Filets de Soles Clarence

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •3-quart heavy saucepan
• •Fine-mesh sieve
• •Potato ricer
• •Large piping bag with a 1/2-inch open-star tube
• •15- to 16-inch oval broiler-safe serving platter
• •12-inch wide sauté pan with lid
• •Pastry brush
• •Slotted fish slice
• •Instant-read thermometer

Instructions

1. 1

   Build the lobster base

   Melt the 3 tablespoons butter in a 3-quart saucepan over medium-low heat. Add the onion, carrot, shallot, and garlic with a small pinch of the measured salt, then cook for 7 to 9 minutes until tender and fragrant without taking color. Stir in the curry powder for 30 seconds, just until its aroma opens, then add the tomato paste and cook until it darkens slightly. Set in the lobster tails and turn them through the butter for 2 minutes. Take the pan off the heat, pour in the measured Cognac from a cup, then return the pan to medium heat and scrape the bottom. No flambé is needed in a home kitchen. Add the wine and reduce it by half.

2. 2

   Extract the sauce

   Add the crushed tomatoes, 2 cups fish fumet, bouquet garni, cayenne, and a pinch of white pepper. Bring the liquid just to a simmer and cook the lobster tails until their meat is opaque and reaches 145°F (63°C), usually 6 to 9 minutes after the simmer begins. Lift out the tails. When they can be handled, remove the meat, cut it into neat 1/4-inch dice, cover, and keep it cold. Crack the empty shells into several pieces, return them to the pan, and simmer gently for 20 minutes. Strain through a fine sieve, pressing firmly on the shells and vegetables, then reduce the liquid until about 1 1/2 cups remain and the lobster aroma is full but not harsh.

   The lobster meat has served in the preparation of the sauce, exactly as the dish requires, but it comes out as soon as it is cooked. Leaving it through the full extraction would turn the dice tough.
3. 3

   Bind the Américaine

   Knead the softened tablespoon of butter and the flour together to make a beurre manié, a paste used to bind a finished sauce. Bring the strained sauce to a gentle simmer and whisk in the beurre manié a small piece at a time, stopping when the sauce lightly coats the back of a spoon. Simmer for 3 minutes to cook out the flour, then taste for salt, curry, and cayenne. Off the heat, whisk in the 2 tablespoons cold butter until the sauce gleams. If it becomes too thick, loosen it with fish fumet one spoonful at a time. If the finishing butter separates, put a teaspoon of cold fumet in a clean pan and whisk in the sauce gradually. Ça se rattrape. Hold the sauce over barely warm water without adding the lobster dice yet.

4. 4

   Make the Duchesse

   Put the potatoes in a pot of cold salted water, bring to a steady simmer, and cook for 18 to 22 minutes, until a knife passes through without resistance. Drain thoroughly and return them to the dry pot over low heat for 1 to 2 minutes, shaking gently, until the surface moisture has vanished. Pass them through a potato ricer while hot. Work in the 5 tablespoons butter, then the egg yolks, nutmeg, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and a pinch of white pepper. Mix only until smooth. The Duchesse must hold a firm ridge from the spoon; if it slumps, let it cool for 10 minutes before piping. The butter will firm and the pattern will recover.

5. 5

   Pipe and gild

   Heat the oven to 425°F (220°C) with the broiler ready for the finish. Lightly butter a large oval broiler-safe serving platter. Fit a piping bag with a large grooved or open-star tube and fill it with the warm Duchesse. Pipe a broad outer oval, then one lengthwise scroll and three crosswise scrolls inside it, creating eight divisions large enough to hold the folded fillets. Beat the whole egg with the tablespoon of water. Gild the potatoes by brushing the raised ridges lightly with this egg wash, which gives them their golden sheen under heat. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, then broil for 1 to 2 minutes until the ridges are butter-gold. Watch without wandering. If egg wash collects in the grooves, touch it away with a dry brush before baking or the design will blur.

6. 6

   Fold the sole

   While the scrollwork browns, lay out the sole fillets with their smoother presentation sides down. Season lightly with salt and white pepper, then fold each fillet in half so the thinner tail end lies inside and the smooth surface faces outward. The parcels should be compact but not compressed. Keep them cold until the platter is browned, because the source sequence matters here: the architecture must be finished before the delicate fish enters the poaching liquid.

7. 7

   Poach at a tremble

   Lower the oven to 200°F (95°C) and keep the browned platter warm. Butter a wide sauté pan and arrange the folded fillets in one snug layer. Add the 1 1/2 cups hot fish fumet, which should come about halfway up their sides, and cover with a buttered parchment round or a tight lid. Hold the liquid at the barest tremble for 5 to 8 minutes, until the fish is pearly, separates in moist flakes, and reaches 145°F (63°C). Do not boil. If the fumet begins bubbling hard and the fillets tighten, pull the pan off the burner at once and let the residual heat finish them under the cover. Ça se rattrape, provided you move quickly.

8. 8

   Finish the sauce

   Warm the sauce Américaine gently. Fold in the lobster dice and leave them only long enough to heat through, about 1 minute. Never let the finished sauce boil, because the butter can separate and the lobster will toughen. Lift the sole fillets from their fumet with a slotted fish slice and rest them briefly on a clean folded towel, blotting the undersides. A wet fillet releases poaching liquid onto the platter and sends the sauce where it does not belong.

9. 9

   Assemble without flooding

   Set one drained fillet inside each of the eight Duchesse divisions. Spoon about 2 tablespoons of sauce Américaine over each fillet, distributing the lobster dice evenly and stopping before the sauce reaches the potato ridges. If a drop lands on the scrollwork, lift it immediately with the corner of a clean damp cloth. The browned grooves can still be saved. Carry the platter directly to the table while the potatoes remain crisp at their edges and the sauce is glossy. À table!

Chef Tips

• •True Dover sole gives the finest, most supple fillets, but evenly sized lemon sole or flounder can carry the method honestly. Choose thin fillets that fold without cracking; thick cod or halibut belongs to another preparation.
• •Use a mild, balanced curry powder. The curry should perfume the lobster sauce and leave the shellfish recognizable, not announce itself from across the room.
• •The fish fumet must taste clean and lightly seasoned before it enters the sauce. A strong, salty commercial stock becomes punishing when reduced; dilute it before cooking if necessary.
• •Raw shell-on lobster tails are the honest home equivalent to a whole lobster broken down for sauce service. Pre-cooked meat can garnish the sauce, but it cannot give the foundation the same depth.
• •A large open-star tube is not decoration for decoration's sake. Its deep grooves hold the gilding and give the Duchesse crisp edges, while a small tube produces fussy lines that dry before the fish is ready.
• •Pour a dry white Burgundy or a brut Champagne. Either has enough body for the lobster and butter while keeping the curried sauce lively.

Advance Preparation

• •The sauce can be prepared through straining and reduction up to one day ahead. Keep the diced lobster covered separately in the cold, then bind and finish the sauce with butter shortly before serving.
• •The Duchesse mixture can be made up to four hours ahead. Press parchment directly against its surface and keep it cold, then let it soften just enough to pipe cleanly.
• •The scrollwork may be piped on the platter up to two hours ahead and kept cold. Gild and brown it before poaching the sole, preserving the sequence that keeps the fish tender.
• •The sole fillets can be trimmed and folded two hours ahead. Cover them closely and keep them cold, but season only shortly before poaching.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 550g)