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cheek”, the small muscle which moves the bovine jaws during chewing. It is not considered as a top-quality cut of meat but, if carefully prepared, it becomes succulent and tasty as well as better than the most high-quality meat cuts in terms of tenderness, taste and texture. The cheek is the hardest cut of animal meat after the heart, but it is deemed to be high-quality and trendy in gourmet environments, since it is difficult to find (it is a small and limited cut; every animal has only two cheeks) as well as delicious if skilfully cooked.

But be careful: as we said, the key for an excellent result is the preparation. The particular structure of this cut’s connective tissue needs low temperatures and long cooking times in order to melt and make the meat more tender and succulent. However, this will cause a significant loss in weight and an inevitable loss in the organoleptic properties, because the overly worn out tissues release the liquids contained within.

Everything changes in the kitchen if we use waveco® and its induced maturation©. Thanks to its innovative technique, we can enhance all the properties of the beef cheek, significantly reduce the preparation and cooking times and always achieve an incomparable result in terms of tenderness and nutritional aspect.

Let’s test waveco® with the preparation of this “Beef cheek with celeriac purée”. For this recipe, use: beef cheek, herbs for the brown stock, celeriac, and wild fennel.

BEEF CHEEK

Take a 350 g beef cheek, put it into a pouch and start waveco® with the following times: 90 minutes of induced maturation© and no more than 60 minutes of cooking at a temperature of 80 °C.

The first step of this process melts the connective tissues without heat and maintains all the organoleptic properties of the cheek and, the second step, the real cooking step (thanks to the low potential and vacuum temperature), cooks through to the heart of the product at the ideal temperature, reducing the cooking times and obtaining an extremely tender meat cut without any loss of liquids.

TECHNICAL FOCUS: BRAISED BEEF AND BEEF STEW

We are talking about two techniques which make meats extremely tender through long cooking times at low temperatures. For braised beef, meat is initially marinated, then browned over a high flame on both sides and finally cooked for a long time. With beef stew, meat is not browned; it is added to a cooking juice and then slow cooked for a longer period of time.

BROWN STOCK

Take some beef bones, roast them, put them into a bag with some water and herbs and start the induced maturation© process for about 60 minutes. This process obtains a juice by extraction, without heat and without adding fat or thickeners.

 TECHNICAL FOCUS: EXTRACTING BONE MARROW

The brown stock is obtained through a slow and long cooking of animal bones, cartilage and connective tissues. It is used to enhance the preparation of the cooking juice itself or to accompany meat stews or roasted meat. Traditionally, salts and fats are added to season the mixture.

PLATING

Cut the beef cheek into four cubes (two per portion), then put the celeriac puree, prepared previously, prepared on to the plate. Lay the cheek pieces, previously lacquered in the pan, with the brown stock demi-glace obtained with the juice extracted through waveco®. Finally, decorate with a leaf of wild fennel.

CHEF FOCUS

 Thanks to induced maturation© and then to the potential for low temperature cooking with waveco® we can save time in the preparation and cooking processes of the beef cheek and obtain a succulent and tender meat, rich in nutrients.

A unique result is achieved for the brown stock, which enhances the brightness and the texture of the final demi-glace: with induced maturation© you can quickly extract it cold from the bone marrow, without acidity and without adding thickeners or fats.