Chef Hans Välimäki – Started His Culinary Career at Young Age

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Chef Hans Välimäki is the owner as well as the head chef of this famous restaurant in Finland, Chez Dominique. Chez Dominique first opened its doors to the public in 1998, and ever since that time, Chef Välimäki’s culinary skills have earned him and his restaurant great praises not only from the diners but from the food critics as well. One of their big accomplishments for this year is getting into the top 50 list of S. Pellegrino’s 100 World’s Best Restaurants.

Born in the early 1970s in Tampere, Chef Välimäki has always been fascinated by food and food preparations. His culinary career started at a very young age for, at the age of 12, he was already a little chef master and was baking pulla, which is a pastry, for his family and friends. Of course, this was not enough for the little chef, so he pursued his culinary career and enrolled in Perho-Helsinki Culinary School. After he graduated in 1997, he went on to work with numerous fine-dining restaurants in the country. He also worked in Sweden with some of the country’s best chefs. He refined his culinary skills under the tutelage of these chefs, and he also developed his own techniques in creating exemplary dishes and artistically arranging them on a plate.

In 1998, he opened Chez Dominque. Chef Välimäki admits that the restaurant started out as a French restaurant, offering authentic and very traditional French dishes. However, in the succeeding years, he began to introduce the traditional dishes of Finland but gave them a modern twist by infusing more European flavors into his dishes.

To give his cuisine that authentic home-cooked feel, Chef Välimäki makes it a point to only use the freshest ingredients for his dishes. In fact, he has cultivated strong relationships with the local farmers and producers to make sure that his kitchen receives fresh produce daily. He also incorporates freshly-picked mushrooms into his cuisine as well as makes use of rabbits and games that he has purchased from the local hunters. Chef Välimäki fondly notes that Finland offers the best and freshest ingredients and produce during the spring and summer months as well as during the autumn months.

In time, his culinary talent became known in the country, and his cuisine earned a reputation of having a perfect balance between traditional and innovative cuisine that one can clearly appreciate the French as well as the Finnish influences in his cooking techniques.

Chef Välimäki has accomplished a lot for his restaurant. It has been named as the best restaurant of the year by numerous prestigious awarding bodies, and it has gotten into the top 50 list of S. Pellegrino. Aside from this, it has also received its two Michelin stars between the years 2001 and 2007, among other awards and praises.

Chef Hans Välimäki’s Cabbage Rolls (from Mummola)

Ingredients:

1.5kg cabbage
1 onion
1dl rice
1 stock cube
6dl cabbage cooking liquid
600g minced meat: half pork, half beef
1tsp ground white pepper
1 egg
1 egg yolk
2dl milk
2tsp salt
50g butter
2tbsp treacle
(3dl double cream and 3tbsp of flour)

Directions:

After removing the hard stems from the cabbage, boil in lightly salted water, removing the leaves as they soften. Save the cooking liquid.
Chop the onion and lightly fry in the butter. Boil the rice according to the packet instructions, adding the stock cube.
Mix the mince, rice, spices, onion, egg, egg yolk and milk. Put about three spoonfuls of the mixture on each cabbage leaf. Roll the leaves into parcels and put them, seams down, into a buttered oven dish. Melt the butter and add the treacle and pour the mixture over the rolls.
Bake the rolls in 180°C oven, about 45 minutes. Turn them over and bake for approximately 30 minutes. If the rolls begin to dry up, pour cooking liquid on them. Cover the dish with aluminium foil and bake for another 15 minutes.
For cream sauce use the baking juices, (3dl of double cream and 3tbsp of flour).

Image Credit: studio55.fi

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