Plaice and crab tortellini, vin jaune, apple, dill, sea herbs

GBC Waterhouse Tortellini FILM 1080P 8 11 22
  • medium
  • 4
  • 3 hours 30 minutes plus time for the apple puree to set
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These squid ink tortellini are filled with a light fish mousse, and served with a creamy vin jaune velouté. The mousse can be made with a variety of different fish - both lemon sole and plaice work well.

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First published in 2022

Ingredients

Metric

Imperial

Plaice Mousse

Squid Ink Pasta

Apple Puree

  • 500g of green apple, peeled, cored and diced into 1-inch cubes
  • 100g of cane sugar
  • 100g of water
  • 1 lemon, juiced
  • 5g of agar agar

Vin Jaune Velouté

Dill Oil

To serve

Equipment

  • Pasta machine

Method

1

For the mousse, first fillet the plaice, removing and discarding the skin (or ask your fishmonger to do this for you). Reserve the head and bones for your sauce

  • 1 whole plaice, filleted, skin removed and head bones reserved
2

In a food processor, blend the fish fillets and slowly add the chilled double cream to form a smooth mousse. Season with salt and cayenne pepper

3

Carefully pick the white crab meat three times, removing any shell you find

4

Fold the picked crab meat through the mousse. Store in the fridge until needed

5

For the squid ink pasta, weigh the flour, egg yolk, olive oil and squid ink into a bowl of a stand mixer with a paddle attachment

6

Bring the ingredients together using the mixer then finish the dough by kneading together on a work top

7

Wrap in clingfilm and leave to rest in the fridge for 1 hour, or overnight

8

For the apple puree, pace the diced apple into a pan along with the sugar, water and lemon juice. Heat gently over your hob on a medium heat and cook for 20 minutes with a lid until the apples have broken down, stirring regularly to avoid any colouring

  • 500g of green apple, peeled, cored and diced into 1-inch cubes
  • 100g of cane sugar
  • 100g of water
  • 1 lemon, juiced
9

When cooked, add the agar agar and bring back to a boil

  • 5g of agar agar
10

Let cool slightly, then carefully blend to a smooth puree

11

Pour out the apple puree onto a tray and leave to set in the fridge

12

Once set, blend once more to a puree and store in the fridge

13

Next, make the vin jaune sauce. Cut up your reserved fish bones into smaller pieces

14

Add the olive oil to a heavy pan, and sweat the shallot, button mushrooms, garlic, bay leaves, fennel seeds and star anise until softened but not coloured. Add a little water if necessary

15

Add the white wine vinegar to the pan and cook out for 1 minute before adding the cut up fish bones, fish head and white wine

  • 30ml of white wine vinegar, or use elderflower vinegar
  • 250ml of white wine
16

Add water, just enough to cover the bones (around 1 litre) and leave to simmer for 20 minutes, covered

17

Pass the stock through a sieve into a separate pan. Add the cream, butter and lemon juice to the strained fish stock. Season with salt

18

Finish the sauce by adding a few glugs of vin jaune to taste, or a dry sherry if vin jaune is unavailable

  • 100ml of vin jaune, or dry sherry (or to taste)
19

For the dill oil, place the dill and oil into a jug blender with a lid fitted loosely to allow any steam to escape

20

Blend the dill and oil on high speed for several minutes. The herb oil might warm up slightly and produce some steam and the dill should begin to split from the oil

21

Set a piece of muslin cloth or a fine tea towel over a sieve and pass the mixture, collecting the oil in a receptacle below. Discard the pulp and store the oil in the fridge until needed

22

Next, remove the pasta dough from the fridge and roll out using a pasta machine, slowly working down the settings from thickest downwards, until it is around 1mm thick. This should be about a third of the way down a pasta machine's settings - we roll to setting 7 of 10. Use a little white flour when needed to stop the dough sticking

23

Cut out circles from the sheet using a 10cm ring cutter

24

Place a spoonful of your plaice and crab mousse into the centre of each pasta disk, leaving an edge

25

Lightly wet the pasta surrounding the mousse with a damp pastry brush and fold the pasta over the mousse encasing it in a semi circle

26

Press the pasta together surrounding the mousse to form a tight compartment. Use a smaller disk cutter to cut away any excess pasta if necessary

27

Pull the two edges of the semi circle together to meet at the back and join, pinching together and shaping the tortellini

28

Once all your tortellini are shaped, and you're ready to serve, bring a pan of heavily salted water to a boil. Cook the pasta for 4 minutes

29

Add the sea herbs to the water and blanch for a couple minutes, or until tender

  • 1 handful of salty finger leaf
  • 1 handful of rock samphire
  • 1 handful of sea purslane
30

Dress the sea herbs and diced apple in some dill oil, separately

31

Place the apple puree and diced apple onto warm plates, and arrange the tortellini on top of them

32

Warm the vin jaune sauce, and then blend with a stick blender until frothy. Add a few drops of lemon juice and a little more vin jaune to taste if needed

33

Pour the frothy warmed sauce over the tortellini. Finish by scattering over the blanched sea herbs

Determined to move away from the world of traditional fine dining, Gabriel Waterhouse started a supper club out of his own Hackney flat. Over time, this has evolved into his own permanent restaurant The Water House Project, where he serves a regularly changing tasting menu to guests in a deliberately relaxed and convivial atmosphere.

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