April 30th, 2011: "Moroccan Style Sole" and Potato Hash

After a disappointingly tragic time at the "Iron Chef" style event at the end of the semester for my "Food Class" I went home a little forlorn. Being told I was "competent," coming in third and then being told I probably would never cook again didn't make me feel so great. From the Field Cooking School is a nice place with great prices for their classes, but don't expect to be coddled by the proprietor. I, more than likely, will end up taking a couple of classes there. Once I get a real job, anyway.

We cooked a few very simple dishes there that didn't impress too much. The dishes seemed more complicated than they actually were due to naming and portioning. What threw me off with the tilapia dish was that it was a 2" circle of fish on top of a 2" circle of toast and then the hash was called "Potatoes Hash Cookies" and I couldn't comprehend what either of these dishes were.

After finishing a paper I decided I'd give these dishes another try and give myself one hour to make them. This time, instead of making them as part of a team, I made them on my own. I spiced up the "hash" which was bacon, potatoes and chives, at the contest, by adding green peppers. Not a big change, but the pepper flavor added a much richer dimension to the dish. I was very pleased with myself on that.

Instead of using tilapia in 2" circles, I decided to make it into a main dish instead of an appetizer and use sole instead of tilapia. The original recipe called for pepper, cumin, coriander and salt, I added paprika and ancho pepper to the mix to give it a bit more bite. To top it, at the contest, we used a mango and cilantro topping. I added a dash of white vinegar and olive oil to give it a more "dressing/sauce" type of feel, something I wish I did at the contest. The bite and flavor of my mango topping was much more complex and complimented the taste of the fish and spices much better than the simple topping at the contest.

I also found that I'm not that keen on Sole. It's just not that great of a fish, it seems bland and boring to me. I also added to my kitchen this weekend by re-purposing a pint size whiskey bottle into my olive oil bottle. It looks totally bad ass. My girlfriend and I enjoyed the meal while watching Date Night, a movie that was surprisingly fun, and over estimating how quickly my body was able to metabolize alcohol. She was impressed by the meal, she found it to be a much more elegant meal than she anticipated me making within an hour