Jewelled sea

Tea cured ocean trout, shaved scallop, jerusalem artichoke crips, horseradish creme fraiche, finger lime

After a lot of travel recently and eating a whole heap of good food, it’s finally time to start cooking again. This time, with a proper knife. Being end of financial year specials, I managed to pick up a Global 20cm chef’s knife for $95. It’s light, grippy, sharp and sleek! I figured I’d actually learn how to use one of these before splurging on a patterned, real Japanese knife.

Ok, so I had actually found my ingredients, then formed a dish in my mind, then realised I needed a knife. What had I picked up? Scallops in shell and ocean trout. So I decided to collect some jerusalem artichoke, finger limes, horse radish and creme fraiche.

I’ve been tea curing fish for a couple of weeks now, so this was relatively easy – salt, sugar, earl grey tea leaves, lemon. I used to put way too much salt and left it for way too long so that it was always too salty, but now, with the addition of lemon, I’m able to cure small pieces in a couple of hours or less.

I had no idea how to use fresh horseradish and incorporate the flavour into creme fraiche. I decided to finely chop it and see if I could simply fold it into the cream. Also, I was being all “I think I know what this is” and picked up the horseradsih without confirming what it was, because sometimes I’m silly like that, so as soon as I got home and started prepping this, I sliced off a bit and licked it to confirm. Go me!

I was very lucky that the native Australia/game shop had finger limes! They came whole and frozen though, so thawing it was a bit of a pain. However, I was very pleased when I could squirt most of them out quite easily. And because the pulp bulbs are round, they do indeed look like caviar!

And here are the scallops. I thought they’d be more difficult to clean and prepare, but it was actually quite easy. They were incredibly sandy though! After a thorough wash, they were ready to slice.

There are no more progress shots, instead, just the final product:

I actually really liked the presentation – so pretty, and inspired by Quay’s raw marron dish that I had when I visited. The pink gems of finger lime were absolutely beautiful, and my jerusalem artichoke chips curled up quite nicely, and gave the dish a sweet nuttiness that worked well. The raw scallops also added sweetness, while the cured trout was the salt element. The horseradish creme fraiche was meant to mimic wasabi, and add tanginess and kick, but I got that horribly wrong. Turns out finely chopped horseradish doesn’t actually mix properly, so there were bits in my cream. The balance also wasn’t there; it had to be more burning and lighter. If I’d manage to whip it into airiness it probably would have worked. It also needed more sour, with the amount of finger lime I had placed, it wasn’t enough.

Overall was I pleased with my dish? Yes for presentation, no for flavour. I usually make food that tastes as good as it looks or better, and this wasn’t one of them. I still have a lot to learn!