More descriptive food writing: Mushroom Stuffed Turbot

Turbot fillet stuffed w/ King Trumpet mushrooms & Buckwheat noodles and a side of fried plantain chips

I’m always ready for some more descriptive food writing. So, today I thought I’d write a post about our dinner last night. Our good friend Amelina, who we haven’t seen for a while, dropped by. She arrived with her own piping hot teapot for herself and a bottle of red wine for us. Earlier in the day I had decided that I would make the two turbot fillets that I bought the other day in Manhattan, and I’d use the King Trumpet mushrooms which I had also purveyed this past weekend. While Amelina filled us in on what’s been going on in her life since we last saw her, I opened up a couple of dozen Hama-Hama and Eagle Rock oysters and then I got to work making my fish dinner, while we slurped down the oysters.  Here’s what I did:

Using the food processor, I finely chopped two medium white onions, four cloves of garlic and a large red jalapeno pepper.  Replacing the food processor blade with a slicing disk I then sliced up the large King Trumpet mushrooms. From the refrigerator, I retrieved a bowl of buckwheat noodles which I refreshed in cool water, and set it aside. In a hot sauté pan I cooked the onions, then added the peppers with the garlic and, in a separate pan, I sautéed the sliced mushrooms. After all my ingredients were cooked, I combined them in a work bowl by gently tossing them with a fork. Next I buttered a small oven proof glass casserole dish. Carefully, I unwrapped the fish fillets, rinsed them, and patted them dry with paper towels. I then placed each turbot fillet in the baking dish so that half the fish draped out on to the counter. Alternating, I added a small amount of buckwheat noodles onto each fillet and about ½ cup of my onion, garlic, pepper and mushroom mixture on top of the noodles to create several layers of a stuffing. Then I folded over on top of the stuffing the part of the fillet that was outside the dish, added a small pat of unsalted butter on top of each stuffed fillet and a pinch of fresh ground white pepper. After loosely covering the casserole dish with a piece of aluminum foil, I placed the dish in a preheated 400° oven and baked it for about 12 minutes.

While the fish was baking, I made a quick sauce by combining the following ingredients in a small sauce pan: ½ medium, finely chopped shallot, 1 cup of white wine, the juice from half a lemon, a bay leaf, a handful of black peppercorns, and three sprigs of fresh tarragon. I reduced it over high heat down to about ¼ cup of liquid and then whisked in 4 tablespoons of unsalted butter.

When the fish was ready, I removed it from the oven, cut each fillet in half, plated it and drizzled a little of my sauce over each piece. Dinner was served, along with an arugula, fennel and baby greens salad tossed with mirin vinaigrette.

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