Pierre Gagnaire’s Roasted Pollack recipe & Perrier-Jouët Blanc de Blanc
Pierre Gagnaire’s Roasted Pollack recipe & Perrier-Jouët Blanc de Blanc
This elegant fish dish is a celebration of three beautiful products: fresh, sustainable pollack, seasonal apples, and of course, Perrier-Jouët Blanc de Blancs. As with all of Chef Pierre Gagnaire’s recipes, the ingredients have been expertly selected to complement the complex sensory experience contained within a glass of fine cuvée.
Here, the mineral freshness of the champagne marries with the delicate pollack, a squeeze of citrus, and the saline minerality of the fresh seaweed. Pierre Gagnaire explains, “the texture of the fresh seaweed works really well with the champagne. This can probably be explained by the fact that the champagne has salty ocean notes.”
The sweetness of roast apple balances out the vibrancy of the seaweed and citrus while enhancing honey notes in the Perrier-Jouët Blanc de Blancs—a flavor achieved by lightly caramelizing a King of the Pippins apple in plenty of butter.
When it comes to cooking the pollack, use your senses. The fish should be golden-brown and beautifully tender. This, as Pierre Gagnaire tells us, “is the art of fire” and learning it cannot be rushed.
Practical Information
- People: For 4
- Preparation time: 30 to 40 minutes
Ingredients
- 4 140 g pieces of pollack with the skin left on
- 3 King of the Pippins apples
- 200 g unsalted butter
- 1 organic lemon
- 50 g all-purpose flour
- 50 ml single cream
- 150 g fresh seaweed (dulse, nori, wakame, sea lettuce)
- a mix of chopped flat-leaf parsley, chervil and chives (around 1 tablespoon per person)
- grapeseed oil
- fine sea salt
- Sarawak white pepper (ground)
Recipe steps
Step 1: Cooking the apples
- Peel and core the apples, then cut them into large cubes.
- In a frying pan, cook them with 80 g of butter. Stir them regularly for 5 minutes, add the lemon juice and zest, and lightly season with salt.
- Then cook them with the lid on for 10 minutes, the apples should be soft and lightly browned. Keep them warm.
Step 2: Cooking the pollack
- Lightly salt the pieces of pollack.
- Brush the skin with cream and place them on a bed of flour. Remove any excess by tapping the fish.
- Heat the grapeseed oil in a non-stick frying pan. Place each piece of pollack skin-side down and cook over a low heat for 4 minutes.
- Remove the pollack pieces from the pan and leave them to rest for 20 minutes.
- Clean the pan, add 100 g of fresh butter and put the pollack pieces back into the pan for a couple of minutes, while basting them frequently.
- Remove the fish from the heat and sprinkle it with lemon on the flesh side.
Step 3: Finish and presentation
- Remove the leaves from the herbs and chop them.
- Blanch the seaweed in boiling water for 1 minute, then drain and trim it.
- Pour the apples into the pan used for the fish. Add the rest of the cream and cook for a few seconds.
- Arrange the apples on 4 warm flat plates.
- Put the herb mixture into the pan and place it on top of the apples.
- Place the apples in the center of the plate, put the pollack on top and the seaweed mixture on the side. Serve the remaining garnish separately.