Lobster with Sous Vide Leek | Recipe by sousvidetools.com

Cured lobster with Sous Vide charred leek and leek consommé

COOK TIME: 16 hours
PREP TIME: 2 hours
DIFFICULTY: Difficult
SERVES: 4

Ingredients

Lobster

1 750g Scottish lobster
6 tbsp of caster sugar
4 tbsp of salt
2 tbsp of chopped dill

Charred leeks

4 leeks, washed
unsalted butter to taste
salt

Lobster furikake

1 tbsp of rice wine
1 pinch of togarashi
salt

Leek ash emulsion

2 eggs
250ml of olive oil

Equipment

Method

This delicious recipe by chef Nuno Mendes has been recreated for our website with kind permission from Great British Chefs

Method

Begin this recipe by preparing the charred leeks. Fill and preheat your water bath to 85°C
Place the trimmed leeks under a very hot grill or on a hotplate and cook until the leeks are dark and charred on the outside. Transfer the leeks to a vacuum pack pouches and vacuum seal
Submerge in the bath and cook sous vide for 20 minutes
Take the leeks out of the pouch and set the juices aside as they will be used for the consommé
Peel away the leeks outer layers until you reach the hearts. Save the outer leaves for the leek ash emulsion and the rest of the trimmings for the consommé. Transfer the leek hearts into the fridge
Fill and preheat the water bath to 90°C for the leek consommé
To make the leek consommé you will need to firstly weigh the leek trimmings. Place in a vacuum pouch and for every 100g add 25ml of water. Vacuum seal the pouches and submerge in the bath to cook sous vide for 14 hours
Take the cooked leek hearts from the fridge and add the juices you set aside earlier. Transfer the mixture to a freezer. Once frozen, line a sieve with a muslin and place over a bowl before placing the frozen leeks inside the sieve. Leave the block to defrost, allowing it to drip through the muslin. You should have a golden brown liquid
Before cooking a lobster you need to insensate it. This is done by placing it in a freezer. Once insensate, it should not resist being handled and will not have control of its limbs. Keep it in the freezer until it reaches this state
Heat a large pan of water on the stove until boiling then take your insensate lobster out of the freezer. Tie its claws together then lay it on its back
To kill the lobster, use a very sharp knife and place the tip just below the lobster’s mouth. Ensure the blade is lined up with the lobster’s middle and that the blade is directed towards the tail
Pierce the head and bring the knife downwards. Next, place the tip of the knife just above the tail and thorax, on the body side, and cut through its middle
Plunge the lobster into the pan of boiling water immediately after killing for approximately 1 ½ minutes. Take the lobster out of the water and then remove the meat from the tail shell. Separate the head, then take the meat from the knuckles and the claws. This needs to be set aside for the fruikake
Make a cure by mixing together the dill, salt and sugar. Use this to spoon both over and under the lobster tail, ensuring it has been completely covered. Transfer to the fridge and allow to cure for 3 hours before removing the tail from the mixture and slicing the thickest section into 4 medallions. Split the remaining meat into 4 rectangular pieces and set aside until ready to serve
Now move on to preparing the lobster fruikake. To do this, take the lobster claws and knuckles and place in a pot along with the rice wine. Allow to cook very slowly for between 45 minutes and 1 hour. You must stir constantly as it cooks. It is ready once the meat has completely dehydrated and has turned into a floss. Use the salt and the togarashi to season before transferring to an airtight container. Set aside until ready to serve
For the leek ash emulsion you will need to preheat your oven to 240°C
Take the outer leaves from the leek (which you set aside earlier) and place in the oven. Cook them until they turn black and are starting to burn. Remove from the oven and allow to cool before using a coffee grinder to grind to a powder
Separate the yolks from the eggs and combine with the olive oil and the leek ash in a food processor. Blitz until the texture resembles mayonnaise

Preparing to serve

Just before serving you will need to reheat the leek hearts in a grill pan along with a little butter and some salt
Make a butter emulsion using 2 parts butter and 1 part water and bringing to a simmer. Warm the rectangular meat pieces from the lobster tails in the emulsion and serve while still warm
Allow the medallions to reach room temperature before drizzling with a small amount of melted butter. Arrange on 4 separate plates
Take some of the butter emulsion and add to the leek hearts. The emulsion can also be used to garnish the plates. Finally, when ready to serve add the warm consommé and the fruikake

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Post by Chris Holland

Our Chef Director Chris Holland worked as Head Chef at the prestigious Alderley Edge hotel before joining us. He has a passion for using the best produce and never compromises on quality. Author of our best selling book Sous Vide The Art of Precision Cooking, Chris is a expert on the sous vide technique.During the later part of my school days at Wardle High School Rochdale I always wanted to be a chef . I knew from the very start that my path to work was never going to be academic it was always going to be something practical and hands on.

As a young boy growing up I was inspired to cook with my Grandma who was and still is an inspiration to me . I have memories of helping make the cakes that she always had made for visitors and family alike . She made the most amazing cakes and I loved nothing more than eating the sweet raw cake batter straight from the bowl . We used to fight over who got to lick the bowl/spoon after the cakes were made. My grandma’s philosophy for cooking even on a shoe string budget was always to use fresh and seasonal ingredients either home grown or bought from the market.

School was somewhat of a drag for me as I was itching to learn to become a chef.

I started at Hopwood Hall college as a chef and instantly fell in love with it .To me it was the only real time I excelled in something and this inspired me to really get my head down and put in the hard work. College was the first time I really excelled in something and gave me the opportunity to laugh at the teachers who said I would never make something of my life!!!!

During the three years at college I also took on a part time position in a local hotel working the bar and restaurant first and then the kitchen. These were great days and gave me the opportunity to see how the industry ticks. I learnt a lot from those days both good and bad !! But I have to say I was itching to work only in the kitchen but it was a good insight into the catering world .

After completing college I moved away from Rochdale for a full time roll at one of Cheshire’s most talked about Hotel restaurants The Stanneylands Hotel. This was the school of hard knocks for me as I quickly realised that although excelling at college meant nothing in “The Real World”.

I loved every minute of the 18 hour days 6 days a week on minimum wage . Although difficult I feel that without this grounding I wouldn’t have achieved what I have today. After 18 months of hard graft I left Stanneylands and went with the Head chef to open a fine dining restaurant at Mere Golf and Country Club. The opportunity to work alongside Matthew Barrett was too good to turn down. I learnt so much from the ex-Ritz chef and working in a much slower paced role helped me develop a much better understanding of how to organise and run a kitchen. We were a very small team and teamwork was and still is the only way to go for me.

After 2 years at Mere I got the opportunity to go into The Alderley Edge Hotel as Junior Souschef. The Early days at the Edge were all about learning new styles of cuising which is invaluable in any role as a chef. I got the opportunity to grow and learn all aspects of every section which was inspiring . I was offered the opportunity at the age of 29 (2004) to take the role of head chef. For me this was when I really started to develop my own style of food.

After 9 years at the top winning Cheshire restaurant of the year , Chef of the Year and appearing on GBM amongst many highlights including cooking for many celebrities and famous people I decided to move on into development with Sousvidetools.

The main inspiration for this was to train and educate people . I always had a great passion for education but could never really see myself at a college . The job is super rewarding and I am proud to say we have become the leading light in sous-vide education in the UK . This is something I am very proud of . Food is my biggest passion and this is what keeps me interested the most . I love to travel and try out other countries cuisines. I am constantly inspired by ingredients and the pursuit of getting the best out of them without destroying their natural flavour .It is super important to me to continue to try and be at the forefront of the food scene this is what inspire me and the team to keep driving forward .

Technology is now widely used in the industry and I am super proud to say we have been a big part of spreading that message.

I am very lucky to be in the position I am and the drive to constantly improve our training and links to the next generation of young budding hospitality chefs.

TI feel that my experience over the last 25 years really enables me to get close and educate the “next generation” of chefs .

The industry which I love is really struggling to bring through new recruits and if I can help that process I will be immensely proud.

The food seen in the Uk has improved dramatically over the last ten years and I feel this will continue with the correct education. What happens next only fate will tell us...

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