How to Roast a Lamb_ New Greek Classic Cooking - Michael Psilakis [91]
DILL OIL
In a blender, purée all the ingredients on high speed until smooth. Pass through a fine tamis sieve. Note: You will have Dill Oil left over for another use.
TO ASSEMBLE
Warm the Cucumber-Yogurt Broth. Remove the warm Poached Halibut from the Court Bouillon. Place each piece of fish in the bottom of a large individual serving bowl. Place a domino of the Lemon Gelée in the center of each piece of fish, and put a Pickled Sardine on top of the lemon. Garnish the top of the fish with the Dried Thássos Olives and Dehydrated Feta, a few grains of sea salt, and some pepper.
Loosely mound the Cypriot Salad on the fish so it is slightly falling off into the center of the bowl; let the baby vegetables fall at random. Drizzle the Dill Oil over the salad. Place a small quenelle of caviar opposite the fish on the plate.
At the table, pour the warm Cucumber-Yogurt Broth around the edges.
SKORDALIA POTATO-GARLIC SOUP WITH CRISPY BACALIAROS CONFIT & BEET TARTARE
SERVES 4
All over Greece, you will see Cod Skordalia (page 98), the inspiration for this dish, with very few, if any, regional variations. This is a universally beloved dish throughout Greek cuisine.
The traditional dish is one of my mother’s favorites. I created this refined version because I wanted to show her how we could evolve something so close to her heart. Here, we capture the soul of the traditional by also bringing in another typical tavern combination of roasted beets with yogurt. These are dishes not usually found on the same plate, but they work together to unify the new, more refined plate that we serve at Anthos.
The same assertive, acidic flavors are here, but the boldness is mellowed with a dairy product: instead of heavy cream, it’s sheep’s milk yogurt. The grassy sheep-milk flavor of the yogurt acts as the unifying element for everything else on the plate, adding both texture and flavor to the acid of the lemon and heat of the garlic that defines skordalia. We emulsify the yogurt and the potato-garlic purée to create a very rich and elegant velvety soup that is still construable as skordalia.
Rather than roasting the beets, we represent them as an assertively spiced tartare, allowing us to incorporate additional depths of flavor. The cod, bacaliaros, has been turned into a confit. Then we make a wildly flavorful Mediterranean salad with the confit, adding capers and lots of fresh herbs. For texture, we add another piece of cod—this time, it’s fried. As soon as the bowl is placed in front of the guest, a server comes by and pours the skordalia soup over the elements already in the bowl. The guest is encouraged to take a spoon and swirl all the elements together. Now, the purple swirls of beet tartare move throughout the silky white soup, the ingredients in the salad disperse, and the crispy, flaky fried cod retains a little bit of its texture.
In each spoonful you get a little of everything, and all the flavors become one. That’s the beauty of soup. It’s one of the rare dishes where you can actually control the experience of the palate from beginning to end. As with all of my Anthos dishes, the theater is a part of this experience too. It’s knowing what is in the bowl when it arrives as separate elements, then having them melded together before your eyes.
When my mother ate this soup at the restaurant, she immediately identified its roots. Tears came to her eyes as she asked, “How do you come up with these things?” My reply: “A lifetime of memories from the meals that you created when I was growing up.”
FOR THE BEET TARTARE
2 large red beets, peeled and roughly chopped
2 tablespoons capers
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon grated fresh horseradish
1 teaspoon finely chopped dill
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh mint leaves
1 teaspoon