Sous Vide Salmon with Crushed Potatoes

Sous Vide Salmon with Crushed Potatoes

A few good friends were coming over for dinner.  What does one cook?  Heston Blumenthal's Sous Vide Salmon with Crushed Potatoes from his book Heston Blumenthal at Home, of course!  My son has just purchased another sous vide-r, and has been cooking sous vide-d salmon.  Well, if he can cook, mary can cook too.

Ingredients:

4 salmon fillets, skin on

80 g olive oil

groundnut oil or grapeseed oil

salt

Preheat the water bath to 50 degrees Celcius.

Place the salmon fillets in individual sous-vide bags with 20 g olive oil in each bag.  Seal under full vacuum and place the bags in the water bath for 15 minutes.

Heat a thin layer of oil in a non-stick frying pan over a medium-high heat.  Remove the salmon fillets from the sous-vide bags and pat dry with kitchen paper.

Season the fillets with salt and place them, skin-side down, in the hot pan.  Cook for approximately 30 seconds until the skin turns golden and crisp.  Serve on top of crushed potatoes with 2 tablespoons of sauce per portion.

Crushed Potatoes

Potatoes are cooked until soft, then dressed with a shallot and oil mixture before being crushed with a fork.  It's a recipe with plenty of potential variations.  You can add rosemary, thyme, onions, shallots, garlic and even smoked bacon to the cooking water.

Ingredients:

750 g potatoes, washed and halved

4 cloves garlic, peeled, and bashed with the flat part of a knife or by hand

Salt

4 shallots, peeled and finely diced

150 g olive oil

2 tsp wholegrain mustard

15 g white wine vinegar

sea salt and black pepper

Put the halved potatoes and garlic in a saucepan, cover with water and add a teaspoon of salt.  Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer and cook until the potatoes are soft.  (Approximately 20 mins).

In a frypan, cook the shallots gently in the olive oil for 5 minutes and set aside.

When the potatoes are done, drain them, discarding the garlic.  Place the potatoes in a bowl, and pour over the shallot and olive oil mixture.  Add the grain mustard and vinegar and crush with a fork until the potatoes are roughly broken up but not fully mashed.

Generously season with sea salt and freshly ground pepper.

Make a stock with the salmon bones together with a carrot and an onion.  Reduce and strain.  Add truffle salt to taste.

Serve salmon on top of crushed potatoes, boiled beans, with 2 tablespoons of salmon stock.

Enjoy!

Yee Sang

Yee Sang

Yee Sang is a Chinese New Year dish in Malaysia and Singapore and is considered a symbol of abundance, prosperity and vigor.  It is only a young dish, apparently taken from China to Singapore then Malaysia, in the early 1960's. There are lots of different representations of this dish, with each one suggesting that theirs is the better one!

My yee sang recipe is from my good friend Monique, who shared many of her recipes with me.  Every year, my family has a reunion and this is always the first dish.  The higher we toss, the more prosperous we get!

1 daikon grated
8 celery stalks grated
4 carrots grated
1 telegraph cucumber grated
1 iceberg lettuce, sliced finely
4 spring onions very finely sliced
1 bunch coriander, leaves picked
1/2 bottle pickled ginger, finely sliced
1/2 bottle pickled leek, finely sliced
1 packet ready to eat jelly fish
3 fillets salmon, cut finely (without skin)
2 packets Changs fried noodle (or deep fried noodle)
crushed peanuts
toasted sesame seeds
crushed prawn crackers
crushed deep fried wonton skins

Sauce:
1 large (1 1/3 cup) bottle plum sauce
1/2 cup lemon juice
2 tbsp sesame oil
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp five spice powder
Mix the above together.


Place half of the grated daikon on opposite sides of the platter. Place half of the grated celery on the right side of each pile of daikon, so that it looks symmetrical.  Follow with the rest of the ingredients, according to the list above. Pile on the jellyfish and salmon.  Place the crunchy ingredients just before serving, then top with sauce.

Gather friends and family around the platter, each with a pair of chopsticks, ready to toss.

Toss, enjoy!

Kong Hei Fatt Choy!

Gravlax

Gravlax

Thanks to Lily Wai Sek Hong for this recipe. I have been inspired by Lily and her blog for many years.

Ingredients:
For every kilo of salmon fillet, use:
4 tablespoons kosher salt
4 tablespoons sugar
4 teaspoon ground black pepper
zest of 1 lemon

Method:
Examine the salmon for bones by visual inspection and by touch. Remove bones with tweezers.

Drape the salmon fillet over an inverted bowl. This will help force the tips of the bones up, making them easier to grasp and to remove.

Place the salmon fillet, skin side down on a large piece of plastic wrap, which is about three to four times the length of the fillet.

Mix the salt, sugar, black pepper and zest into a bowl.

Spoon the mixture onto the exposed salmon flesh, making sure to cover as much of the exposed areas as possible.

Wrap the salmon fillet tightly in the plastic wrap. Take a second sheet of plastic wrap, and wrap again.

Place the package in a baking dish or container to catch the juices that will flow from the package during the curing.

Place this in the refrigerator, and refrigerate the salmon fillet for at least two days. Longer refrigeration will intensify the flavors.

Remove the container from the refrigerator, open the package, and rinse gravlax in water.

If any pieces of salt or pepper are stuck to the flesh, wipe off gently. Dry with a paper towel and sprinkle with more freshly ground pepper.

Use a sharp boning knife to cut the gravlax. Position the gravlax so that you cut from the tail end first. The gravlax should be thinly sliced on the bias (at an angle). Each slice should be detached from the skin.

Use a sharp boning knife to cut the gravlax.  Position the gravlax so that you cut from the tail end first.  The gravlax should be thinly sliced on the bias (at an angle).  Each slice should be detached from the skin.