Category: English Recipes

Yeast and Beer Battered Brill with Panko Onion Rings and Garlic Aioli

~ Phil Sperss ~ Leave a comment

Yeast and Beer Battered Brill with Panko Onion Rings and Garlic Aïoli

37007454851_86e59943ed_k.jpg

Nothing brings back memories of a visit to the seaside more than a bite into light but crispy battered fish, fresh out of the fryer. The combination of the first crunch when you sink your teeth into the batter, accompanied by the steaming hot firm flesh of fish, together make the epitome of comfort food. Everybody has their own preference on how the perfect battered fish is made. Some people prefer a thick beer batter while some people prefer it coated with breadcrumbs. Then comes the debate on what is the best fish to use. Is it questionably now sustainable cod? Or is it the now commonplace hake? Maybe you prefer a more premium fish to be used in your chippy, like halibut or turbot.

When it comes to battered fish, I prefer to use any sort of flatfish, with my personal favourite being brill. Flatfish encompass a wide range of fish such as turbot, halibut, brill, plaice and soles. They are characterised by having a flat underbelly, with both eyes having evolved to be on the same side. All flatfish live on the seafloor, feeding off crabs and small fish while blending in with the sand and sediment to avoid predators. From a culinary perspective, flatfish are excellent as their flesh is firm and flakes of in large pieces when cooked. Furthermore, unlike other fish, flatfish do not have scales and thus are much easier to prepare. Flatfish come in all sorts of varying shapes and sizes, from the fairly small lemon sole to the sometimes humongous halibut which can reach sizes of up to 200kg a fish. For this recipe, a large flatfish fillet would be the most optimal, as it would be fairly thick, ensuring that the fish will not overcook before the batter is cooked to a delicious golden brown. A thick fillet also means that there will be a greater texture contrast between the crispy batter and the soft firm flesh inside it. In addition, a thicker fillet also translates to a smaller surface area to volume ratio, preventing too much loss of moisture when cooking, allowing the fish to retain some of its flavourful juices.

Among the different types of flatfish, the most prized flatfish favoured by chefs is the turbot, which as well as having the characteristic firm flesh found in flatfish, also has dense meat and a subtly sweet taste. As mentioned above, my preferred fish of choice for this dish is the closely related brill, also known as Scophthalmus rhombus. In comparison to turbot, brill can be said to be its undervalued brother, selling for much cheaper and affordable prices. It has an identical firm texture while only tasted slightly less sweet. And in all honesty, after being deep-fried in batter, this difference would no longer be noticeable. I still believe that a turbot’s taste is more superior than brill’s taste. But unless you are cooking a dish that emphasised the quality of ingredients as well as the delicate different in taste, it is not worth it paying the price premium for a turbot in comparison to brill.

35231371176_ad7248eac7_k.jpg

Brill is a brown coloured fish with light and dark patches that can be found up to 2kg in weight, thus making its fillet the perfect thickness for deep frying. When buying brill from the fish monger, I prefer to buy whole brill as the bones of any flatfish are the best bones for making fumet (fish stock), as they are packed full of gelatin. When choosing fish, the best indicators of fresh fish are clear and not bloodshot eyes, as well as bright red gills. Further tell tale signs of the freshness of a fish is the firmness of its flesh, which should be able to bounce back to shape after being pressed lightly. A fresh fish should also smell of the sea without any musky aromas. When holding up the fish, it should also be able to hold itself without going limp. Unique to flatfish, one trick to when choosing which fish to buy is to flip the fish over to it’s white underbelly and look for blemishes caused by bruising to the fish.

Yeast and Beer Battered Brill with Panko Onion Rings and Garlic Aioli

  • 2x 200g Fish Fillets (I personally prefer using Brill), do not use any oily fish such as tuna or salmon
  • 7g of Fresh or 5g of Powdered Yeast
  • 100ml of Vodka
  • 200ml of Beer (freshly opened)
  • 400g of Plain Flour
  • Rice Flour for dusting
  • Salt
  • Vegetable Oil/Rapeseed Oil/Canola Oil
  • 10g of Beef Dripping or 5g of reused oil
  1. To start off the batter, add in the plain flour, salt and yeast. Mix well together.
  2. Add in the beer and vodka and whisk together for a minute and not any longer. It’s okay to have lumps. The batter should be think enough to coat the back of a spoon. Adjust the amount of flour or beer if necessary. (Do not add more Vodka)
  3. Let the batter chill in the fridge for around 30 minutes or place the bowl in an ice bath to quickly cool it down.
  4. Season the fish fillets with salt and let rest in the fridge for 10 minutes.
  5. To prepare the deep-frying oil, fill a pot with vegetable oil and add in the beef dripping. Alternatively add in the reused oil.
  6. Heat up the oil to 180℃ (356℉).
  7. Remove the fish fillets from the fridge and pat dry with a paper towel.
  8. Coat the fish fillets with rice flour.
  9. Dip the fish fillets in the batter and coat well, wiping off excess batter.
  10. Transfer to the hot oil and fry until it is a crispy golden colour.
  11. Remove and pat dry the excess oil using a paper towel.
  12. Serve immediately and enjoy!

36539632100_90866a42bd_k_Fotor.jpg

Notes:

  • The batter should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, somewhat like the consistency of a hollandaise sauce. Too thin and it won’t be crispy and too thick and the fish will not cook properly and the taste will be doughy.
  • A light a crispy batter is made with an aerated batter, which can be done using yeast, baking powder or a carbonated liquid (beer)
  • Using a carbonated liquid like beer losses their fizz the longer you leave them. To compensate for that, I add a little yeast to the batter to keep the fizz up while the batter is resting
  • Whisking the batter together for more than a minute causes gluten strands to form as two of the wheat proteins in flour, glutenin and gliadin start to bind together. While this is useful when making bread, it cause the batter to become heavy.
  • Resting the batter causes the small amount of gluten strands that form to relax. Counteracting this problem.
  • Adding vodka to my batter also helps makes the batter light and crispy as the alcohol in the vodka interacts with the glutenin and gliadin in the flour and prevents them from binding together. Preventing gluten strands from forming.
  • This of cause means that the batter now has a very high alcohol content, which may prevent yeast from growing. As such, I dilute the vodka with beer to lower the alcohol below 13% (which kills yeasts).
  • Keeping the batter ice-cold also gives an extremely crispy batter due to the huge differences in temperature between the oil and batter, a technique from making tempura.
  • When deep frying, I prefer to use a neutral oil such as rapeseed oil or canola oil so that it does not impart any flavour into the fish. However as these oils may be harder to find, it would be easier and cheaper to just use vegetable oil.
  • In terms of improving the flavour of the fried product. It helps to add a tablespoon of beef dripping which helps give a final product a richer taste. Food cooked in oil that has been previously used in frying taste better in fresh oil. This is because as you fry oil, compounds in the oil start to oxidize and make the food taste better. So adding a bit of used oil into the fresh oil adds a lot of flavour.
  • When deep-frying, the most optimal temperature is around 180℃ (356℉). Any lower than that and the batter takes too long to cook, causing the fish to overcook before the batter becomes golden and crispy. The batter will also be slightly chewy and soggy. Any higher and you risk the oil starting to smoke and the batter browning too fast.
  • Salting the fish and letting the fish rest in the fridge causes the water to be extracted from the fish, allowing the fish to have a firmer texture when frying.
  • Coating the fish with rice flour before dipping in batter into them gives a more even batter coating.
  • If the fillet stops bubbling, the fillet is already over cooked as there is no longer any steam leaving the fish fillet and the oil will start to enter the crust, making it extremely oily.
  • Do not add too many fillets into the pot at once as it causes the temperature of the oil to drop.
  • The most premium fish used for battered fish here in the UK is Halibut and Turbot which are both flatfishes. Brill is also a flatfish and in my opinion is an underrated fish which is much cheaper compared to Halibut and Turbot. Flatfishes have a firm texture which makes them perfect for deep-frying.
  • Other common fish used for Fish and Chips here are cod, haddock and pollock. Cod is the most traditional fish used but due to unsustainable farming is not so common anymore. The more famous alternatives nowadays are haddock and pollock which are relatively cheap but have a rising price due to their increased popularity.

35231302106_2efc5de254_k.jpg

  • Onion Rings
    • White Onions/Yellow Onions
    • Pako Breadcrumbs
    • Rice Flour
    • Remaining Batter
  • Garlic Aïoli
    • Extra Virgin Olive Oil
    • Garlic
    • Salt
    • Egg Yoke
    • Lemon Juice
 
To make the Panko onion rings, cut the onions crosswise and separate out the individual rings. If possible, remove the membrane in-between each ring. Coat the rings in rice flour before dipping in the rings in the excess fish batter. Place the batter coated rings in a bowl of panko breadcrumbs and coat well before frying until golden brown. Again make sure the oil reheats to a 180℃ (356℉).
 
To make the garlic aïoli, smash the garlic cloves with the flat side of a knife. Remove the skin and add the garlic into a bowl. Add in the salt and egg yolks. Start whisking the mixture until the egg yolks are mixed with the garlic. Continue to whisk while slowly adding in oil, a few drops at a time, building up to steady stream. Add enough olive oil till the sauce has reached your desired consistency. Add in a squeeze of lemon juice and adjust the seasoning to taste. A shortcut here is just to use a blended and blend the garlic and egg yolks together and continue to blend the mixture while slowly adding in the olive oil as the point of whisking is just to agitate the mixture to promote emulsification.
 
35141690311_29281c04e0_k.jpg
 
 

When deep-frying, I prefer to use a neutral oil such as rapeseed oil or canola oil so that it does not impart any flavour into the fish. However as these oils may be harder to find, it would be easier and cheaper to just use vegetable oil. In terms of improving the flavour of the fried product. It helps to add a tablespoon of beef dripping which helps give a final product a richer taste. Food cooked in oil that has been previously used in frying taste better in fresh oil. This is because as you fry oil, compounds in the oil start to oxidize and make the food taste better. To enhance the flavour of your battered fish. It is also possible to mix a tablespoon of older oil into your fresh oil when deep frying. When deep frying, the most optimal temperature is around 180℃ (356℉). Any lower than that and the batter takes too long to cook, causing the fish to overcook before the batter becomes golden and crispy. The batter will also be slightly chewy and soggy. Any higher and you risk the oil starting to smoke and the batter browning too fast.

The best fish batter to me is one that light and crispy. In order to do so, we need to aerate to batter. This can be done using a raising agent such as yeast or baking powder, or simply using sparkling water or beer. My preference is to use both a mixture of yeast and beer. The explanation is as follows. When flour is mixed with water, it forms gluten strands as two of the wheat proteins in flour, glutenin and gliadin bind together. While this is useful when making bread, it cause the batter to become heavy. Resting the batter causes the gluten strands to relax. This is because it allows the batter to remain light and crispy. However, if using a carbonated liquid like beer or sparkling water, they lose their fizz the longer you leave them. To compensate for that, I add a little yeast to the batter to keep the fizz up.

15574050631_069eb59565_k.jpg
Llandudno, Wales

In addition to this, I also like to add vodka to my batter, as the alcohol in the vodka interacts with the proteins in the flour and prevents them from binding together. Preventing gluten strands from forming. This of cause means that the batter now has a very high alcohol content, which may prevent yeast from growing. As such, I dilute the vodka with beer to lower the alcohol below 13% (which kills yeasts).

Keeping the batter ice-cold also gives an extremely crispy batter due to the huge differences in temperature between the oil and batter, a technique from making tempura.

When cooking the onion rings, I prefer to use Panko breadcrumbs compared to normal breadcrumbs as they have a larger surface area thus give a more crispy finish but if you can’t find them than normal breadcrumbs work as well.

32314266582_e3923635b2_k.jpg
Marseille, France

An Aïoli is a sauce that originates from the Mediterranean countries. It’s name literally means garlic and oil in Provençal and the original recipe for it does not contain egg yolks. With the rise in popularity in mayonnaise, modern-day recipes now contain egg yolks and added lemon juice to help cut the richness of the sauce. When making sauces such as aïoli, hollandaise or mayonaise, we need an emulsifier, which prevents a mixture of oil and water from separating after being mixed together. This is because non-polar oil molecules have a greater affinity for each other. The same goes for polar water molecules. An emulsifier works by having both a hydrophilic (water-loving) and hydrophobic (water hating) chemical group. The hydrophilic group sticks into the suspended water particles while the hydrophobic group sticks to oil and prevents the two from joining.

Examples of emulsifiers are lecithins which are found in egg yolks, and compounds found in garlic, which is why it is possible to make an Aioli without egg yolks.

Irish Lamb Shank Stew

~ Phil Sperss ~ Leave a comment

Irish Lamb Shank Stew

16272786853_8e9cb9fa13_k.jpg

England is famous around the world for its gloomy weather, with little sunshine and miserable rain. Even in spring, England can sometimes be chilly, with downpours that make you want to stay at home and snuggle under a warm blanket. On days like this, nothing beats coming home to the aromas of a good stew on the stove top wafting through the house. To pair with this, what better way to enjoy a good stew than with a freshly baked loaf of bread just out of the oven to soak up all the delicious stew?

Spring in England is the season for spring lamb. British lamb is famous around the world, on par with New Zealand lamb. Furthermore, lamb is also highly sustainable and ecologically friendly, with little water intake compared to cows. And if it sounds too good to be true, almost all lambs in England are free range and grass-fed.

Lambs are sheep that are less than one year old. After being weaned off their mother’s milk, most lambs in England spend their time on the english country side running up and down hills and pastures. Spring lamb is the most sought after lamb in England because of their sweet and tender characteristics. This is because spring-lamb were traditionally born in the late winter, so that after they finish feeding on their mom’s milk, they were able to easily switch over to the newly grown grass. Lamb is also a cheaper red meat alternative to beef as they mainly feed on grass and clover, and not need to be fed on expensive feed.

I for one, absolutely adore stew cuts. While tough, they are packed with flavour and if cooked slowly for a couple of hours, will become extremely tender and juicy. Lamb shanks are one of those cuts. The shank of a lamb is the meat and bone from below the knee. Lamb shanks are usually cooked whole, with the usual serving size being one shank per person. This lamb shank recipe is fairly simple, with a paprika, oregano and garlic base to it.

13850177345_f01129ad16_k

Irish Lamb Stew

  • Ground Paprika
  • Dried Oregano
  • Salt
  • Minced garlic or garlic powder
  • Red Wine
  • Celery
  • Carrots
  • Red Onions
  • Lamb Shanks
  • Olive Oil
  1. First, combine the minced garlic, oregano, salt and paprika with some olive oil to make a paste. Using your hands, rub the paste onto the lamb shanks, making sure they are well coated.
  2. Leave the lamb shanks in a container to marinade overnight.
  3. The next day, scrap off the excess marinade into a bowl before searing the lamb shanks in a pot.
  4. When searing the lamb shanks, make sure to get all sides of the shanks well coloured. Remember, no colour means no flavour. You don’t have to cook the lamb shanks through, just browned all around.
  5. After that, remove the lamb shanks from the pot and pour in a dash of red wine just to deglaze the pot, not more than a cup. Once deglazed, pour in the rest of the marinade and replace the lamb shanks.
  6. Cut the vegetables up into smaller pieces and place the vegetables in between the lamb shanks.
  7. Pour in enough water to cover the lamb shanks and stew for 3 hours (covered) until the meat is falling off the bone. After this, remove the cover and reduce the stew to your desired thickness.
20787247694_3660a98f6f_k.jpg
View of the Wrekin, Shropshire, England

Deglazing the pot is the act of adding liquid (usually wine) to a pot that was used to cook vegetables or meat in order to scrap off the bits and pieces that have stuck to the pot. This step is important as this residual food contains the most flavour, and is prone to burn if not scraped off. I prefer to place the vegetables in between the lamb shanks and the pot instead of placing the vegetables below and the lamb shanks on top. This allows us to use less water to cover the lamb shanks, meaning that the final stew will be more concentrated, and less time will be needed to reduce the stew. From my experience, 3 hours is about the minimum that you can stew this dish for, any less and the lamb shanks will still be chewy. Many people say that the longer you let a stew cook for the better it gets. I actually disagree with this. If this dish is let to cook longer than 4 hours, all the fat in the lamb shank is melted off, and what remains is just the lamb meat which will not be cushioned by fat when eaten, giving it a rather stringy texture. This being said, as with all stews and soups, they taste better the day after and this stew is no exception. In fact, if left to cool in the fridge and reheated the day after, this presents the opportunity to skim off the lamb fat that would have gelled together in the cold. In order to speed up the cooking process, it’s completely possible to cook this dish in a pressure cooker, which can reduce the cooking time from 3 hours to 30 minutes, thus saving time and energy. However, the stew will probably still need to be reduced down to your desired thickness before serving. While it is possible to thicken the stew with flour or corn starch, I prefer not to as it doesn’t increase the flavour concentration of the stew. If you however decided to use this method, remember to whisk the corn starch or flour with hot water first before pouring into your stew to get rid of lumps which risk sinking to the bottom of the pot and burning, thus ruining your stew.