This is a rather easy disg to do. And oooooooohhhhhhhmg how good it is! You basically inhale everything on your plate. So if you want to have "just a little", don't even put it on your plate. Then you might be able to save some for later. If you would want to. Why would you, I'm not sure.
There were some "funny" mishaps while preparing this dish, like the piping bag breaking and someone forgetting to pick all the fish bones... But of course, cooking is like that. I'm fairly happy with the duchesse roses, after working with the torn down piping bag and VERY hot mashed potatoes... You live, you learn.
Hope you do better than me - enjoy! :)
Duchesse roses
~500 g of floury potatoes
3 tbsp butter
3 egg yolks
½ tsp nutmeg
water from boiling the potatoes and/or milk
salt, black pepper
Gratin sauce
1,5 dl dry white wine
1,5 dl fish broth
1 shallot or small onion
~15 small fresh button mushrooms (or as much as you like)
½ dl wheat flour
1 dl cream
1-2 dl grated cheese (robust tasting)
butter
thyme (dried or fresh)
salt, pepper
Other
~800 g zander (about 4 fillets)
~1 dl de-shelled shrimp (larger the better)
fresh thyme twigs to garnish
First, get the mashed potatoes going: wash, peel and dice the potatoes. Boil in salted water until cooked. Pour the boiling water away, but take some in a cup before you do. Let steam dry on a warm stove (the stove can't be on though!).
Add the butter and mash until pureed. Add the yolks and the seasoning, if it feels dry, add some of the boiling water, cream or milk once you have the desired consistency (it has to go down the piping tube you know). Let cool.
Butter a casserole tin. Once the mashed potates have cooled down enough, use piping bag or piping tube to create pretty roses on the sides of the tin. If you don't have anything for piping, use two spoons the best you can. No worries, the taste is the same :) Cook the potatoes in 225 C oven for about 10 minutes, or until it stars to brown a bit. Not too long though, it'll get more time in the oven soon. Once ready, let it rest.
For the gratin sauce, start with peeling and mincing the onion. Clean the mushrooms, if small leave as is, or cut in half or if very big, slices. Heat up a pan, add butter and minced onion. Sauté the onions, add mushrooms and sauté a bit more. Add the flour and heat for a few minutes (don't fry, they'll turn brown and it's not the point). Measure in the wine and fish broth, add bit more butter and seasonings. Boil about 10 minutes. Add cream and boil a few minutes more. Taste, add salt or pepper if needed. Add cheese and let melt.
Put the zander in the casserole tin (where the duchesse potatoes already are). Put shrimp on top of the zander. Pour the sauce on top of everything; try to get it even.
(It's easy to overcook the shrimp in this recipe, so try and use the larger ones you get. Alternatively, you can add shrimp on top of everything few minutes before the dish is ready - provided you have pre-cooked shrimp. If you do this, you can always put a bit of grated cheese on top to make it pretty too.)
Bake in 225 C for about 15 minutes or when the grating is nicely brown. Not too much though, otherwise the zander and shrimp will go over (they won't get spoiled still though).
Garnish with fresh thyme twigs and enjoy with cooled white wine! I'd go for Riesling, although this time we enjoyed it with Gewürstraminer (since we had it), and it did go really well. I guess it's your basic rule of thumb; if you use the same wine for cooking and dringking it always (?) goes together.
I'd do this on a Sunday, but I'd also do this on a Tuesday to brighten up a day :)
