Sole Food

At the end of each year, we make resolutions.  Some of us go on diets, some of us vow to finally fulfill a lifelong dream, and some us vow to eat more seafood.  I fall into the latter category.  I recently watched the movie "Julie and Julia", and was motivated by the first dish they show julia child eating while she was in france.  It was sole ala meuniere, which is basically a fillet of sole sauteed in clarified butter and then served with a simple pan sauce of parsley, lemon, juice, and (ahem), more butter.  In the movie, Julia Child's eyes rolled back into her face as she tasted the first bite and if you follow this method, I guarantee that yours will also.

Sole Meuniere is all about the butter.  I should clarify (sorry, cheap joke)...instead of sauteing in an oil we use clarified butter here, so unless you have some on hand, this needs to be your first step.  it's super easy, all you do is heat a stick or so of butter in a saucepan until melted, and then skim the foamy milk solids off of the top.  turn your heat to low, and then wait for the rest of the milk solids to fall to the bottom.  

then, you need to strain what's left through a cheesecloth-lined sieve for later use. Voila!!  Butter clarification complete.  We do this so that the butter has a higher smoke point, therefore, giving you the benefit of sauteing in oil, with the taste of butter.  what you have leftover, you can use for eggs, potatoes, or whatever.

from here on out, it is remarkably simple.  season your flour and dredge both sides of the sole in it, shaking off the excess.  add about 3 tablespoons of the liquid gold that you just so expertly made and give your fish a ride in the butter hot tub for about 4 minutes.  Notice how the edges are getting golden brown and crispy like?  Of course you do, now it's time to flip, carefully using a fish spatula (like the one in the next pic in the upper right hand corner.).  I say this because the sole is an extremely delicate fish that requires a soft touch (like kitties, or rolling out pasta, or brain surgery).

now, once you've flipped, let the fillet cook for about 3 more minutes, and then add your butter, parsley, and lemon juice, and kind of shake your pan to combine everything. there you go.  this dish is extremely versatile, pairing wise, and would go well with lots of different sides.  we served it with some rosemary baby dutch tates and a small salad. pour remaining pan sauce over fillets and garnish with some lemon wedges (that you put face down into the butter bath for a few minutes).

one last thing...this meal had an amazing contrast of being delicate but still being totally rich and amazing.  As you can see, we cut the fillet down into two small portions and had reasonable sides.  The thing about french food is, they don't skimp, but they don't gluttonize everything either. if you are making a resolution for a healthier life, this is definitely not something that you would eat every day, but it is definitely not something that you should be afraid to make or serve, once in a while either.  my personal guideline is one of moderation, not deprivation.  it is the small treats and little things in life that make it worth living/enjoying, and if we take those away, it just kind of, well, sucks.  Happy new year everyone, I hope that you all are looking forward to learning new recipes, techniques, and methods to enrich your cooking skills.

peace.

Sole ala Meuniere (serves 2, but i trust y'all can figure it out if you want to make more.)
1 fillet sole
3 tbs clarified butter (see above on how to make)
1 lemon halved
2 tbs butter (non clarified), cut into pieces
1tbs minced flat leaf parsley
seasoned flour for dredging (i just used salt and peps)
(see pics and read method above for instructions)

DISH recommends: Chemex coffee maker. I love this thing.  christmas present from the lady in my life.  it makes awesome coffee with no bitterness.  it was developed by a chemist, so, you know...

a recipe so good, you just may have to laminate it...

I've always been a pretty big fan of puff pastry (well-made, all-butter puff pastry).  It's a very versatile dough to have around, it freezes exceptionally well, and there is no proofing involved, so you can pretty much just prepare it however you like, and when you are ready to bake, it is also.  However, the problem(s) with puff pastry, are finding one that actually tastes what puff pastry is meant to taste like (hard to find here in the midwest), and if you actually manage to accomplish that, not spending a ridiculous amount on it.  the mainstream brand you will probably come across most often is pepperidge farm, and I'm sorry to say that it not only sucks, but uses a lot of margarine, not butter.

A couple of weeks ago, I was watching PBS, and stumbled across an episode of julia (please, please, please, click here and watch this!), where Michel Richard and she were making puff pastry. the old school way. all butter. all the time. it was a revelation. it seemed so easy, it was exactly what I had been looking for. so, in true latestDish fashion, here we go (I could jut assume you all watched that video link, but just in case...)

After you have combined your flour and salt with the water (in your food processor) and made a rough dough (the dough ball will clean the sides of your processor), knead it a few times (on a floured surface), and slash the top like this so the dough will be easier to roll out and work with.

cover it with a damp kitchen towel and move on to making your butter block. lay a large piece of plastic wrap down on your work surface and line up the sticks of butter(straight out of the fridge, very cold) so they are close together.  make sure that your plastic piece is big enough, the butter is going to spread out quite a bit. And please, people, use real butter.  don't even try to use margarine or anything of the sort. butter is real. real is good for you, in moderation.

Had a rough day? Stressed out? well, lucky you! this is the part where you get to smash the butter together with a blunt object (hooray!). all joking aside, you really have to lay in to this stuff.  don't be afraid to commit and connect here. picture your arch nemesis, or the DMV, or the cable company. Whatever foe you choose, just remember to follow through, don't want any damaged countertops here. you want to end up with a uniform rectangle here, like below. you shouldn't be able to see any gaps in the lineup where the butter was touching.

now, roll out your dough into a sort of rounded square shape.  this dough is great because it has fairly low gluten formation, and rolls out like a champ.  really fun stuff to work with.  you can see that I left it thicker in the middle, because that is where my butter will rest, and the edges of the dough will be folded over the butter, making it thicker on the edges. It also sort of acts as a little insurance so that the dough won't rip in that area.

lay your butter in the middle of the dough and then fold the edges over the butter completely sealing the butter square and leaving you with a uniform rectangle.

flour your work surface and the dough again, and roll out into a long, vertical rectangle, like below.  I don't have an exact measurement for you guys here, but I would say that it is prob close to 24 inches or so ( basically the width of my counter top). once that is done, use a pastry brush to brush off excess flour, and fold like a business letter. (this process is known as lamination.  it is used in several doughs and that is what gives us all the buttery, flaky, layers of goodness.  We do this at work with the croissant doughs also).  We are going to do this a total of 6 times.

bring the bottom third up to the middle

and then fold the top down to meet the edge of the bottom third

you should have a nice square at this point.  even if it is a bit wonky, you can use a pastry knife or your hand or whatever to kind of square it back up (it just makes for easier rolling as you go). Rotate the dough so that the seam is running vertically, and repeat this process one more time, and then wrap in a damp towel, and set in the fridge for 30 min to harden the butter. (this step is crucial! do not skip it, or your dough will not turn out.) After the 30 minutes are up, roll out and fold again two more times and then back in the fridge for another 30 minutes. then, after those 30 minutes have passed, repeat the two turns one more time.  It sounds like a lot of work but trust me, it's not.  it takes maybe 4 minutes to do each two turn process.  do some house work during the fridge rests or exercise, or whatever.  It's basically like making a soup or stew or something that you occasionally have to check on and should be no reason to deter you from trying this excellent recipe.

this is just a pic of me brushing off the extra flour, to enable maximum rollage.

this is my dough after the second rest and fold process.  I still have one more fridge rest to go and two more turns (or folds, if you prefer) to make but I made indentions to show how many times I had rolled out and folded it up to this point.

this is a just a shot to show how much this dough puffs up after baking.  It was probably rolled out a little thicker than a pie crust would be.

this is a shot of the inside of that same trial piece.  I can only tell you that it is the most flaky, buttery, piece of goodness that you will ever eat.

  

                                      

I wanted to make a sweet treat with some of the dough, so I decided to try my hand at making palmiers.  I wasn't sure how to make them so I just did a quick search and this is the first thing that came up. Might not be the best video, but I did like the technique of brushing the pastry with water and then dipping it in sugar. made a nice caramel crunch.

this is another pic of an apple tart that I made at thanksgiving with the same dough. ridiculously easy.  It was from a martha stewart recipe.  

Basically, the whole point of this post is to encourage you guys to make this dough. Yeah, it seems like it is a little daunting at first, but just break it down step by step and it is not bad at all.  really easy actually.  It's really nice to have something in your kitchen repertoire that can be used for everything from a crust for a tart to a flaky little dessert. Being a good cook is all about versatility, and I can't think of many things that could be more versatile than this. give this process a try and I promise that you will never go back to the mass produced versions.

Puff pastry dough (ala Michel Richard) (once again, it would be in your best interest to watch the video link above!)

1 pound pastry flour (however, I took julia's advice and used 4 oz. cake flour, 12 oz. All Purpose Flour, because that is what I had on hand)

1.5 tsps salt

1.25 cups water.

combine all this in food processor and pulse to make a rough, dough ball.

you will also need 1 pound butter.

for steps and process, follow the pics and directions above.

Good Luck! and happy holidays, hope you make this dough and enjoy it as much as I have:)

DISH recommends: Video.pbs.org.  I love pbs.  I recently got the pbs app for ipad and it is so cool.  it downloads all the shows from the week and you can sort through and pick whatever you want to watch. i don't have cable so its a really cool way for mames and I to get our pbs on. however, this website is pretty cool too. I wasn't sure I'd be able to locate that video of Michel and Julia, but a quick search led me to this site.  looks like the same deal (lots of julia vids here).  check it.

for british eyes only...

around christmas time last year I made my first prime rib. ever. and while it was glorious, it was pretty darn expensive (expect to pay anywhere from $10 per pound on up to ridiculous $$ per pound if you get the prime rated stuff).  Lately, I had been craving some roast beef like it was nobody's business.  However, since I can't just go rib-roasting it up all the time, I needed to find an alternative cut to satisfy my beef needs.

On the whole, the british aren't really known for their food, but one thing that they know how to do  is roast a beef treat.  I discovered that while they do love their rib roasts, they are also fond of top round roasts. this seemed more my speed.  so I headed to the store to see what I could find and EUREKA!! top round roast spotted, not to mention EUREKA EUREKA!! 9 dollars. that's about 5 times less coin than a rib roast of the same weight.  While I was excited at this bargain, I was also pretty skeptical.  Was this going to taste good at all, I mean you get what you pay for right?  I was scared that without all of the intra-muscular fat and marbling that I was going to be feasting on something closer to resembling hydrated jerky than basking in the beef nirvana of my dreams.

But I figured that at this point 9 bucks was 9 bucks.  that was the beauty of this whole experiment.  It wasn't like I had coughed up 50+ clams for this thing, so I dove right in.  I basically went about this like I do for any roasty treats,  Veg-pile (you can call it whatever you like.  how about veg-bed, or veg-rack, or you could even call it a veg-table...ahem...), salt and peps, some herbage, throw on the well seasoned meat (always, ALWAYS, fat-side up). and roast away.  Cooked to med-rare, thinly sliced, and smothered with gravy goodness, this was fantastic!  It was the roast beef I had been looking for.  while it was much leaner than the rib roast I had made earlier, it was equally delicious, just in a different way. It was a bit chewier, but in the best way possible. I like to think of it as the beef just taking the long way home.  

Psst...Do you like gravy? If your answer is no, then you can leave this blog right now and never come back!!!...Still here?  I thought so. ok, I have a trick I use for gravy every time. remember that veg pile we rested the meat on? of course you do.  It looked so pretty before, but now it kinda looks like  complete annihilation...that's just fine.  it's probably swimming in beef fat. and needs to be drained of about 90 percent of that.  I drained my beef fat into a pot, added about a spoonful of flour and made a quick roux, and then added stock to the pan of veg, and smashed it up. put the roasting pan with the veg over your burners on high heat, add the roux and add some booze (wine, ale, sherry, port, whatever) or more stock , and then whisk and mix it all up together, scraping up the tasties from the bottom. lower heat and let it reduce to your liking and then pour through a strainer.  Now that's a gravy you can be proud of! 

A proper Bloke's Roast Beef (adapted from jamie oliver, he's british, I kind of figured it was a safe play)
preheat oven to 475 (do this now, it's important that your oven is crazy hot at the get go)
for veg pile:

2 onions rough chop

2 carrots ""

2 celery stalks ""

couple turnips or parsnips ""

garlic cloves (to your liking, you can use the whole head if you want), left whole

olive oil

salt and pepper

1 handful Simon and Garfunkel (parsley, sage, you get the rest...)

for herb paste:

6 good sized sprigs rosemary

4 sprigs sage

4 sprigs thyme

4-5 cloves garlic

olive oil

salt and pepper

the rest:(or in this case, the roast)

3-4 pound top round roast

In a good sized roasting pan or a large skillet,  add the chopped veg and herbs.  season with salt and pepper and drizzle with olive oil. toss well and set aside.
to make the herb paste, mince all the herbs and garlic together and add a couple healthy pinches of salt and pepper.  add to a a bowl and drizzle in some oil.  just enough to make it paste like, not swimming. rub this on the meat and then (I know sounds like a lot) salt and pepper the meat again, but don't go overboard. place meat on top of veg stand and either let hang out in the fridge until you are ready to roast, or go for it at this moment (this VERY moment!!!!).  put pan in oven (in middle rack) and lower heat to 400F.  if you are using a dig-thermometer (like the one i linked up there) make sure to put it in before you put the beef in the oven, it's sort of crucial to your cause (never again...) if you don't have one, don't sweat it, you can get it close by roasting around one hour for medium.  If you want med-rare, just take it out around 10-15 min. earlier. and so on. baste the beef around the halfway mark and if the veggies are starting to dry out, you can add a splash of water to the pan to prevent burnage. once roasted to your desired doneness, take the pan out of the oven and let the roast rest on a cutting board (at least 15 minsok. this is normal. pour this stuff into your gravy.  you thriftster, you...
serve with roast veggies (not posting a recipe, but what you can do here is par-boil some root veg and then toss them with oil and salt and peps and when you pull the roast out, put these in and then turn the oven to 450 to finish them off and get some color. should be done around the time everything else is).
or mashed tates. or just serve them with your favorite sides.

DISH recommends: all-clad lasagna pan. this pan says it's for lasagna, but so far has met all of my roasting needs. and it's way cheaper than their roasting pans and only like an inch smaller.  check it.
ps--like the new look?  hope so.  mames gave me a much needed make-over.  hope to actually get organized around here...