Season Foods: French Cuisine #2

Bisque de langoustines - Scampi Bisque

Main Ingredient - Scampi

Mis en place - items to prepare

1. Mirepoix - Carrots, Onion, Celery, Leek all diced
2. Fresh tomatoes, Garlic Cloves
3. Cooking Liquid - Dry white wine, Cognac, Fish Stock + Water, Tomato paste
4. Bouquet Garni - Leek green part (parsley, bay leaf, Thyme)
5. Seasoning - Cayenne Pepper, Salt, Pepper
6. Rice Flour, Butter, Cream, Olive Oil
7. Garnish - Breadloafs

Starting with the Mis en place -preparing all the ingredients before cooking.

What is a Mirepoix?

Mirepoix pronounced (mir pwah)
is a mixture of vegetables particularly used to enhance their flavors by either; saute or just adding to any other stock. The three main ingredient for a "mirepoix" are (Carrots, Onions, Celery).

They produce the most fragrant aromas when combined and are great for making Soup, Stock, Sauces & other flavor enhanced dishes.

Dice the Mirepoix items (Carrots, Onion, Celery, Leek) into cube shapes 1-2cm should be good enough, then put aside. Now for
the next step.

Mis en place 40% COMPLETED.

Blanching tomatoes.

Next step includes blanching the tomatoes to remove the skin in a very easy way.
First start by boiling water up to the point where the tomatoes can be submerged thoroughly in the water & adding a pinch of salt.

(I hope you don't need a picture of a pot with water boiling in it... do you?)

By cutting cross shapes along the top and bottom of the tomatoes when blanching helps the removal of the skin when blanched at boiling point.

Blanching them for 15-20 seconds during boiling point should be enough. Next step is to now is to remove the skin and then scoop out the tomato seeds.

(Do you need a picture for this too?)

Once they're seedless, then dice them & set aside

What is a Bouquet Garni???

Now a Bouquet Garni is the assortion of herbs usually put in stock or sauces to bring aromatic flavors to the dish. The usual bouquet garni consists of Thyme, Parsley, and Laurel Leaves and twined together with a thread.

The green part of the leek acts as a mechanism to hold them together in place so they stay bundled together within the twine.

You wouldn't want these herbs ending up in your dish.

Once you got these set now you can prepare the other items. Crushing the garlic (self explanatory - not rocket science, actually it is science.)

OK MIS EN PLACE COMPLETED 100% - assuming you prepared all the other ingredients aside, like the cognac wine fish stock etc.

Succession in a big pot.

First off, your going to get your olive oil and pour them in a big pot. This is where it gets interesting. You know the Mis en place, are going to be getting thrown in the pot in perfect sequence.

Once the olive oil is in there on a burner at about med-high heat, you start with the onions, they'll begin to sizzle... this is where the science part takes place. Anyway, once they turn lightly translucent, you add in the carrots, let that sizzle for a few. then you add in the leeks and celery. Wait until you get that smell, like your doing good and the food is smelling fragrant and aromatic, (if it smells like burnt carrots then you've over cooked them.)

Now add in the scampi. With a mallet or baseball bat,
crush all the scampi inside the pot. Go berzerk because its time to relieve some stress at this point. once your done going all out on the poor little scampis keep stiring them until the juices in the pot are semi reduced.

Add alittle tomato paste. Its good to stir it in right after the massacre because you give it time to let the acidity in the paste evaporate before the Flambe.

its fire time. Add in the cognac, NOT TO MUCH; unless u want to burn ur kitchen down. keep it to a minimum about a shot glass or two. light it up with a kitchen lighter
keep your eyebrows away from the pot. (learned the hard way)
then add the white wine, fishstock and fill it up with water. Just enough so all the ingredients are submerged, leaving about 5mm of water space between submerged ingredients. Season with Cayenne Pepper, Salt & Pepper.

Let that simmer for about 1 hour. Check occasionally. Main goal is to reduce until you have a semi soup texture. Add water if it becomes to reduced in liquids.

Now ready for emulsion?

You can do it this way, with a high powered emulsion blender. Or you can use a regular blender. Take out the Bouquet Garni, and then add the rest of it in a blender or use an emulsion blender directly in the pot.

Make sure to take out the Bouquet Garni**

Once they're blended well, strain it two or three times. the shells are flavorless and also a bit dangerous. So make sure they're well strained. The reason for keeping the shells on up until this point is because, they contribute ALOT into the flavor when you are boiling it in the pot. What your doing is extracting all the flavors in the ingredients and then removing the excess and using only the liquids.

Once strained and the soup is just a liquid add to another pot, your going to add some rice flour to thicken the soup (only if the soup is still very watery). You dont need that much rice flour, or at all if your soup is reduced enough. Your going to add in cream to the stock to make it more silky.

Once you acquired "soup texture," your going to add butter (optional). With a whisk your going to whisk in some butter. However butter becomes dangerous when you reboil the soup with the butter inside. They begin to seperate. So butter is recommended before serving.

Making croutons.
Bread + Cube Cuts + butter + Salt & Pepper + Pan. (I think you get the jist...)

There you have it. Scampi Bisque. I want to add that this is an amaaazing meal. I usually love dunking sandwiches in them. Thats just me though. Enjoy!

I am an amateur chef posting my process, that I've learned in culinary art school. I want to share all my experiences with the world on steemit; to help expand this community.

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