Nutriton and Healthy Cuisine - Barley, Soba and Hearty Greens

Chef took away our butter today. We are now, after months of sauteing in oils and finishing our sauces with butter, having to develop flavor with out too much fat. We will rely on reduced stocks, wine, juices, herbs and spices.
We began without as much as a reflection on fusion and jumped right into Nutritional Cooking.
We arrived this morning to a wonderful vegetable stock that Chef had made for us to work with. We began with a barley salad. (above) Cooking this grain in the stock helped to give it some flavor. We roasted some cipollini onions to add to the barley along with some leeks. We steeped some currants, chili's and orange juice together then added it to some curry, lemon juice and honey. All this was tossed with the barley and left to marinate for awhile.
The next dish we made was a soba noodle salad. We used an arrowroot slurry with stock to thicken this dressing. This enabled us to cut back on much of the oils normally used. This Asian flavored dressing (soy, ginger, lime, garlic) was tossed with the noodles, a scattering of sauteed shitakes and blanched snow peas to create a very nice chilled salad.
The last recipe we prepared was a warm salad using beet greens, radicchio, arugula and spinach. The dressing again was thickened with an arrowroot slurry incorporated with orange and pomegranate juice to from vinaigrette. Only one tablespoon of oil was used. Flavorful and healthy!
What a concept. It does take more planning and prep to use this stock and slurry method. Especially if you want to have a cold salad like the soba noodles. A good a flavorful stock takes time, but once you have some on hand, the possibilities are endless. Thanks Chef.

Goodnight.