We did an Argentinian FAM trip this week. These are when a group of travel agents or travel journalists from a certain country are invited to travel our area in an organized tour that takes them to visit and dine at places organizing the trip. We do them often depending on the season.
For a special appetizer course to be served to the group, I wanted to expose them to the technique, flavor, and texture of sous-vide salmon. This way, I could design the plate flavors to work with the almost raw, though cooked, texture of salmon prepared this way. The salmon was cooked at 52C which should have actually been done at 50C. It would have had a more vibrant orange color at 50. I use 52 at a boundary after reading about Bruno Goussault's statement that many of the proteins in the fish begin to denature at 52C. The pseudo-raw texture was the reasoning for the spanish name which translates to 'sushi slow-cooked' (at least it does in my gringo lingo).
The salmon was brined for 25 minutes before bagging and cooking. It sits on top of lemon coriander jasmine rice (cooked jasmine folded with a cilantro lemon zest puree). Braised baby bok choi (in ginger and dashi broth), sesame nori furikake, and micro cilantro complete it. 2 sauces are added... soja sauce and a lemongrass syrup that I made after failing to create lemongrass jelly by not adding enough pectin to it.
I want to spend a lot more time working on my plate presentations and creating elements that will set them off. This one is not bad, but element portions definitely should have been estimated better ahead of time. Applying the sauces with more controllable bottles instead of spoons would have also improved the vision. Although there is much room for improvement, I like the organic flow of it. Still thinking.
