Chef Parvinder Singh Bali shares six delicious ways to enjoy the avocado

I will be honest: For a long time, I was sceptical about the avocado. Not the fruit itself, but the conversation around it. It had become so thoroughly associated with a certain kind of aspirational eating: the brunch plate, the toast, the photograph, that it was easy to forget it was actually an ingredient. Something a cook could think seriously about.

What changed my mind was working with it properly, with real intent, in a professional kitchen. The texture holds across heat, compression and blending in a way I had not fully anticipated. Once I stopped thinking of it as a garnish and started treating it as a base, something to build from, these six recipes came together quite naturally. They move through an entire meal, from a light starter to a layered dessert, because that is the point I want to make. This is not a one-course ingredient.

Duncan Wells, who works with Australian Avocados out of Western Australia, said something that stayed with me: that the real work is making sure the product reaches people consistently and at the quality they expect. I think about that from the kitchen side too. An ingredient is only as good as what a cook does with it. What follows is what I think that looks like.

Recipe 1

Mango, Apple & Nori Crisp with Avocado

I wanted to open with something unexpected — something that signals immediately that this ingredient can sit in company it has never been asked to keep before. The nori crisp is caramelised with a light sugar syrup, rolled and baked until it becomes a delicate shell. Inside, diced avocado, raw mango and apple come together with a sesame tahini dressing, finished with togarashi for heat. It is tropical, buttery and deeply snackable — the kind of dish that makes people reach for another before they have finished the first.

Ingredients

For the Nori Crisp

Nori sheets 3 pieces

Avocado 1 piece

Sugar 40 gm

Water 60 gm

Apple 1 piece

Sesame tahini 1 bottle

Togarashi 5 gm

For the filling

Raw mango 1

Mashed avocado half a piece

Salt and lime juice To taste

Method

Take nori sheets and cut into small rectangular shapes — 10 pieces from 1 nori sheet. Heat sugar and water to make a light sugar syrup. Brush each nori sheet with the syrup on both sides and roll onto a well-oiled cylindrical pipe. Sprinkle with togarashi. Bake at 120°C for 25 minutes.

Cut avocado, mango and apple into equal dices. Mix sesame tahini with lime juice until smooth. Combine diced fruits with the tahini dressing. Fill into the baked nori and garnish with microgreens.

Recipe 2

Compressed Watermelon with Avocado Mousse, Lime Sour Cream, Microgreens, Caramelised Pecan & Miso Dressing

This is the dish where I ask the avocado to do something it does not usually get asked to do — to become a mousse with genuine structure and body. When you blend avocado with cream cheese, lime juice and xanthan gum, you get something that holds its shape on the plate. That is a different technique entirely from guacamole, and it opens up very different possibilities. Against the compressed watermelon — which has been vacuum-packed with miso dressing until it is deeply infused and almost jewel-like — the mousse creates a contrast that is both beautiful and completely satisfying. The caramelised pecans and balsamic reduction do the rest.

Ingredients

Compressed Watermelon

Watermelon 1 piece

Microgreens 10 gm

Balsamic reduction 10 ml

Caramelised pecans 20 gm

Avo mayo 10 gm

Miso dressing 20 ml

Lime sour cream 15 gm

Avocado 3 pieces

Avocado Mousse

Avocado 3 pieces

Cream cheese 100 gm

Lime juice 75 ml

Miso Dressing

Sake 250 ml

Mirin 100 ml

Miso 100 gm

Lime juice 25 ml

Avo mayo 100 gm

Avo-Mayo

Avocado 100 gm

Apple cider vinegar 10 ml

Lemon juice 10 ml

Onion powder 2 gm

Garlic powder 0.3 gm

Salt 2 gm

Olive oil 30 ml

Lime Sour Cream

Lime juice 100 ml

Lime zest 3 limes

Sour cream 500 gm

Xanthan 10 gm

Method

• Blend avocado, lime juice, cream cheese and xanthan gum together until completely smooth to make the mousse.

• For the miso dressing, reduce sake and mirin to half. Add miso and reduce further. Mix with lime juice and avo mayo until smooth.

• For the avo-mayo, blend avocado, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, onion powder, garlic powder, salt and olive oil until smooth.

• Cut the watermelon into large rectangular chunks. Toss with miso dressing and vacuum pack. Allow to infuse for a few hours or overnight. Plate and pipe with avo mayo and lime sour cream. Drizzle with miso dressing. Garnish with balsamic reduction and caramelised pecans.

Recipe 3

Avocado Tempura Chaat

If there is one dish in this series that I knew would stop people mid-bite and make them reconsider everything, it is this one. Chaat works because of contrast — hot and cold, crisp and soft, sweet and sour — and Australian avocado delivers all of that in a single ingredient once it meets a tempura batter and a 180°C fryer. The outside becomes golden and crisp; the inside turns almost custardy. Set that against saunth chutney, yoghurt and chaat masala, and what you have is something that is completely familiar and completely new at the same time. The avo-miso ketchup is the detail that pulls it all together — umami, depth, a slight earthiness that ties the Japanese technique to the Indian flavours around it.

Ingredients

Avocado Tempura Chaat

Avocados (not fully ripe, cut into 10 pieces each as wedges) 5

Tempura flour (ready-made mix available) 1 pack

Saunth chutney 300 ml

Yoghurt 500 gm

Chaat masala 50 gm

Avo Miso Ketchup

Miso 20 gm

Olive oil 20 gm

Onion (chopped) 60 gm

Tomato paste 20 gm

Ginger (diced) 5 gm

Coriander seeds 2 gm

Fennel seeds 2 gm

Avocado 1 whole

Black pepper (crushed) 1 gm

Salt 2 gm

Olive oil 5 ml

Agar-agar 2 gm

Water 100 ml

Method

• Cut avocado into wedges. Prepare tempura batter. The standard preparation is: mix the flour with ice-cold water (roughly 1:1 ratio by volume), stir minimally — a few lumps are fine and actually desirable — and use immediately. Ice-cold water is the key; it prevents gluten from developing, which is what keeps tempura light and shatteringly crisp rather than doughy. Dip the avocado pieces in batter and fry at 180°C until golden and crisp. Drain well.

• For the avo miso ketchup, heat oil and cook onion, ginger, spices, pepper and salt. Add tomato paste and miso; cook for 5 minutes. Add water and bring to a boil. Add agar-agar, let set, then blend smooth. Strain and transfer to a squeeze bottle.

• Plate the crispy avocado tempura pieces. Drizzle with avo miso ketchup and yogurt. Spoon over saunth chutney generously. Finish with chaat masala and serve immediately.

Note:

Source avocados that are 2–3 days short of peak ripeness and ripen them controlled (paper bag with a banana speeds it up if needed)

Recipe 4

Avocado & Yuzu Lime Sorbet

A sorbet made with avocado should not work — at least not in theory. Avocado contains fat, and fat is what sorbets are supposed to avoid. But when you balance the ratios correctly, use a good stabiliser and let the yuzu cut cleanly through the richness, something unexpected happens. The fat in the avocado gives the sorbet a smoothness that most fruit-based sorbets never quite achieve. Combined with the floral, citrus brightness of yuzu and a touch of lime, this becomes a palate-cleanser that people remember long after the meal is done. It is elegant, light and, in my view, one of the strongest arguments for the avocado as a year-round kitchen staple.

Ingredients

Avocado 260 gm

Water 543 gm

Castor sugar 141 gm

Dry glucose 43 gm

Stabiliser 5 gm

Orange juice 20 gm

Yuzu puree 16 gm

Butter 50 gm

Lime 1

Method

• Heat water, sugar, dry glucose and stabiliser together. Bring to a boil, stirring until completely dissolved. Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.

• Add the avocado, orange juice, yuzu puree, butter and the juice of 1 lime to the cooled base. Blend until completely smooth and silky.

• Pass through a fine sieve. Churn in an ice-cream machine according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Transfer to a container and freeze until set.

• Scoop into chilled glasses or bowls. Garnish with a thin lime slice or fresh microherbs and serve immediately.

Recipe 5

Roasted Broccoli and Feta Cheese Fagottini with Avocado Tuille

This is the most technically demanding dish in the series, and the detail I was most excited about is the avocado tuille. You are taking an ingredient that is inherently creamy and making it crisp — a thin, baked wafer that sits on top of the pasta and dissolves almost the moment it reaches the tongue. Getting the ratios right is everything: too much avocado and it will not bake; too little and you lose the flavour entirely. When it works, it is this translucent, lacy thing that is both structurally precise and completely ephemeral. Set against the broccoli-feta fagottini — tender pasta parcels in a yeast butter sauce with a pumpkin foam billowing over the top — it is the kind of dish that demonstrates what is possible when a great ingredient is given the right technique.

Ingredients

Pasta Dough

Flour 1 kg

Eggs 10 pieces

Whole eggs 4 pieces

Olive oil 15 ml

Broccoli & Feta Filling

Broccoli 1 kg

Feta 250 gm

Bechamel 200 gm

Thyme 5 gm

Salt As required

Pepper As required

Yeast Sauce

Yeast 25 gm

White wine vinegar 30 gm

Soy sauce 20 gm

Water 20 gm

Garlic 2 gm

Olive oil 1 tsp (5 ml)

Avocado 30 gm

Butter 20 gm

Roasted Pumpkin Foam

Pumpkin 500 gm

Caramelised onions 100 gm

Cream 125 gm

Butter 50 gm

Xanthan 5 gm

Avocado Tuille

Avocado 30 gm

Butter 20 gm

Wheat flour 30 gm

Olive oil 30 gm

Sugar 10 gm

Salt 2 gm

Egg white 30 gm

Final garnish

Truffle oil 3-4 drops

Method

• Roast the pumpkin at 180°C for 25-30 minutes, covered with foil. Slice and caramelise the onions. Blend the roasted pumpkin and onions together, then strain. Mix in cream, butter and xanthan. Transfer to a canister and charge with N2O to create foam.

• Blend all yeast sauce ingredients, except butter, into a smooth liquid. Cook on a low flame for 10 minutes. Add butter and blend again until smooth.

• Combine all pasta dough ingredients into a stiff dough. Rest in the chiller for at least 1 hour or overnight. Roll through a pasta machine, fill with the broccoli-feta stuffing and shape into fagottini parcels.

• Cut and blanch the broccoli. Crush with olive oil, add salt and thyme, and roast at 180°C for 15-20 minutes. Chop and mix with feta, béchamel sauce and pepper.

• Preheat oven to 160°C. Blend all tuille ingredients into a smooth paste. Spread into silicone moulds. Bake at 160°C for 12 minutes. Remove carefully and allow to cool.

• Place fagottini in a bowl. Spoon over yeast sauce. Add pumpkin foam generously. Lay the avocado tuille on top. Finish with 3-4 drops of truffle oil and serve immediately.

Recipe 6

Avocado Condensed Milk Cremeux with Tropical Fruit Guacamole, Mango Cream, Lemon Sorbet and Pavlova

The dessert course was where I wanted to make the strongest argument for this ingredient. Most people will accept avocado in a salad, or even a chaat — but a dessert? That requires a genuine belief in what the avocado can do when it is treated with the same seriousness as any other high-quality ingredient. The condensed milk and coconut milk pull out a natural sweetness that is already present in a well-ripened Australian avocado. You are not fighting the ingredient; you are working with it. By the time this arrived at the table during the Mumbai showcase — layered over a tropical fruit guacamole of alphonso mango, raw mango, pineapple and passion fruit, finished with a bright lemon sorbet, pavlova and mango cream — the conversation about what this ingredient could do had already been answered.

Ingredients

Avocado Cremeux

Avocado 100 gm

Condensed milk 75 gm

Coconut milk 125 gm

Xanthan gum 1 gm

Salt 0.5 gm

Lemon juice 1 gm

Lemon Sorbet

Water 900 gm

Liquid glucose 120 gm

Castor sugar 320 gm

Lemon juice 350 gm

Salt 3 gm

Tropical Fruit Guacamole

Avocado 75 gm

Alphonso mango 25 gm

Raw mango 25 gm

Pineapple 25 gm

Passion fruit puree 50 gm

Castor sugar 20 gm

Mango Cream

Mango puree 170 gm

Castor sugar 50 gm

NH pectin 2 gm

Cornflour 5 gm

Unsalted butter 50 gm

Lemon juice 15 gm

Pavlova

Egg whites 140 gm

Castor sugar 90 gm

Icing sugar 50 gm

Milk 50 ml

Condensed milk 80 ml

Almond powder 60 gm

Yogurt 30 ml

Vinegar 2.5 gm

Refined flour 40 gm

Phyllo Crisps

Phyllo sheets 20

Method: 

• Cut all fruits into small cubes (brunoise). Toss with passion fruit puree and castor sugar to make the tropical fruit guacamole.

• For the financier base, melt butter and milk and add castor sugar. Add dry ingredients to the butter mixture, then add wet ingredients and combine. Bake at 170°C for 8-10 minutes.

• Blend all avocado cremeux ingredients — avocado, condensed milk, coconut milk, xanthan gum, salt and lemon juice — until completely smooth.

• For the mango cream, warm mango puree and add the sugar-pectin mix and cornflour; cook until one full boil. Remove from heat. Add lemon juice and butter.

• For the lemon sorbet, heat water, liquid glucose and castor sugar until dissolved. Cool completely. Add lemon juice and salt, then churn in an ice cream machine until set. Freeze until required.

• In a wide bowl or glass, layer the avocado cremeux as the base. Spoon tropical fruit guacamole over the top. Add a quenelle of lemon sorbet. Arrange broken pavlova pieces and phyllo crisps for texture. Finish with mango cream and serve immediately.

— Chef Parvinder Singh Bali is Director of the School of European Pastry and Culinary, Mumbai. These recipes were developed in collaboration with Australian Avocados