#6 Poached Salmon Miso Soup

When I first started watching Ramsay's Ultimate Cookery Course, I was immediately intrigued by his beautiful Poached Salmon Miso Soup, however, there was one ingredient in there that remains mysterious, the fish stock. From what I could recall from shopping at various supermarkets, there were only chicken stock on the shelves so where was I suppose to get FISH stock? In the video, Ramsay just pulls fish stock out of his fridge like it was the MOST common thing in the world, but after googling fish stock and even fish stock substitutes I ended up with one conclusion...there can be NO replacement, I have to start with fresh fish, slice up fish fillets, and use the bones to make my own basic fish stock.

Now let me tell you, as much as I love dry-fried whole fish...I am dreadfully fearful of any meat that retains it's original form... It's so scary to even TOUCH it let alone butcher it and carve out fillets. But great food comes with great challenge right? I realized in order to be a good cook I need to woMAN up and stop being afraid.

I went to the market and picked out a Seabass and told myself to start getting comfortable with it. Thank goodness the markets here already do a pretty good job in gutting and cleaning the fish so luckily I just have to do a little more knife work.

So here I'm thinking okay, just chop off the the head and carve out some fillets, shouldn't be too hard... But how WRONG am I... The seabass, not even a large fish, proves to have harder bones than I imagined. Since I have absolutely NO idea what I'm doing, being precise wasn't even an option! And I probably wasn't even using the right knife? ...knives?

After a lot of squealing and struggling, I finally managed to get MOST of the meat off and chopped the fishbone into several sections ready for boiling. 

Not the prettiest sight, but it was the best I could do at the time. For a first try...I don't think it's too bad. However, I feel bad for the fish...so sorry. As you probably guessed, the fish fillets were made into a beautiful Thai inspired, Lemon Steamed Fish, delicious fragrant. Lemon has become a "must" in my dishes these days.

Okay, so on with the stock!

To make a basic fish stock requires searing the vegetables and fish in a large pan then adding white wine, water, and fresh thyme to boil and simmer for 30-40mins.

Since I was running short on time, I decided to sear everything in a large pan with some olive oil and pour all the contents into the slow cooker so I don't have to keep watch, allowing me to attend to other chores.

Ingredients

1 fishbone (I used seabass)

1/2 tablespoon of olive oil

1 carrot, chopped

1/2 onion

2 celery stalks, chopped

1 garlic clove

1 teaspoon thyme

1/2 cup white wine

salt, pepper

4 cups of water

I pour two cups of water on the outer layer and soon you have steamy hot fish stock. I drained the soup to clear all the bits and pieces.

Volia! You may use immediately in your dishes, refridgerate, or freeze for later.

The only disappointment is... after all that hard work and time, I was left with barely a large bowl of stock.

FINALLY with the last of the ingredients for my Miso Soup is sitting right in the fridge. READY! I was so excited to see how the dish would come out. Today, I've invited my roommate and colleague as guinea pigs to try it out.

#6 Poached Salmon Miso Soup

Ingredients.

Salmon ............................197NT

Miso, Fish stock ................30NT

Kaffir leaf, Chilli, ginger ......5NT

Bok Choy ........................6NT

Mushrooms .....................16NT

TOTAL: 254NT (for three)

Several things went wrong here:

1. I had no idea how long I was suppose to poached the salmon, it's color changed quite quickly but the insides were still fairly raw. Then of course the thickness of the salmon was uneven, so even when most of it was cooked, there were a few thicker parts that were still a bit raw.

2. How did Ramsay managed to push the salmon slices off so effortlessly, creating beautiful neat slices... I gave up mid-way and just went with small shredded pieces of salmon.

But apart from the little bumps in the road mentioned above... the broth tasted amazing! Never had anything like it before!

All the flavors blend together beautifully, in fact, it didn't even taste like traditional miso soup, it's one of a kind.

I believe the fresh fish stocks really enhanced the flavor, bringing it up to a whole new level, which just proves that making things from scratch really DOES make a difference. HUGE difference.

It won't be long before I try to fillet a fish again and make some fish stock early in advance so I can pull out seafood dishes with amazing flavors on the go.

I swear, Ramsay continues to inspire and amaze me every single day. 

Can I marry this guy please?

Lesson 3: Get organized.

From organizing my actual cooking space, famailirizing, to preparing all the ingredients beforehand makes cooking a lot less hectic and even more enjoyable.

Soon, amazing dishes will be coming out of your kitchen everyday!