DBS Indulge Masterclass: Osvaldo Forlino

*Invited Session*

I had the chance to be invited by Asian Food Channel (AFC) and DBS Indulge to attend Chef Osvaldo Forlino DBS Masterclass at AFC Studio. Some of us may make the connection to Italian fine-dining restaurant, Forlino, at Fullerton which Chef Osvaldo set up in 2008. He is no longer with the establishment and has now 2 of his own restaurants, No Menu and Ristorante Amarone located at Boon Tat Street and Capital Tower respectively. Another restaurant, focusing on seafood, will soon be opening at Marina Bay Financial Centre too.

So as you can probably imagine, I am very excited to be picking up tips from such a experienced Italian Chef! Chef will be demonstrating some simple recipes that you can replicate at home. DBS Masterclass seeks to present opportunities to learn and taste dishes from reowned chefs to the general public, a great proposition.

Spacious and well equipped afc studio located in the heart of Somerset, Orchard Central. Now you can even head to Dean and Deluca after your session to pick up some ingredients for home!

Featured recipes of the night include Salted Cod with Mashed Potatoes and Porcini Mushroom, Homemade Tagliatelle in Garlic and Walnut Sauce and Fresh Peach stuffed with Amaretti Biscuits and Chocolate.

A sommelier from Straits Wine Company was also at the studio to introduce the respective wine pairings for the dishes that night!

Chef and his wife, who helps him in the kitchen, so adorable. We started off with Fresh Peach stuffed with Amaretti Biscuits and Chocolate as it needs to go into the oven for sometime. This is really simple to make though!

The recipe appears to be for a pretty large serving, so please adjust accordingly!

You will need

• 15 white peaches
• 75g of butter
• 200g of Amaretti biscuits, crumbed (I personally would want to try with digestives!)
• 30g of cacao powder
• 4 egg yolks
• 6 tablespoons of white sugar

Method:

• Cut peaches in half and pit them
• Spoon out some flesh in the middle to create a ‘space’ for the filling
• Mix sugar, butter, cacao powder, crumbed biscuits and pulp of peach flesh previously spooned out together to get chocolate mixture.
• Fill the peach with the mixture (kind of look like peach pits!)
• Bake it at 170deg for 30 minutes or till brown

The dessert is of course served last in the studio, but I’ll serve mine to you first, just the way I like it usually.

Peach on the left, plated in the kitchen. On the right, plated by Mrs. Osvaldo Forlino.

I like the baked peach a lot, it was still kind of firm and naturally sweet, very good on its own as a warm dessert. I have mixed feelings about the chocolate filling as it was rather mushy, personally, perhaps a small ball of chocolate sorbet would be a good alternative as well?

Wine Pairing: GD Vajra Moscato d’Asti 

Next we worked on Salted Cod with Mashed Potatoes and Porcini Mushroom. Pretty fuss free yet impressive enough for a nice dinner at home! While he worked, Chef will occasionally share some memories of him being in the kitchen with his MaMa when he was young. He stressed that good food does not necessarily need to come from expensive ingredients. Therefore what he is sharing with us today are simple recipes, passed down from his family, using ingredients that one can easily find in their kitchens. I am no culinary expert myself, but I have always enjoyed home cooked food so that resonated very well with me.

Finished with drizzle of olive oil and chopped parsley, plated by Chef.

The recipe called for Baccala, which is a salted cod that is cheap and can be kept for an extended period of time. Since it is salted, the cod needs to be soaked about 3 days before hand to purge the salt from the flesh. Fresh cod might be a convenient substitute! First time having Baccala and the meat was firm and there was nothing fishy with the taste. It was just a tad rubbery to me.

The mash was smooth and delightedly moist on its own. Chef recommends that we use a potato press to achieve the smoothness but for most of us without the niffy kitchen gadgets, hand mashed is more than adequate.

The porcini mushrooms was a burst of flavors in my mouth. A simple fry up of the fresh mushrooms with olive oil, salt, garlic, butter and a sprig of rosemary can taste so wholesomely good. Chef tipped that if you wish to turn the taste of garlic down a notch, you can remove it’s core. The sauce also complimented the light fish well.

Wine Pairing: GD Vajra Langhe Bianco Riesling

For the mashed potatoes, you will need

• 500g of potatoes
• 50g of unsalted butter
• 1 cup of milk

Method:

• Boil a pot of salted water and add potatoes. Cook for 15 minutes till potatoes are tender but still firm to the touch. Drain potatoes out
• In a small saucepan, heat the butter and milk over low heat till butter is melted
• Using a potato mashed or electric beater, slowly blend the milk mixture with the potatoes until it becomes smooth and creamy.

For the cod, you will need

• 300g of salted cod (Fresh cod will do too!)

Method

• If using salted cod, soak the cod for 3 days. Change water daily.
• Boil the fish for about 10-15 minutes until it becomes tender (we noticed that chef puts some root vegetables in the boiling pot as well, I think it helps to remove fishiness)

For the mushrooms, you will need

• 200g of porcini mushrooms
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• Salt to taste
• Chicken stock
• Chopped parsley (as a garnish)

Method

• Warm a nonstick pan with olive oil and garlic cloves
• Slice porcini mushrooms and saute them till they are toasted
• Add a ladle of chicken stock and salt to taste

What’s a night of Italian cooking demos without pasta? (Check out another one of his niffy kitchen tools, the automatic parmesan grater!) Chef shared with us how to make Homemade Tagliatelle in Garlic and Walnut Sauce. I have to say I was very intrigued and waiting to taste this as other than pesto (which technically only has some nuts), I have never heard of pasta with a nut based sauce before! And nuts are kind of my thing too.

We all heard of different ways to cook pasta, so the host, Anita, asked Chef for the right of cooking it. His advise is to use lots of water, enough to submerge all the pasta, salt it, and to start putting pasta in when it is boiling.

Plated by Chef.

The sauce was grainy, with a distinct walnut and garlic taste, very unlike any pasta that I’ve had. I wonder if removing the skin of the walnuts will make a difference? The taste might be less harsh without the skin perhaps. I like that the sauce calls for milk, healthier than cream but part of me was itching to replace milk with cream, sigh.

To make the pasta, you will need

• 300g of flour
• 3 eggs
• 1-2 spoons of water

Method:

• Add eggs to the flour and mix together till consistency of dough is smooth and elastic
• Add a bit of water if the dough gets too dry
• Place the dough in the pasta machine to flatten it and cut into layers of you desired width (I guess you can do this manually too)
• Leave the paste to dry for awhile
• Boil the pasta for a few minutes in boiling water
• Saute the pasta with the walnut sauce and serve warm

For the walnut sauce, you will need

• 150g of walnut, chopped
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 5 slices of square bread
• Milk to soak the bread
• Knob of butter

Method:

• Soak bread in milk
• Put chopped walnut, garlic and bread in a blender and blend well
• In a pan, warm the sauce with butter and water

With Chef Osvaldo Forlino and his new team, Chef Pepe and Chef Daniel.

Love this notebook that was in the goodie bag every participant will recieve, along with a apron!

Thank you Fairenza, Zinuan and Clara from AFC and the DBS Team for the invite. Kudos to DBS Indulge for creating foodie experiences and it was indeed an enjoyable and informative evening.

Look out for the next DBS Masterclass with Chef Ronnie Chua of Tatsuya happening soon on 20 July 2012! Check out the event here.

AFC Studio

Orchard Central #07-02
181 Orchard Road
Singapore 238896
Tel: +65 68344829 (AFC studio)
Tel: +65 68358838 (office)

http://www.asianfoodchannel.com/

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