How Much Is Enough? The Art of Layering a Flavour

There are two types of people in the world: those who subscribe to quality over quantity and those who believe you can have both. I’m here to make a case for the latter – especially when it comes to certain ingredients that bear repeating. In some cases, more is more.

Sandwich stores all over Australia melt multiple varieties of cheese onto crusty sourdough. Hokkaido baked cheese tart pipes a secret blend of three cheeses into shortcrust pastry – and sells more than 20,000 pieces a day around the world. In her book Ostro, Julia Busuttil Nishimura pumps her lasagne with parmesan, buffalo mozzarella and scamorza. And, of course, there’s quattro formaggi, the beloved four-cheese pizza, which by some accounts has been in existence since the early 18th century.

Reusing the same ingredient in different ways also reduces waste and fosters creativity in kitchens. A classic example is a traditional Peking duck banquet, which can include crisp-skinned duck pancakes, san choy bao, spring rolls, duck meat fried rice or noodles and soup all made from the bones and carcass of the animal. From the fine-dining realm, Attica’s Ben Shewry layers three varieties of native pepper in a sauce that accompanies grilled shiitake mushrooms. At Vue de Monde, chef Hugh Allen has accompanied lamb rib and saddle with lamb tea and wild garlic on his degustation menu. Melbourne’s finest cocktail bars, such as Byrdi in the CBD, take a similar approach – a highball here might be assembled from last season’s foraged peach leaves, peach leaf distillate and clarified stone fruit, offering access to these flavours no matter the season.

On one hand, using multiples of the same or similar ingredient can be cumulative – a bold move to double-down on decadence. See it in sweet treats like Connoisseur Gourmet Ice Cream’s new Triple Choc Cookie ice-cream, which features a layer of white chocolate ice-cream and milk-chocolate ice-cream around a dark chocolate fudge core and housed in a crisp chocolate shell. In other instances, using different versions of an ingredient is a balancing act. For example, Mork Chocolate Brew House’s chilled campfire hot chocolate employs a darker, 70 per cent drinking chocolate to counter the sweetness of the chocolate biscuit, chocolate ice-cream and house marshmallow with which it’s served.

Ultimately, you don’t have to be a more-is-more person to appreciate a chef’s repurposing of the same ingredient in a single dish: it’s a chef’s creative forte. Chances are you’ve been enjoying variations of the same ingredient in your food for some time without noticing. My plea to you is this: double-down on cheese, triple-up on chocolate and serve salmon with its caviar. You can never have too much of a good thing.

This article is produced by Broadsheet in partnership with Connoisseur Gourmet Ice Cream’s new Choc Cookie ice-cream, part of its new Laneway Sweets range, available now.