Halibut baked in salt crust

Seabass baked in salt is a Sicilian speciality. It was seabass that I cooked in the salt crust for a family last December near Chipping Norton - they were celebrating Chanuka at the same time as a 70th birthday. The family were originally from Italy, hence the Italian theme.

As it was their father's birthday, his sons were hellbent on revenge and played a blindfold wine tasting session. Their father was given glasses from his wine cellar (he had visited the vineyards where he had brought his wine from), and glasses from various budget supermarket plonk. Could he tell the difference blindfold? The result? Well that would be telling, but it certainly made the sons' night!

The idea of this dish is you make a verrrrrrrrrrrrrry salty dough which you bake the fish in. You can add herbs, lemon, capers, peppercorns of various colours etc to flavour it. The fish bakes in the steam created inside the salt crust and takes a little of the salt seasoning like you would expect - it's just enough salty twang, not overpowering like you would think from that much salt; instead it's delicious and very moist.

Raddichio braised in red wine and balsamic. By the time the wine and balsamic has reduced to a glaze the raddichio is ready. You can also sprinkle them with parmesan and flash them under the grill. Something I discovered on holiday. 

It's a bit of food theatre - you take the fish in salt crust to the table and let the guests break it open, warning them not to eat the crust! They have another plate with the accompaniments in front of them, and aioli to go with it which is the traditional sauce. Real Italian food is about big flavours done simply - and it doesn't get better than this! Why complicate everything?

You bake the fish skin side up so the skin sticks to the crust and comes off when you remove the top crust. It's always good trying something out for the first time at an event - it has to work, there is no room for error. It did too! Worked in the one above too, which was a halibut version I cooked the night that my Mum and I were planning her 70th birthday road trip around NZ.

What a fun dish - why don't you try it!? I used this recipe, with a little adapting along the way.....

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Braised lamb shank in red wine with creamed potato

Elvis isn't dead! I saw him near Stratford on Avon on 31 October.

Well two of him actually, along with Diana Ross (a 1969 version), Scooby Doo, Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz and a whole host of other characters. We were cooking for a fancy dress birthday party at The Boathouse on 31 October. A week later we were back at the same venue, this time cooking for an anniversary. The couple had invited all their closest friends who had been at the wedding, and requested a re-creation of their wedding breakfast menu (as cooked by another chef). As most of the events we cook for are special occasions we always like to cook whatever guests would like.

Starter:

Fish cakes with cucumber salsa

Main: (as discussed)

Lamb shank on bed of mashed potato – 1 salmon en croute

Gravy/Jus

French beans with red onion

Glazed chantenay carrots

Desert:

Apple Pie with vanilla ice cream and pouring cream

Lamb shanks were the pork belly of the late 90's - the thing that every restaurant had on their menu. They need slow moist cooking - around 3 - 4 hours minimum - till the meat is tender and almost falling from the bone, and the sauce is rich and seriously tasty. When we used to cook them at Charingworth Manor back in '97/ '98 they were £1.00 each - so the accountant was very happy too. These days however, since they became so popular they are more like £3.00 each. It had been rather too many years since I had last cooked lamb shanks, but just as I was getting ready to cook them @britishfood posted a recipe here which refreshed the memory. I did a much similar thing, though used a whole bottle of wine used carrots and celery as well, and lamb stock rather than beef. Also thickened the sauce after the shanks were cooked with a little cornflour (I use cornflour instead of beurre manie just in case of gluten/ wheat free guests).

It was another busy Saturday with 2 other events going on elsewhere, so in the rush to pack everything up I didn't pack the camera, hence the only photo I got was the apple pie just fresh from the oven after cooking (above), and the lamb shank (right) taken at 2:30am on the Sunday morning, after I had returned to base and cleared up. I always like to do one spare in case the number suddenly goes up at the last minute, a guest having something else changes their mind, or one gets dropped/ damaged. The version we had served 6 hours previously looked more spruced up of course.

If you want the perfect apple pie recipe there's a link here - the pastry is the best ever!

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