Great British Menu ™
Baker:
Season:
Week:
Challenge Type:
'Welshman's Caviar'
Daniel: "The title of my dish is Welshman's Caviar. It's just potatoes, laverbread and these Welsh onions. The potatoes are going to be cooked in like a laverbread stock. The onions are going to be pickled and charred. And then I'm going to make laverbread look like caviar."
Notes taken during cooking
Spencer Metzger: "You know, there's laverbread going in, every component, really. It's all going to be about him extracting as much flavor as he can from that laverbread."
Daniel: "So I've got potatoes poaching and then I'm going to start working on the caviar."
Dan's vegan caviar is made from laverbread stock. It's made using spherification, which binds the stock into tiny spheres when it hits the liquid in the bowl.
Daniel: "I've got these tiny little bottles with these little pipettes. Almost like a syringe. So it's just going to take ages to form the individual droplets."
Spencer Metzger, having tasted the vegan caviar
"Dan's laverbread caviar was kind of a bit underwhelming. It's a bit flat, so I'm a little bit concerned it hasn't got enough flavor and it's not going to wow everyone enough."
Plating
Next to plate is Dan, who's still making his vegan caviar.
Daniel: "In hindsight, I probably should have invested in a little machine, really, to make the caviar pearls."
With a base of laverbread, he starts to build his dish.
Daniel: "These are steamed potatoes cooked in dashi stock."
Daniel adds capers, crispy leeks, and Welsh onion on top of his nori wrapped potato. Adds sea herbs.
A drizzle of chive oil and Dan is ready.
Spencer Metzger: "How's your potato?"
Daniel: "It was a little bit hard."
Peers, talking behind the scenes
"I think a tiny bit longer cooking the potato and it would have been perfect."
Back in the Judging Room
Spencer Metzger: "How do you feel like that comes together on the plate? Is that the consistency you were looking for?"
Daniel: "Yeah, I didn't want anything too heavy. I didn't want it too claggy, possibly. I'd like a little bit more acidity on the plate."
Peers, talking behind the scenes
"Oh, I like it. I'd want. I don't want to mop this sauce up with my bread."
Back in the Judging Room
Spencer Metzger: "And the caviar. Let's talk about that. So, obviously, this was one of the main elements ... the spherification."
Daniel: "Yeah, I think so, yeah. I'm quite happy with the size and the texture of them. But I could go a little bit stronger with flavor on the caviar."
Peers, talking behind the scenes
"The lava bread caviar is a stroke of genius."
"That caviar is so cool.:
"I'm not sure about that caviar. I know you lot like it."
Back in the judging room
Spencer Metzger: "If you had to score this dish, what would you give it and why?"
Daniel: "I'm going to go for an optimistic seven. I think there's things that I could certainly work on, but I'm relatively happy with how it's gone."
Final Judging
Spencer Metzger: “Daniel, for your dish, Welshman's Caviar, this dish hit the brief bang on. The laverbread sauce. The flavor was good. I think you could have added some more of that vegan cream and butter to make it a little bit creamier. The nori potatoes, they're a little bit waxy. They needed slightly more cooking lower and slower, and I would add some more flavor to really enhance that cooking stock. The laverbread caviar, it was a really creative idea. I found that mixed with the sauce, it worked really well. This dish has potential. You need to just make some small adjustments to it and fine tune it.”
As a family-run site, we pour our hearts into recording and transcribing cooking shows, developing tested recipes, and sharing culinary insights—all without bombarding you with ads.
Your low-cost subscription would help us cover ingredient costs and confirm that our passion project matters to you.
Please join our cooking community today.