Chef Vitalii Savelev won the Euro Asia S.Pellegrino Young Chef regional final.
Courtesy of Chef Vitalii Savelev
Flatfish Cooked in Sunflower Seeds with Potatoes Baked in a Russian Oven
05 Oct 2020
Difficulty
Intermediate
Total Time
4H 20MIN
Ingredients
Soles: 1
Baked potato: 200 g
Butter: 80 g
Dill: 15 g
Scallion: 10 g
Mustard sauce: 50 g
Salted tomatoes: 30 g
15 g
Sunflower seeds
Tomato jelly: 45 g
Salt: to taste
Black pepper: to taste
Vegetable oil: 100 g
Sunflower seeds: 200 g, roasted and peeled
Granular mustard: 50 g
Egg yolks: 3
Honey: 20 g
Butter: 70 g
Tofu cheese: 25 g
Vegetable oil: 100 g
White wine vinegar: 4 g
Salt: to taste
Black pepper: to taste
This recipe for flatfish cooked in sunflower seeds with potatoes is baked in a Russian oven, and uses unrefined sunflower oil, traditional only to Russia. The recipe was developed by Vitalii Savelev as a way to communicate Russian memories and traditions through flavours and home cooking.
See below for the recipe and steps.
01.
Fry the seeds until they go a brown colour, put into a container and cover with oil. Let it brew for 1 day.
02.
For the baked potato
Wash the potatoes and put them a highly-preheated oven (preferably on charcoal) at 240C for 35 minutes until fully cooked. Peel and cut into small pieces.
Chef tips: If you don't have a Russian oven, you can use a simple convection oven.
03.
For the tomato jelly
Wash 2 kg of tomatoes, cut into big pieces, add salt and pepper, and put on a deep baking pan. Add a couple of twigs of thyme and basil, cover with foil and put in the oven for 35 minutes at 185°C.
04.
Put the prepared tomatoes in a sieve with a towel and put under a press for a couple of hours to obtain clear, concentrated juice.
05.
Pour the juice into a saucepan (300 g), add 2 g of gelatine (thickener) and 1 g of agar (thickener), bring to a boil and pour into a siphon (fill the siphon with 2 gas cylinders). Let the siphon cool to 50C.
Chef tip: If you don't have siphon, it is not a problem, you can do it without (it will be another texture, but the same taste).
06.
Put the mass in a high glass (air jelly should be obtained), let it cool in a refrigerator for 15 minutes, cut out jelly balls using a special spoon.
07.
For fish
Fillet the fish, put it in a tall wooden bowl, add Salt, pepper and oil.
08.
Fry the seeds in a dry pan (the temperature of the seed should be 120C).
09.
Fill the fish with hot seeds and leave for 10 minutes.
10.
Heat the butter to room temperature (it should be liquid), put the yolks in a saucepan and beat with butter in a water bath until it becomes thickened.
11.
Put mustard, honey, vegetable oil, tofu, salt, pepper and vinegar into the mass.
12.
Beat with a blender until smooth and rub through a fine sieve. The sauce must be put in a siphon and kept warm until serving.
13.
Heat 200 g of broth with butter in a saucepan, add baked potatoes, bring to a boil and add cut green onion and dill.
14.
Cut salted tomatoes.
15.
Plating
Put heated potatoes on the bottom of the plate without closing the center. Place mustard sauce from the siphon in the center of the plate and put tomato jelly balls on the top of it.
16.
Put tomatoes and dill springs on the top of the potatoes.
17.
Remove the seeds from the fish, break into small pieces, and put on the top of the sauce. Before serving, drizzle with seed oil and add fried seeds.
18.
The final dish.
