Day 18

Doesn't everyone want to make a salmon mousse? What, no? Well I don't know what to tell you. It was not on the top of my list either. So I'll tell you how we made it. We pureed salmon in a food processor and then added egg whites and salt and pepper. We needed to check the seasoning before adding the cream so we pan fried a mini salmon patty. It needed more salt. Once the cream was incorporated we used this mousse in two different preparations.
The first preparation was to make a salmon forcemeat of sorts. We wrapped and shaped the salmon mousse into log shapes with plastic wrap. They have to be super tight and well wrapped. Many many distasteful jokes followed the rolling of the salmon logs. I'm sure you can see why.
It was just too easy. They got poached and then sliced . We had folded in some blanched carrot and bell pepper brunoise. It looks like confetti. I love it. Not the taste of the mousse so much as just the appearance of the specks in the roll.
The other way we used the mousse was to slather it onto fillets of sole and roll them up to make paupiettes. These we poached in a court boullion and served over a beurre blanc and a bed of sauteed spinach.
Yes mine looks pretty nice. I will explain how I was scored lower than I liked. I like perfect scores in case you forgot. I had too much protein on the plate. I should have only plated two of the three pieces of fish. I would have done just 2 but they did not look good. Uneven and all lobsided. I thought one would make chef annoyed because he can eat very large amounts of protein in one sitting. Once I saw him put down a pork chop and then a lamb burger. He is French. So I over filled my plate. Bad choice that as you can see below got me a 9/10 for plate. For temperature I really took a hit. I have excuses though. My plate sat on his table waiting for him to finish testing others (3 others) plates first. So I had reheated my fish in the court boullion liquid and thought they had enough heat for serving. Not so much. The internal temp was only 123 or so which is warm, not hot. Other people didn't even heat the fish back up except for when they flashed the plate in the oven before serving. They got 5- I got 6. Mine was not COLD! So I was frusterated. Whatever. Lesson learned. It was warm, not hot. I am still pissed.
Tomorrow we are doing 2 plates. I will fare better. I am sure. We also pan seared salmon fillets. Not a full plate but I think he was just checking to see if we knew how to basically cook a really common fish. Mine was fine. It had good color and was cooked medium rare +. Almost too medium rare, but fine.

Monkfish and John Dory tomorrow. I am telling myself "one plate at a time".