Poached Trout

http://blogs.kqed.org/essentialpepin/2011/09/19/poached-trout-in-vegetable-broth/

The other day, I got two brown trout from Chip. He had cleaned and frozen them, and, knowing Chip, they can safely be considered fresh.

We used to have a trout feast now and then in Switzerland. There was a fish farm near Sargans and that was not a far drive from Zurich, where I lived with our parents, and it definitely was not far from St. Gallen, where we lived all four of us when I was working in Switzerland back in the first four years of the 70’s.

Trout was always considered a delicacy. It has such a tender, sweet taste, and the only way it should be eaten is fresh (!) and poached. Pan fry and grilling and all other methods just toughen the meat and take the taste out of the fish and you never know what you eat. Some recipes will just try to put some taste back into it but they never succeed. They simply want to cater to those habitual fryers. You'll agree with me once you had 'truite bleu', or 'Forelle blau'. This name, French and German, means 'blue trout' which I have never heard used here in the states. The name comes from the fact that the skin of the freshly caught rainbow trout takes on a soft blue hue when it is poached. But it must be fresh! Wherein lies the problem for us.

Anyway, there were the three brown trouts Chip had caught one recent morning at the Harriman Reservoir down near the Whitingham water lock (where the water enters the pipe to the powerhouse). The first one I tried grilling - more for speed than expecting good taste and only I can be blamed for the relative disappointment. I grilled it in lemon butter and while the taste was not bad at all, the texture was totally wrong. I served it with stir fried peppers, yellow, green, red and orange, and a fresh spinach salad with Catalina dressing, of course. I also served some St. Michelle Gewürztraminer. As far as it goes, it was not a smash, but it was good.

So, for the next round, I planned my preferred poaching. The link above gets where I was while I prepared the meal. Since I usually have not much luck by cutting recipes down to 'serves one' I decided to serve four, the original recipe. After all, I had the fish for the four filets Pépin is asking for.

Let me tell you: Jacques Pépin tells you to serve the meal on a soup plate. That's OK, but choose a soup plate with a low rim, because you'll want to lick the plate. The four servings are so small, the little bit of fat you cannot show at all;) I did use only one potato instead of the two, which is prolly why the serving looks more like an appetizer than a meal. But then, we wanted trout, not spuds. Right?

Because I did not find anyone game to come and join me on short notice - that's because we all gallop through life instead of taking it at a comfortable canter - I wound up with four plates. And I ate two servings, and licked both plates. If you are alone, you can do that, even though - in my case I heard Mims call out her sharp 'Richard', which always meant that I had shocked her in one way or another. Quite a shake-up, if you think you are alone.

I used a South African Chenin Blanc in the recipe, to keep me from suffering in the kitchen, to stay with me for dinner.

This wine was produced by MAN Vintners in 2011. They give their address as Paarl, In the South African Republic. If you search for that on Google World, you see what an obviously blessed wart of our world this is. I won't give you all that talk of berries an fruit and oak and stuff. This wine is good! Balanced, pleasing bouquet, not overly dry and by no means sweet. Just beautiful. 

I send you this a a monument of a memorable dinner.

With love, and never fading wishes to share some of all this with you,

Isa