Lobster - Tomato "Bouride" w/ saffron Espuma

This soup, a bouride, French in origin, is a garlicky seafood puree. The flesh of the fish itself is the primary thickener. I made this one heavy on the tomato and fennel to accompany the orange-saffron espuma recipe I've been developing. The flavors are basic Mediterranean, and I'm very familiar with them and the way they work together, this allowed me to focus on the experiment at hand. The espuma, or foam, is basically pressurized, flavored whipped cream with some gelatin. Absence of gelatin would cause the "fluffed" cream to "fall", or turn back into cream, immediately upon contact with the hot soup.

This exercise was to figure out what precise amount of gelatin is needed to allow the foam to slowly melt into the soup as it is eaten. Too much gelatin and the espuma turns into a gooey unpleasant clump; to little, and one may as well just drizzle the cream into the soup and not bother trying to achieve texture. I've been very unsuccessful with this sort of battle of textures in hot - cold contrasts lately. So I was very pleased when I realized that I had guessed an ideal amount the first time. The espuma held up and eased into the soup slowly, even with a hot grilled shrimp placed directly into it, yet it had a silky, creamy texture when chilled. Click on the picture to enlarge, you can see the way the espuma is melting into the soup, and offering a gradual change in texture as it slopes up toward the crest.

Now that I have the formula down I can apply it to New Virginia cuisine.