Canapé crash course: Part 2
The first tip of our second round of canapés is as follows: Make sure that you are as ready as you can be before plating them up. Get each and every little thing as close to being finished as you can, this way, when plating, it will go quickly and the food will be served as it should be. Canapés should be fresh. If allowed to sit they gather moisture, lose crunch, temperature (if hot), structural integrity as well as their general appeal. Canapés should look good, be presented by the host and explained to the person receiving them. This way you can facilitate people experiencing your hard work the way they should, with excitement and enjoyment. There are very few things better than offering someone a mouthful of flavour and watching their immediate reaction as their face lights up in good company. The second round of rustic canapés are simply named as follows: – Melba and cabrito sandwich with grilled fennel and apple & mustard jam – Stilton, culatello and fig on toasted ciabatta – Biltong, manchego and pickled cucumber on rosemary and sea salt crackerHave fun with your canapés this week and send us some pictures on Instagram and Facebook!
Equipment
- Chopping board
- Sharp knife
- sharp bread knife
- small mixing bowl
Ingredients
- 100 g Sols Karoo pork, culatello
- 100 g Sols topside beef biltong
- 270 g Sols organic cucumber, onion and turmeric pickle
- 285 g Sols apple and mustard savoury jam
- 100 g Sols golden melba toast
- 100 g Sols rosemary and sea salt crackers
- 1 Sols ciabatta loaf
- 100 g Flamingo, manchego cheese, Kokerboom kaas
- 100 g Black winged stilt, stilton, Kokerboom kaas
- 125 g Cabrito goat cheese, Belnori
- 1 Fig preserve, weltevrede fig farm
Instructions
- For the first canapé, cut slices of melba toast by two. Then with a sharp knife (I like to keep hot water close by to rinse after each use) cut very thin slices of the cabrito and layer melba, cabrito, melba, cabrito. Now slice the fennel into thin appropriately sized slivers which you may layer on top of the last layer of goat cheese. Place a small dollop of Sols apple and mustard jam upon that with slivers of fresh apple to garnish.
- Cut lengths from your ciabatta loaf and then toast them until golden. Trim them down into equally sized pieces, making sure you omit any of the crunchy crust. Take the stilton cheese and mash it into a creamy paste in your mixing bowl. Now, take two teaspoons and gently shape a small quenelle with the cheese and place on one half of the ciabatta pieces. On the other half place your culatello. Cut the preserved fig into quarters and place one on each canape. (Garnish in picture: parsley and pansies).
- For the final canapé, gently break each rosemary and sea salt cracker into halves. Biltong goes onto that, creating a barrier that protects the biscuit from moisture. On top of the biltong, place a couple of pieces of pickled cucumber. Finish off with brunois (small dice) of the manchego cheese as well as a couple of slivers of pickled onion from the cucumber jar. (Garnish in picture: chickweed and marigold petal).