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Chef's Choice: Olivier Mayer

When Olivier Mayer last made headlines in Whistler he was winning the 2011 Chef's Challenge during Cornucopia. Today he's in New York City preparing for the Master's Golf Tournament. He hasn't traded in his chef's apron for golf spikes.
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INTERNATIONAL INGREDIENTS Private chef Olivier Mayer plies his trade around the world and looks forward to returning to Whistler where his primary employer has a home.

When Olivier Mayer last made headlines in Whistler he was winning the 2011 Chef's Challenge during Cornucopia.

Today he's in New York City preparing for the Master's Golf Tournament. He hasn't traded in his chef's apron for golf spikes. No, he's going to be part of the culinary team preparing for the internationally recognized annual golf event.

"For me, I'm going to get a chance to play with those guys," says Mayer joking, his larger-than-life French accent as he speaks by cell phone.

Mayer says he's been in New York for the last four months and expects to be there for another two or three months before returning to Whistler.

He primarily cooks for one family. His main employer has a home in Whistler and when they are in Whistler, he's in Whistler. At the moment the family is in New York so he's based in the Big Apple right now.

"They are my main clients, even in New York," says Mayer. "I work with them, say, three, four times a week.

He says the connections he has made in Whistler have led to contracts and jobs all around the world. In the next few months he plans to be in the U.K. and Hong Kong before returning to Whistler.

He prepared food for an event this week at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, where the works of New Yorker George Bellows are on display until Feb. 18, and before that he says he did an interesting New York political dinner.

He isn't exactly certain whom he's preparing food for at the Masters golf event as details of the contract haven't been completely finalized, but he knows his services are needed in Augusta, Georgia, for the first week of April. The annual tournament takes place at the historic 18-hole course called the Augusta National Golf Club and this year it is scheduled for April 11 to 14. The golfers invited to compete at the prestigious tournament include world-class competitors like Phil Mickelson, Fred Couples, Ernie Els, Vijay Singh and Tiger Woods.

While golf is in Mayer's near future, his heart is in the mountains.

"I'm looking forward to coming back for skiing," says the chef of his desire to get back to Whistler as the busy din of New York can be heard bleeding through his phone.

Mayer teamed up with chef Guillaume Gissinger in 2011 to compete in the Chef's Challenge that year during Cornucopia as the Shirtless Chefs. The duo prepared a winning duck dish in 45 minutes to win the culinary show down. The competition featured duck and apple as secret ingredients.

Gissinger and Mayer were the only team of two in the event that featured teams from Araxi, The Four Seasons and Whistler Cooks. Each of the other teams in the competition had at least four people on the team.

He certainly isn't shirtless in New York and he's come a long way since his days in the early 1980s when he studied business at France's Strasbourg Graduate School of Management. This is a school that turns out bankers, financiers, business managers, accountants, auditors and people who specialize in supply chain management, management information systems, or marketing and sales.

Clearly it is an entrepreneurial institute that has produced at least one chef who loves Whistler.

Roast lamb with spinach mousse and wild garlic puree

Serves 4

Ingredients

For the spinach mousse

  • 400g baby spinach - 250g cooked and chilled
  • Skinless chicken breasts, chopped
  • 200ml double cream
  • 50g crème fraîche
  • Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the cannon of lamb

  • 2 fillets of lamb, about 280g each
  • 4 tbsp olive oil
  • small bunches of tarragon, chervil and chives, all chopped
  • 50g Dijon mustard
  • 60g salted butter
  • 500g pork caul (ask your butcher)
  • 200g spinach leaves

For the garlic confit

  • 12 garlic cloves
  • 3 sprigs of thyme
  • 3 tbsp olive oil
  • 25g sea salt

method

1. Preheat the oven to180°C. Blanch the spinach in salted hot water for one minute, then refresh in cold water. Drain the leaves and leave to dry. Put the chicken in a food processor, season with salt and pepper and blend to a purée. Add the spinach and start the food processor again. Mix together the cream and crème fraîche and pour slowly into the spinach and chicken until it combines to make a mousse. Place it in a metal bowl and leave in the fridge until you need it.

2. For the cannon of lamb, trim and remove excess fat from the fillets. Season with salt and pepper and, in a large frying pan, sauté in the olive oil over a high heat for one minute on each side. Meanwhile, mix the chopped herb leaves in a bowl with salt and pepper. Remove

the fillets from the pan and wipe off the fat with kitchen paper. Brush the fillets with the Dijon mustard and cover with the herb mixture.

3. Lay out a 30cm square of pork caul and cover with half the spinach leaves. Spoon a generous amount of spinach mousse over one side of the fillet and place this side down on top of the spinach leaves. Cover the other side of the fillet with spinach mousse and then carefully wrap the pork caul around the fillet, tucking the ends around and under. Transfer to a roasting tin, and repeat for the second lamb fillet. Cook for 12 to 14 minutes, depending on how pink you prefer your lamb. Remove from the oven and allow the lamb fillets to rest for 10 minutes before serving.

4. Meanwhile, make the garlic confit. Put all the ingredients in a square of foil and fold to make a parcel, ensuring all edges are sealed. Bake in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes until softened. Drain the oil and remove the thyme sprigs and keep warm until serving.

Tastes great with fondant potato, balsamic scented jus, wild garlic purée and Duxelles mushrooms.