This was my submission for the Chef’s Roll x Kikkoman Soy Sauce Challenge! Basically the challenge was to make any dish that highlighted soy sauce, and the winner could win a $3000 cash prize or a trip to Japan. For me, the money would be nice, but I love Japan, and any excuse to go again would be(yes, I did just go in April 2023), so I was very happy to participate in this! I won’t lie, when I think of soy sauce and cooking, my immediate thoughts are to go either with a crudo, a sashimi dish, or something braised in the soy. When I think a little further, a dressing or a marinade come to mind too. But I knew that if I did any of those, it would be really predictable, and if anyone can use salty soy products in a dessert, it would be me. At least my track record with miso desserts permitting. So I started thinking about what I could do with soy sauce in general. Soy products like tofu, kinako, and soy milk are all super easy to utilize in a dessert, while also reinforcing that natural soy flavor. The thing about soy sauce is that yes, it is nutty, but it is also really smoky and salty. And on top of that, it immediately darkens the color of anything you add it to, so you will have to veer towards the brown side in terms of how your dish will look. To avoid making a giant salt bomb, using soy sauce judiciously is important, especially in a dessert. At the same time, I wanted this to be a dessert where the flavor profile completely changes/is complimented by the smokiness and saltiness. When I think of flavors that work well with smoke and salt, chocolate, caramel, almond, acorn, and tea come to mind right away. But I feel like chocolate is a copout, and it will completely mask the color of the soy sauce, and this is a soy sauce competition, so I wanted the color of the soy to really come through. So nixing the chocolate, that was kind of how I came up with the other flavors in this dessert, namely being caramel, almond, acorn, and tea. It was a really eclectic mix of flavors, but it works in a really autumnal way, which is the aesthetic I was going for with this dessert(on a personal level, I was manifesting being able to go to Japan in the fall with this prize, so that was what I wanted to plate up on a visual level).

With the components, and there are a lot of them, we have a hojicha-soy cremeaux, acorn-soy financier, soy sauce tuiles and croquant(caramelized nut, in this case almond, wafers), a soy sauce caramel, brown butter “snow”, and fresh gooseberries. Normally, I try to reel in the components and flavors to 4 components and 3 main “hero” ingredients, so this was admittedly a lot less restrained than I would typically go. The main reason for this is that as I was conceptualizing the dessert, I was really trying to think of all of the ways that I could use the soy sauce. But in doing so, it created this need for bitterness(hojicha and the caramel) and tartness(gooseberry), that was really necessary for balancing out the saltiness and smokiness of the soy. So while the ingredient list is… a lot, I can vouch that the flavors do meld together quite nicely, and that everything does offer something on the plate, except maybe the brown butter snow, which is purely there to add something that isn’t brown to the dessert, but even that still gives subtle brown butter notes and pulls some of the sodium/salt from the soy away from some of the other components. From a flavor standpoint, this is basically a study in nutty, salty, sweet, and toasty. I’m choosing to think of it like that because the actual ingredient list makes me want to roll over from how against my normal approach to conceptualizing a dessert goes. This dessert is fragrant, nutty, aromatic, sweet, smoky, bitter, rich, and thanks to the gooseberries, a little tart. It was so nicely balanced as a bite that I actually was able to inhale one portion in seconds!

From a technical standpoint, I would grade this dessert probably a 9/10. The cremeaux is really unforgiving, being like a mix between a pastry cream and a chocolate mousse. There is so much fat in that cremeaux that it can overwhip and separate if you are not careful. So watch that like a hawk as you are doing every step. The financier is relatively easy if you own a stand mixer – the main thing is not to overmix the batter! The caramel and “snow” are also really easy components to make, but I will say, using a laser-pointed thermometer will make the caramel and the croquant steps infinitely easier. The croquant is a bit more technical, because like the caramel, it involves you heating up sugar to a certain temperature. But unlike the caramel, the croquant is poured over almonds, left to set, then blitzed into a find powder, sifted onto a baking sheet, and then baked into a thin caramelized wafer paper. It is delicious, and a great vehicle for the soy sauce, but it is time-consuming and after the cremeaux, the croquant is a close second in terms of technical difficulty. The tuiles are pretty straightforward, and if you have a Pavoni tuile stencil, they are super easy to make, and in pretty shapes too! Oh, and because I used only acorn flour, almond flour, and kinako(toasted soybean flour) in this dessert, it ends up being 100% gluten-free as well!

Makes 4 portions:
For the hojicha-soy cremeaux:
3 tbsp soy milk
1 tbsp unsalted butter
3/4 tsp gelatin powder + 1 tbsp cold water
1/4 cup white chocolate chips
2 tsp hojicha powder
1g soy sauce
1 egg yolk
1/4 cup heavy cream

In a pot, heat up the milk, butter, and gelatin first. In a double boiler, melt the white chocolate down, and then add to that the hojicha, soy sauce, and egg. Pour into that the milk-butter-gelatin mixture and stir until combined. Refrigerate the white chocolate for 2 hours, or until firm. Transfer to a stand mixer with a paddle attachment and slowly whip in the heavy cream to form a smooth, luscious cream. Be very careful when doing this process, since it has a high chance of overwhipping and splitting if you look away for even a second!

For the acorn-soy financier:
1 egg white
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp granulated sugar
2 cup acorn flour
2 tbsp almond flour
1 tbsp kinako
3 tbsp brown butter
1/4 tsp xanthan gum
1/2 tsp soy sauce

In a bowl, whip the egg white, vanilla, and sugar to stiff peaks. Fold into that the acorn flour, almond flour, kinako, and xanthan gum, and then add in the remaining ingredients to form your batter. Transfer to a piping bag. Pipe the batter into four silicone 1-inch by 2-inch bar molds and bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes. Allow the financier to fully cool before attempting to unmold.

For the acorn-soy tuiles:
1/4 tsp egg white powder
1/4 tsp soy sauce
1 tbsp cold water
1 tbsp brown butter
3 tbsp acorn flour
1/4 tsp xanthan gum
2 tbsp granulaed sugar

In a bowl, whisk everything together to form your batter. Pour and spread your batter into Pavoni tuile molds(I used a leaf and a branch mold). Bake the tuiles at 325 degrees F for 10 minutes. While the tuiles are still warm, lay them onto a rolling pin to give them a nice, curled shape.

For the soy sauce caramel:
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp soy milk
1/2 tsp soy sauce

In a pot, heat up the sugar until it reaches 300 degrees F – the sugar should be an almost amber-brown color. Add in the cream, soy milk, and soy sauce, and reduce the heat to low, stirring the sugar into the cream until it is fully dissolved into it. Once the sugar is dissolved into the cream, reheat the mixture until it reaches 250 degrees F, then take off heat, allowing it to cool before plating.

For the croquant:
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tsp soy sauce
2g corn syrup
1/4 cup water
3 tbsp almond flakes

In a pan, heat up the sugar, soy sauce, corn syrup, and water to 300 degrees F. Pour the sugar onto a parchment sheet or silpat and sprinkle over that the almonds. Allow the sugar to cool before transferring it into a spice grinder or food processor. Blitz it into a fine powder and then dust it using a sifter onto a cooking spray-lined parchment sheet, making sure that you dust at least two layers of the sugar dust onto the sheet. Bake at 350 degrees F for 3 minutes. Allow the croquant to cool after baking before cracking into smaller pieces.

For the brown butter “snow”:
1 tbsp brown butter
1/3 cup tapioca maltodextrin

In a bowl, mix ingredients together until a fluffy white powder forms.

To garnish:
Fresh gooseberries