Fish

Lemon Sole Grenobloise

Transglutaminase. WTF is that? Meat Glue apparently. Commonly used in Molecular Gastronomy. Obviously. OK, so after my initial reaction to very scary ingredients, I made the plunge and purchased this magic meat glue. Transglutaminase is a special protein derived from Tuna, that comes in a powdered form, so that you can reseal pouches of food in quite spectacular fashion.

This dish was a great chance to learn how to fillet lemon sole (watch as many YouTube videos as you like, it is quite simple), then you add your filling of Cavolo Nero, anchovy, lemon zest, and capers to the fish, then dust with the meat glue, add the top layer of fish, wrap in clingfilm for a few hours, and hey presto, you have now created a perfectly sealed pocket of fish and filling, it's quite simple once you get over the initial ideas of "what the hell am I doing and why?"

I loved the chicken sauce which dresses the dish, taking Tom's standard chicken stock recipe and then adding yet more chicken to the process of reducing the stock. The topping of sourdough croutons, confit lemon peel, fried parsely,  and topped with an anchovy fritter was fun. The mix of batter uses a starch called Trisol mixed in with self-raising flour and sparkling water, that gives a very crispy batter. There is also a beurre noisette hollandaise, but if I'm honest, I prepped this too far in advance, so when It came to plating it had split, so I had to rescue the hollandaise with another egg yolk and a splash of water, just made it taste a bit eggy in the end. 

A lovely dish, I was very happy I chose this as my first venture into the H&F Fish mains, lots of techniques to try, lots of things I could improve. I will give myself a 6/10, just because I know I could make this better with practice. 

Spiced Tuna with poppy seed crusted turnip, roasted mushrooms, and lime beurre noisette

This fish dish was actually quite an easy one to prepare thankfully, and I was very happy with the Herb Sauce that accompanies the dish too. It's the same herb sauce that accompanies the rabbit legs, so i had made this before. The mushrooms got a touch overcooked in the syrupy chicken sauce as I wasn't paying attention, when the sauce looks like it is bubbling toffee, it is done! I liked the sous vide turnips, I thought they were a touch underdone, but in the end it worked out OK, the toasted poppy seeds give it a really good texture and complement the flavours nicely. 

I really wanted to use ceps that grow in the garden here at Chateau Edwards, as normally by this time of year there are plenty popping through, but this year, I've not had much success in finding them. It was a very wet summer, so maybe that is something toi do with it. The dish called for garnish with an Oyster leaf, which is something I was unable to find, but replaced with a watercress leaf that did the job nicely. 

The tuna is crusted with toasted corainder and cumin seeds, ground to a fine powder, so it is a tasty dish with loads of great complimentary flavours, highlighted by the lime beurre noisette that lifts it. I am going to give myself a 7/10 for this, as I felt I could have done a better job with the mushrooms and final plating. 

Cured Cod with chicory gratin

Fish, nuts, and grapes. Who would have thought that this combination had such a pleasing result? I loved making his dish, and considering the elements of the dish, it's actually on the simpler end of the scale when it comes to prepping Tom's dishes. The cod is cured in a 10% brine, then wrapped tightly in clingfilm overnight, to try and hold it in a nice tubular shape. 

There are lots of other really nice contrasting textures, the red chicory is cooked quickly in pickling liquor in the sous vide, then chilled, and topped with a delicious hazlenut gruyere crust. I think this was my favourite part of the dish, and I will definitely make this again as it's relatively simple but very tasty thing to make. 

The grape sauce is sweet, think of a combination of port, red wine, redcurrants, and 500g of grapes cooked together, and you get the idea of where this is tasting. It would go just as well with any meat dish. My friends always make fun of me for eating too much meat, so I had to laugh when I saw that the butter topping for the fish was mixed through with crispy ham hock, or "schweinshaxe" as it is referred to in german. This made a really nice compliment to the fish, along with a classic beurre blanc to finish the dish. 

The finishing plating of the dish includes semi-dried black grapes, which the recipe calls for a dehydrator, but I just put them in the oven on a very low temperature for about 8 hours which did the job nicely. 

I loved making this dish, and I was happy with the plating. I could have cooked the fish just a little bit better, but a finish with the blowtorch gave it a nice touch in the end. I will give myself 8.5/10, which is ok, could have made a few improvements in the cod preparation, but I'm still calling it out as the best bit of fish cooking I have ever done.

Fish & Chips with pea puree & tartare sauce

Almost all pubs have fish and chips on the menu. Most of the  time, it is a standard formula of flabby flaccid fish, frozen chips, Heinz tartare sauce in a mysterious blue sachet, or maybe some Marstons malt vinegar. The Hand and Flowers approach to fish and chips kicks that memory into touch.

There are so many different layers to a good fish and chips dish. If you think about how it should be, there is a crunchy texture to the batter, delicious fresh fish, perfect triple cooked chips, creamy tartare sauce, and a smooth tangy pea puree. There are a few elements of this dish that are quite easy to follow, so it's a great dish to practice techniques. The batter is a 25/75 blend of Trisol and self raising flour, the fish is filleted Whiting, a very readily available fish that is a fraction of the cost of Cod. The triple cooked chips worked really well, I lowered the temperature on the first cooking when steaming, and  that seemed to really help. If there is one element of the dish I couldnt replicate as faithfully as possible it was the pea puree, as Tom uses a Pacojet beaker, which churns and chills the puree.

So, I will give myself an 8.5/10, losing a point for the puree, and half a point for the fish, which I thought could have been a little bit crispier in presentation, but that is just me wanting to create the perfect fish and chips.  I loved making this, it's now a standard that my kids love too.

And they think that lemons should always be wrapped up in muslin, I am creating a monster!

Cured Monkfish

I cannot cook fish. It is official.

OK, it wasn't a total disaster. but let's be honest, no one is gong to remember this dish. Where did it go wrong? Well, I left the fish in the spices for too long, so the flavour was a very powerful hit of toasted coriander that just blew away everything else.  And I had run out of coriander seeds so made do with some ground coriander which gave the curing spices a very different texture, and I probably overcooked them too. 

The Roasted cauliflower puree was nice, but I reaslise that as Tom's recipes for puree use a Thermomix, I will never achieve the same consistency. Christmas is coming but I don't think I can stretch to a new cooking toy to justify this. The caramelisation of the Roasted Cauliflower was good, so that was one relatively simple part of the dish I didn't totally annihalate. 

I managed to find some Minus 8 maple brix verjus which was part of the sauce that decorates the plate with Chablis shallots and partially dehydrated grapes, so I was pleased with that bit of the dish, and the peanut crumble to top the fish added a nice texture too.

So - I think a score of about 5/10 is fair. The monkfish was well cooked but still could be a lot better.

 

Poached Halibut in Red Wine Sauce 

Aside from the fact that it looks like my dog has barfed over the plate, yeah, it tastes ok. I was just being a bit rushed and couldn't be bothered or patient enough to make it look pretty. Not squeezing the liquid from the cooking of the spinach didnt help, but hey, it's a learning curve. 

I really enjoyed the elements of this dish, there's nothing here not to like. I used my home cured smoked bacon lardons which gave it a really nice flavour, and the baby onions that had been steamed in butter were delicious alonside the spinach and forest mushrooms.

Potato puree needed more work to be totally smoot. You take a baked potato, then when cool, skin them and pass them through a drum sieve. I guess I could have done this pass through pregessively finer sieves, but time is a challenge! 

The halibut was OK, it was a pain just to find some and having drawn a blank about 3-4 times at various fish markets, I was happy just to find a piece that would work for this dish. The red wine sauce that goes with this I have also made for the Chateaubriand recipe, so this was another good test of these skills.  

This is going to get a 6/10 for me, I was happy with the onions, bacon, braising liquid, mushrooms, and general overall falour, but I still could have cooked the fish better, and when you compare the H&F dish to mine, well, it's not even the same meal. Onwards!

Cured Halibut in vine leaves and potted crab pie

This was meant to be hake, not halibut, but as I had worn out three pairs of shoes looking for either hake or halibut, this was one replacement I wasn't going to argue with. I have one issue with the dish, all of the best bits are hidden! The fish is cured in salt, wrapped in vine leaves, then poached in a vacuum seal bag, but you don't get to see it!

Same with the crab pie, there is a luxurious combination of brown crab mayonnaise and freshly picked white crab meat, bound together with diced apples, topped with potato puree, but you don't get to see it. It tasted amazing, so you will just have to take my word for it. 

I garnished the dish with more of the semi-dehydrated grapes that I used for the monkfish and made a nice sauce that blends a classic beurre blanc sauce with a simple reduction of shallots and white wine, so I was happy with this part of this dish. I didn't have any white grapes left to peel and decorate the plate as my kids had already munched all of them. 

This fish dish was the recovery I needed after the headache of the monkfish and poached halibut. I'll make this one again, as it is one of the few recipes in the book that only fills one page, Yes, there are lots of other things I was able to reuse such as the shallots, potato puree, grapes, but I was also very happy to get some vine leaves at last so that I could complete the dish.

I'll give myself a 7/10, as the main fish ingredient is a replacement, the brown crab mayo didn't fully emulsify to the consistency I wanted, and the pomme puree is still a bit off, but by adding a touch of cream to the puree it helped with the consistency.