Smoked eel in grilled soup
The grilled flavours in this soup and the smoky flavour of the eel are balanced out perfectly by the crème fraîche.
Equipment
- cast iron grill pan
- toaster (or oven)
- cheese slicer or mandoline
- silicone brush
- hand blender
- cast iron Japanse teapot (optional)
Ingredients
- 1 zucchini
- 200 gr leek
- 1 fennel
- 1 shallot
- 2 cloves of garlic
- olive oil
- butter
- 4 sprigs of fresh thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 500 ml chicken broth
- 200 ml white wine
- 2 eel fillets
- 1 slice of casino white bread
- 2 tbsp crème fraîche
- pepper & salt
- zorri cress
Instructions
Zucchini
- Start by grilling the zucchini. Slice it lengthwise using a cheese slicer or mandoline. When almost at the middle, turn it around. When the middle part gets to thin to slice, keep that part apart for later.
- Put the cast iron grill pan on high heat.
- Meanwhile brush the zucchini with some olive oil.
- Grill each slice on both sides. Make sure you don't crowd the slices. I usually grill 3 or 4 slices at a time.
Leek & fennel
- Chop the shallot finely and cut the left over zucchini as well as the fennel in small pieces. Cut the leek in rings.
- Fry the onion on low heat in a frying pan until glassy. Then press 2 cloves of garlic and add those, as well as the chopped vegetables and some butter.
- Fry for 5 minutes and then add the white wine. Let it reduce a bit.
Soup
- Now put all the vegetables (grilled zucchini as well) in a soup pan and add the bay leaves, thyme and the broth. Put it on low heat for 15 minutes.
- Then take out the bay leaves and the thyme and use the hand blender to make a smooth soup.
Serving
- Toast the slice of white bread and cut 12 thumb sized pieces of it. Put crème fraîche on each of them.
- Slice both of the eel fillets in 6 pieces (12 in total).
- Put 3 pieces of toast on each plate and a piece of eel on each piece of bread. Finish with a leave of zorri cress on each piece of eel.
- Put the soup in the Japanese teapot.
- Serve the plates without the soup.
- Add the soup to the plates at the table, both for dramatic effect and to make sure the toast remains intact until (and mostly during) eating.