Creamy Butternut Squash Fish Soup

I wanted to make a simple clean tasting fish soup. The motivation was my desire to have a fish soup and J's refusal to contemplate eating such. Basically the idea here is to make a vaguely oriental soup based on butternut squash and then add the fishy element afterwards.

Ingredients:

1. One cubed butternut squash;
2. 1 large chopped shallot;
3. 250 ml tin of coco nut milk;
4. 3 stems of lemongrass;
5. 1/2 tbls of fennel seeds
6. 5 kefir lime leaves;
7. 500 ml vegetable or fish stock (or just water);

For added fishiness:

1. Thai fish sauce to taste;
2. 250 gr prawn;
3. 250 gr monkfish cut into large bite sized chunks.

Soften shallot in a little bit of vegetable oil in a soup pot at medium heat. Add spices and let them roast for about a minute. Add butternut squash and stock and let simmer until the squash is completely soft about 15 min. Remove the lemongrass and whizz the soup up in a food processor or using one of these very clever magic wand things.

Bring soup back up to simmer and slowly add the coco nut milk. Do not add the full tin as that may make the soup too rich (not all butternut squashes are the same size after all) add until you like the consistency and taste of the soup. Let the soup simmer until the milk is fully settled into the soup. At this point what you have is beautiful vegetable soup which I would have happily had as such after adding salt.

The point however was a fish soup. At this point start adding fish sauce one tablespoon at a time. It is important to give the soup a couple of minutes of simmering before adding more fish sauce as it is very potent and salty and you really won't know if you have added enough until it has had time to settle. Continue until the soup is slightly fishy but not salty to the taste.

Add fish, bring back to simmer until fish is ready. Serve with a few leaves of coriander and a line of best EVOO.

(a variation on this theme would be to replace the lime leaves with coriander root)

Green Olive Pesto Salmon

Some years ago David taught me how to make a dish of marinated salmon that was absolutely brilliant. For a little while I made this all the time but then as happens with all recipes I learn I got bored of it and forgot all about the recipe. I did however, send the recipe to an old friend Aksel and he apparently never got bored with salmon prepared this way.

Today he returned the favour by emailing me the original email I sent him six years ago. I must say this sounds really good.

Ingredients:

1. 1 tbsp capers-rinsed and drained;
2. Juice and Zest of 1 lemon;
3. Quarter 75 ml virgin olive oil;
4. 1 tbsp dijon mustard;
5. 2 tbsp black mustard seed;
6. 250 gram salmon fillet;
7. Salt and pepper to taste;
8. 8 1.5 cm thick slices of baguette toasted;
9. 75 ml green olive pesto*
10. 2 scallions thinly sliced on the diagonal

Combine in blender: capers, lemon juice and zest, olive oil, mustard, 1 tbls of mustard seed until smooth. Cut salmon in to dice (quarter inch) and put in mixing bowl -- add caper mixture and mix well -- season to taste with salt and pepper

Spread each toast with pesto, top with salmon (now mixed with sauce), sprinkle with remaining mustard seeds and scallion slices and serve immediately

Green olive pesto:

1. 375 ml cup of pitted jumble green olives;
2. 1/2 red onion chopped;
3. 75 ml of pine nuts;
4. half clove of garlic thinly sliced;
5. 125 ml of olive oil

* combine everything except oil for a minute then add oil slowly--let stand half hour before using

Halibut with Fennel Risotto

I like halibut cut into 2 cm steaks, seasoned with salt & pepper and fried in olive oil 2.5 min each side. That’s it! Anything else detracts from the fish. You can put sauce over it, e.g. beurre blanc is very good, but this is an extremely fatty fish that in my, not overly humble, opinion does not react well to more involved cooking methods.

Fennel Risotto on the other hand is a dream for cooks that want to indulge in multi step recipes:

Ingredients:

1. 200 gr. Arborio Rice;
2. 1 Leak finely sliced;
3. 3 Garlic cloves chopped;
4. 1 stalk Celery finely sliced (optional not sure the celery adds much);
5. 1 Spring onion finely chopped;
6. 1 Medium Fennel;
7. 1 litre Vegetable broth;
8. 25 gr. butter;
9. 50 ml olive oil;
10. 100 ml Vermouth;
11. Salt & Pepper to taste;
    
12. 75 gr. Grated Parmesan.

Preparation:

• Cut the tops of the fennel and slice finely. Reserve any of the beard like leaves and add to the risotto at the same time as the parmesan. Cut the remaining fennel bulb in two and reserve half for the broth and slice the remainder into fine slices.
• To prepare the broth either dissolve good quality vegetable bullion in hot water or make your own which I generally can not be bothered to do. Add the remaining fennel half and let simmer for at least 20 min to allow the fennel taste to leach into the broth.
• In a very hot heavy bottomed pan heat about 15 ml of olive oil. When the oil is smoking add the sliced fennel and fennel tops and fry stirring occasionally until the fennel starts to caramelise. At this point lower the heat and add the remaining oil and butter and allow to melt before adding the leak, garlic, spring onion, and celery and allowing them to fry until soft.
• Off the heat add the Arborio Rice and turn to coat in the oil and butter mixture. Put back on the heat and start adding the broth a ladleful at a time. The idea is that there should be enough broth to just about cover the rice. Allow the rice to absorb just about all the broth before adding more. Repeat until the rice is “al dente”.
• When the rice is al dente add the Vermouth, and allow it to be absorbed before mixing in the parmesan. Season and serve immediately.

Brandade De Morue

I first had Brandade de Morue (or baked salt cod) in approximately 1978 in Brasserie Lipp on the Boulevard St Germain in Paris and I was not especially impressed. Problem was that I was a teenager from a country where you have fish for every other meal at least and having fish in a restaurant was a wasted opportunity to eat meat as far as I was concerned. I returned to Brasserie Lipp about four years later and found that I loved the stuff. As a matter of fact to this day I return to Brasserie Lipp for no other reason than to have their Brandade.

Everybody seems to agree that the dish originates from Nimes in the South of France but there are a number of stories as how exactly the dish was invented and why it originates in a region that does not fish cod. The most likely explanation as far as I’m concerned is that Bretons traded salt cod with the Provençales in exchange for salt from the region. Local cooks then developed the dish over time to incorporate local ingredients and to adapt it to local tastes. Over time they then grew to love the taste.

My favourite tale of the origins of Brandade de Morue is that it was invented by Benedictine monks who decided to stretch their insufficient stock of Bacalao (Provençal for salt cod) with potatoes when faced with the sudden and unannounced appearance of an important visitor for lunch. This story, which I’ve come across several times, rings true (i.e. all the ingredients are what a Provençal kitchen would contain as a minimum even if they are broke) and the dish is sometimes know as Brandade de Morue à la Bénédictine. Unfortunately, things almost never happen in such an exciting manner and the more probable explanation is that years of trying to make a foreign food palatable was how we came to have this excellent dish.

The recipe for a basic or if you will classic Brandade is as follows:

Ingredients:

1. 750 gr. Salt cod;
2. 1 large potato;
3. 2 garlic cloves;
4. 250 ml olive oil;
5. Freshly ground black pepper to taste;

Preparation:

• Soak salt cod at least 12 hours in cold water in the fridge, make sure you change the water at least 3 times preferably more often to remove excess salt. There is no consistency to how salty the cod is when sold so the time it takes to water the fish will vary. The idea is that the fish should be slightly more salty than a fresh fish that you’ve cooked covered in salt;
• Put the cod in a pan of cold water and bring to a boil. Lett simmer for about 10 minutes;
• Drain cod, and place in fresh water for 10 minutes;
• Boil potato, remove skin and pass it through a sieve;
• Flake the cod to remove any skin or bones;
• Pound the cod and garlic to a paste in a mortar and combine with the potato;
• (or you can just put the cod, garlic and potato in to a food processor and wiz it into a paste but where is the fun in that)
• Place the cod paste in a sauce pan over low heat and combine, slowly, with the olive oil while stirring constantly;
• Season with pepper to taste.

That’s your basic homemade Provençal Brandade but as far as I’m concerned this is where the fun starts. There are literally a million variations that start from this point. The first variations are to add herbs (bay leaves, thym) and/or vinegar (white vine) to the soaking water. Depending on how you are actually planning on consuming the Brandade this will give a little added flavour to the dish.

It is for also very common to replace the oil with warm milk or to mix milk or oil with warm cream. I’ve even seen recipes with cream only but that is way rich for my tastes. Lemon juice as seasoning is also very common as is mixing in parsley.

The next step is in serving the Brandade. Brasserie Lipp gratinates the Bradade with cheese (I think they use Cantal) before serving it with a small salad. Another classic is to drizzle olive oil, bread crums and paprika on top before warming the Brandade up in the oven.

This weekend I intend to serve Brandade warmed up in ramekin and covered in the Mojo Rojo I discovered in the Canaries. I figure that if the Mojo Rojo made regular potatoes excellent then potatoes and salt cod should also benefit greatly from the mixture.

BEURRE BLANC

Beurre blanc is a hot butter sauce made from a vinegar and shallot reduction to which butter is added. Apparently, the origin is that a chef in the Loire Valley forgot to use eggs and Tarragon when making a Béarnaise sauce for a fish dish he was serving at a dinner held by the Marquis de Goulaine. The sauce was an instant hit and was named beurre blanc on the spot!

Ingredients for a Basic Beurre Blanc:

• 2 tablespoons white wine vinegar (can be replaced by the juice of one lemon)
• 2 tablespoons dry white wine
• 1 tablespoon minced shallots
• 1 to 2 sticks unsalted butter, cold
• Salt and pepper to taste

In a saucepan combine vinegar, wine and shallots. Over low to medium heat reduce mixture to about 1 tablespoon of a jam like substance. Over low heat add cold butter in a spoon size at a time while whisking continually. Continue to add, butter quickly, barely allowing for previously added butter to melt. Whatever you do, work quickly and pay attention to the temperature. Overheat the sauce and it will separate, leave it too long and it settles and instead of frothy you get flat.

If you are looking for a fine sauce strain the beurre blanc but I quite like getting the shallot with the sauce. You can at this point serve the sauce over asparagus or almost any fish. There are however, loads of methods of making beurre blanc more interesting. Dijon mustard is a classic recipe as is truffle and cream. Muscadet instead of white wine is an Anjou version and in Nantes it is made with fish stock.

Beurre Blanc Genovaise is this rather interesting version:

• 4 shallots, very finely chopped
• 2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 250 ml water
• 250 ml dry red wine
• 2 Tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh tarragon
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh basil
• 1 Tablespoon chopped fresh chervil
• 1-1/2 teaspoons anchovy paste
• freshly ground pepper, to taste
• 2 sticks unsalted butter

You make this exactly in the same way as the basic sauce but obviously with a lot more ingredients. I had this in the Hotel President Wilson in Geneva over Salmon and it was excellent.