Local chefs’ chemical combos cook up edible art

While stretched out in a dentist's chair, Richard Boone got the notion to go molecular.

A container labeled sodium alginate intrigued him; the hygienist explained that the chemical compound is used to make teeth molds. When it's mixed with a liquid, the liquid turns solid and doesn't turn back.

Today, Boone, executive chef at Sonoma Wine Bar & Bistro in Virginia Beach, tinkers with sodium alginate, sodium citrate, calcium chloride and other chemicals to come up with mind-bending dishes.

Consider a sunny-side-up egg that looks like a sunny-side-up egg but tastes like mango and coconut. Or a spoonful of what looks like caviar but tastes like coffee.

Boone moves among a small group of local chefs and barkeeps who dabble in what is known as "molecular gastronomy."

It's a trend that began more than a decade ago and has chefs applying scientific techniques and tools to cooking. Practitioners turn out everything from gorgeous ganache ribbons to edible menus.

It's popular in Europe, but it's been slow to catch on locally.

"People don't really understand it," Boone said.

Diners, he said, are turned off by the idea of using chemicals to prepare food or aren't adventurous enough to try the dishes.

In the kitchen, Boone has made sauces from romaine lettuce that taste like an entire Caesar salad. He once served pinot noir "caviar" atop raw oysters.

But he's learned that it's best to ease local diners into the idea, and his most popular vehicle for doing that is his Iced Turtle Parfait with coffee caviar, which sells for $7.95.

It's an elegant dish that combines Boone's favorite childhood flavors of caramelized pecans and chocolate - in this case chocolate ganache - paired with melted white chocolate and cream spiced with cognac, clove and cinnamon.

Atop this frozen concoction is a pillow of whipped cream and - here's the alchemy - a spoonful of "caviar" with the shape and texture of fish eggs but bursting with an intense coffee flavor.

To make it, Boone uses a French press to brew a bruising strong coffee. Then he adds sodium alginate, brings it to a boil and winds up with coffee gel. The gel is poured into a plastic bottle with a pointed nozzle, and Boone squeezes drops of gel into a solution of calcium chloride and water. The resulting spheres are rinsed and ready to go.

The parfait is one of Sonoma's most popular desserts. While you won't find full molecular meals on the restaurant's menu, the dessert is a great introduction to the movement, Boone said.

At the Green Onion in the Great Neck section of Virginia Beach, bartender Travis Lindblad got into chemicals about a year ago and now he's experimenting by adding "spheres" of flavor to cocktails.

Recently, he put together a martini made with berry-flavored vodkas, a squirt of Sprite and a blanket of bright red fruit punch spheres in the bottom of a martini glass.

Another cocktail made with Hpnotiq fruity vodka with a hint of cognac, lime juice, citrusy yuzu puree and basil gets a garnish of teal blue spheres made from Blue Curacao, a liqueur with an orange flavor.

Lindblad also has been experimenting with turning Nutella, a chocolate-hazelnut spread, into a dust to rim a martini glass.

From 5 to 10 p.m. Thursday, the Green Onion will be serving faux caviar drinks and others featuring molecular gastronomy.

At artcafe26 in Williams-burg, chef Bernhard Klinger of Austria is serving raspberry caviar and chocolate sand.

And last weekend at Aqua S Restaurant in Duck, N.C., executive chef Kenny Sloane created roasted red pepper caviar to serve atop citrus-cured salmon.

Sloane also has been using liquid nitrogen to make sorbets out of ingredients such as prickly pears and to turn soy lecithin into carrot froth.

"It's something that, when it comes out of the kitchen, there's a 'wow!' factor to it," Sloane said. "People don't anticipate it, but I think they enjoy it."

Lorraine Eaton, (757) 446-2697, lorraine.eaton@pilotonline.com