli, broad beans, almonds and ranch dressing

It was in Hawaii that I first fell in love with ranch dressing, a simple mayonnaise-based sauce with garlic, buttermilk, soured cream and chives. The charring technique gives the broccoli a wonderful extra layer of flavour – a kitchen trick that works with pretty much any vegetable.

INGREDIENTS

1 head of broccoli

2-3 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

4 turns of freshly ground black pepper

2 garlic cloves, peeled but left whole

500g broad beans

75g flaked almonds

½ tsp butter

juice of ½ lemon

For the ranch dressing

150g mayonnaise

½ tsp red miso paste

75ml sour cream

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

50ml buttermilk

½ teaspoon salt

1 tbsp white wine vinegar

a handful of chives, finely chopped

a handful of parsley, finely chopped

METHOD

1. Preheat the oven to 200C fan-forced

2. First make the dressing: Mix all the ingredients together – except the herbs – until combined. Now stir the herbs through. Keep in the fridge until needed.

3. Cut off the broccoli stem and cut it into small pieces; break off the florets and slice in half to make smaller pieces. Mix 1 tablespoon olive oil and the salt, pepper and garlic cloves in a bowl. Add the broccoli pieces and stir to coat (stir in a little more olive oil if necessary). Place them on a baking tray and cook in the oven for about 10-15 minutes; then turn them over and cook for another 5-10 minutes until they are starting to brown and crisp. Keep an eye on them – depending on the strength of your oven they may brown very quickly.

4. While the broccoli is cooking, place the broad beans in a bowl, cover with boiling water for 1-2 minutes to soften them, then drain. Heat the remaining olive oil in a frying pan until hot, then fry the broad beans for about 5 minutes until crisp but not too browned.

5. In a dry pan toast the flaked almonds on a low heat until starting to colour. Add the butter and allow to foam for 30 seconds, then tilt the frying pan and spoon the foamed butter over the almond flakes. Remove from the heat and drain on kitchen paper.

6. Mix the broccoli and broad beans together and squeeze the lemon juice over; season with more salt if needed. Place in a bowl and top with ranch dressing and toasted almonds.

Serves 4

Rack of lamb with pinot noir sauce

This dish was inspired by a visit I made to a vineyard in south-western Australia where they used little sheep to trim the vines. In the spirit of "what grows together goes together", I came up with this dish. It's like a classic stew, just with the ingredients cooked separately and combined at the last minute. I like my lamb rack to be pink. Here I have used a traditional method of cooking it, but for the same result you could instead put the racks in a cooler oven (60C fan-forced) and leave them for four hours, then sear them in foaming butter to colour and caramelise.

INGREDIENTS

8-bone rack of lamb

50ml vegetable oil

150g carrots, roughly chopped

150g onions, roughly chopped

150g celery, roughly chopped

1 leek, roughly chopped

4 garlic cloves, chopped

1 bouquet garni

500ml pinot noir

500ml chicken stock

a handful of dried porcini mushrooms

2 tsp dark soy sauce

1 tsp Marmite/Vegemite

salt and pepper

For the kale

1 shallot, sliced

vegetable oil

200g kale, roughly chopped

salt and pepper

METHOD

1. Preheat the oven to 200C fan-forced and place a roasting tin inside to heat.

2. First, make the gravy. Pour 3 tablespoons vegetable oil into a large pot, then add the chopped carrots and onion and season them with salt. Add the celery, leeks and garlic. Stir through, then add the bouquet garni.

3. Pour 500ml wine into the gravy and let it reduce over a medium heat. Once it has reduced to a few tablespoons turn the heat down to low. When the liquid has almost entirely been absorbed, add the chicken stock, then the porcini mushrooms, the soy sauce and the Marmite/Vegemite. Leave to simmer over a low heat until it's reduced and thickened. Remove from the heat and pass the gravy through a sieve, squeezing out any excess liquid from the vegetables (discard these).

4. Meanwhile, cut the rack of lamb into two equal pieces. Sear in a hot pan in the remaining 2 tablespoons vegetable oil for 5 minutes, then transfer to the heated roasting tin. Roast for 15-20 minutes, or until the internal temperature reaches 56C (for medium-rare) on a meat thermometer. Once it's cooked, remove the lamb from the oven, season with salt and pepper and rest for 15 minutes.

5. Now prepare the shallot for the kale. Place the sliced shallot in a small heatproof cup and just cover with the vegetable oil. Microwave for 30 seconds to make a confit.

6. Place the kale in a deep, wide saucepan with a splash of water. Season with salt and pepper, cover with a lid and let it steam over a medium-low heat for 2 minutes. Remove any leftover water from the kale and add the confit shallots and toss through.

7. Slice the lamb between the ribs and arrange a few slices on each plate, along with the kale and the carrots and a good drizzle of the red wine sauce.

Serves 4

Roasted new potatoes with seaweed salt and vinegar

INGREDIENTS

20g salt

800g new potatoes, scrubbed

50ml vegetable oil or beef dripping

2 tsp seaweed salt (make this by blitzing salt with a sheet of nori)

20ml malt vinegar

METHOD

1. Preheat the oven to 200C fan (220C/gas mark 7). Place a roasting pan in the oven to heat.

2. Meanwhile, add 2 litres of water and the 20g salt to a large pan and bring to the boil. Add the potatoes and parboil for 10 minutes, then drain and allow to cool.

3. Remove the roasting pan from the oven, add the vegetable oil or dripping and return the pan to the oven.

4. Once the oil is hot, add the potatoes to the roasting pan and carefully turn them in the oil. Add the seaweed salt and cook for 20-30 minutes until the potatoes are well browned.

5. Take the potatoes out of the oven and drizzle with malt vinegar. The potatoes go perfectly with some white fish, such as cod.

Serves 4

Jack Stein's World on a Plate is out now, $45.