Recipe
Oriental-style cauliflower-carrot puree and shallow-fried trout with four-flavour sauce and white rice
with a garnish of rosemary flowers and carrot greens.
White rice
Choose a good quality basmati rice for this, not parboiled.
When buying it, pay attention to it not having many broken
grains.
Use a thick-bottomed pan (I used stainless steel) for even
heat distribution.
Ingredients:
Basmati rice
Salt
Water
optional: Garlic, cloves
Wash the rice with cold water to get rid of the loose starch.
Cover the rice with about 2 cm (a bit over half an inch) of
hot water. Add a pinch of salt, and optionally spices/garlic for
flavouring (cloves work well but I didn't use them this time).
Bring to a boil, stir (only ONCE to keep the sensitive grains
from damaging) and cover. Leave to simmer on low heat, undisturbed until the water is absorbed and the
rice is done. Using a transparent lid, you'll be able to tell by
looking at it; when the rice is done, there will be little holes
in the top of the rice and there will be no more bubbling going
on.
The hot water at the start not only helps getting
the rice done more quickly, but at the same time it also helps to
keep the grains separated because the overall cooking process
is shorter.
The flavour of the rice itself is subtle and a wonderful way to carry some of the stronger flavours on the rest of the dish.
Oriental-style cauliflower-carrot puree
Ingredients:
Cauliflower
Carrot
Salt and pepper
Water
Mustard
Coriander powder
Nutmeg (optional)
50 grams solid coconut cream (1/4 block)
This is much like a regular British cauliflower puree, but with an Oriental twist. I used a plain, smooth English mustard. Both the carrot and the natural turmeric used for colouring in the mustard give extra flavour and a yellow colour to this dish.
Discard the outer leaves and center stem of the cauliflower. Break the desired amount of florets off the cauliflower. For half a cauliflower, use about one large carrot (or several small ones). Cut into small pieces or grate, so that they'll get done quickly.
After washing the vegetables, pour enough (hot) water on them to just cover them. While bringing the whole to a boil, add in a generous teaspoon or two of mustard and season with salt, pepper and (optionally) nutmeg as well as a bottletop-full of ground coriander. Crumble in 50 grams of coconut cream. When the vegetables are boiled soft, mash them with a hand-blender (after discarding a bit of the water, if you wish to have a bit thicker puree). For smoothest results, do this while piping hot.
Four-flavour sauce
One cornerstone of Asian cookery (Chinese, specifically) is to balance flavours. Four-flavour sauce is a play on this as it combines sweet, sour, bitter and salty flavours. I chose Brewdog Punk IPA as it has a nice flowery flavour and a bitter aftertaste. If you're not into bitter flavours in your food, feel free to substitute with another ale.
Ingredients:
Onion
Garlic
Lemon juice (sour)
Honey (sweet)
Brewdog Punk IPA (bitter)
Kecap Manis (ABC sweet soy sauce, both sweet and salty)
1 teaspoon cornflour
Pinch of star anise powder
In a skillet, sautee the onions until transparent (ideally slowly on
low heat). Add in garlic, then sweet soy sauce. Leave for a little bit
to caramelize the sugars in the soy sauce (which also contains salty
and umami components, by the way). Add in the beer to cool down and
stop the caramelizing, then add in honey and lemon juice. Have a taste
with a clean teaspoon to verify if the flavours are balanced, and
correct as needed. Let reduce for a while and thicken with a teaspoon
of cornflour. Traditionally, the cornflour is dissolved in a bit of water before adding it; I sprinkled it in from some height while stirring vigorously.
I used about 2 tablespoons worth of sweet soy sauce, a tablespoon worth
of honey, a splash of IPA and juice of half a lemon. If you can't find
sweet soy sauce, using dark salty soy sauce should work as well as long as
offset by the honey. Add in a pinch of star anise powder (or alternatively,
fennel) to finish it off.
Shallow-fried crispy trout
Two weeks before the cook-off, I visited the Farmers market and needed to
decide what to cook. I decided for trout, as it would cook quickly. However, while sampling the smoked trout from the same source, I noticed a bit of earthy/muddy taste in the product. This is caused by the chemical geosmin, a chemical compound (also responsible for the earthy flavour in beetroot) which breaks down in the presence of acid.
Ingredients:
Skin-on trout fillets
Salt
Crushed black peppercorns
Lemon juice
Corn flour
Score the trout, making slits about half a centimeter deep and 1 cm apart in both
sides. Season the trout with the lemon juice, salt and pepper, making sure to rub it into the slits as well. Sprinkle 1-2 tablespoons of cornflour on a plate and dip the trout fillet in it. Leave to marinate.
Heat some olive oil in a skillet. Dust the trout with cornflour again and put it into the pan, skin-side down. The red meat will slowly turn lighter pink from bottom to top as it gets done. Flip over when a bit over halfway done, taking care not to break the tender fish. Leave for about a minute on the other side; the fish should now be cooked through. Using any leftover time, flip back onto the skin to give it a crispy finish.
This is similar in preparation to the crispy salmon recipe of a certain celebrity chef, but the cornflour gives it even more crisp (more so also than wheat flour), and helps the marinade to stick to the fish.
Presentation
It is hard to make a puree look fancy, which is why I went for three different spoon sizes to plate up the cauliflower puree.
As is done traditionally in many Asian countries, I packed the rice into a bowl before turning it upside-down onto the plate.
The four-flavour sauce was intended to accompany the trout, and is also carried nicely by the rice- so it is used for both. I limited the amount used as it is quite strong in flavour, and could have easily overpowered the other flavours on the dish.
I cut the trout fillet in half, stacking one piece on top of the other. This takes less plate space, and shows off the pink colour of the trout.
Garnish: The rosemary bush in front of my house was in bloom, so I decided to cut off a few florets for garnish. Their flavour is just like that of rosemary, but a bit more subtle and a bit sweeter. I also had some very intense-tasting home-planted baby coriander leaves (just starting to develop jagged edges on their leaves), but used a small snippet of the beautiful fresh carrot greens instead as it looked a bit nicer.