When you’re thinking about Valentine’s Day, who else to ask for culinary advice but a Frenchman? Jerome Cogné is head chef at Bouchon Bistrot, Hexham, and he’s our newest appetite columnist. To introduce him, what could be more fitting than this sumptuous supper, for Valentine’s Day, for Mother’s Day, for every day?
Roasted Anjou pigeon breast, sweetcorn galette, wild
mushrooms & Madeira sauce
Ingredients
Serves 4
4 whole Anjou pigeon
1 small savoy cabbage
250g wild mushrooms
for the galette
110g cooked sweetcorn
1 whole egg + 1 egg yolk
60g plain flour
250ml double cream
30ml milk
for the Madeira sauce
100g shallots
1 glass Madeira
veal stock
garniture aromatique – carrots, celery, onion
Method
For the sweetcorn galette; mix sweetcorn, egg and egg yolk together, add flour and whisk, add cream and milk. Season and set aside to rest for 1 hour.
For the sauce; sweat garniture aromatique with the shallots, allow to start to colour, add Madeira and reduce, add stock then reduce again. Sieve then boil on a high heat, add cubes of cold butter and whisk.
For the cabbage; cut leaves into fine strips (Julienne), blanch in boiling water until tender, drain and set aside.
Slice mushrooms, ready for action.
Start cooking galette, like a thick pancake, in a small frying pan in a pre-heated oven,
10-15 mins each side at 175C/Gas 4.
Pan fry (with oil and butter) whole pigeon on each side to colour, then oven roast for 10 mins (for pink) at 175C/Gas4. Rest for 15 mins; take breast off bone.
Pan fry blanched cabbage with
butter, salt and pepper, then mushrooms. Put galette in the centre of the plate, the cabbage on top, mushrooms around the plate, then the pigeon breast and Madeira sauce.
Pan-fried mackerel, warm potato salad and wholegrain mustard vinaigrette
Ingredients
Serves 4
4 fillets fresh mackerel
12 new potatoes
mixed salad leaves
for the vinaigrette
wholegrain mustard
chardonnay vinegar
vegetable oil
Method
Start with the vinaigrette; mix salt & pepper with mustard, add a touch of vinegar, then add the oil slowly while you whisk vigorously, then taste and season further if needed.
Cook the potatoes in salted water until cooked through, cool slightly, peel and dice into small cubes, and then add a spoonful of the vinaigrette.
In a non-stick pan, cook the fish (skin side down) on a medium heat for about 3 mins. Remove from the heat, then turn over to the flesh side and set aside. It will finish cooking like this.
Put the warm potato salad on the plate, add a mackerel fillet, then mixed salad (which should have been dressed beforehand)
Et Voilà, Bon Appétit!
Tarte fine aux pommes
Ingredients
1 roll puff pastry
12 Golden Delicious apples
melted butter
caster sugar
Method
Roll puff pastry to 4mm thickness. Cut a 15cm disc out of the pastry.
Peel apples, cut them in half, core then slice to 2 mm thick.
Arrange slices neatly on top of the puff pastry until covered, brush with melted butter; sprinkle over some sugar.
Cook in the oven for 20-25 mins at 175C/Gas 4 until light in colour.
Serve warm (rather than hot) with a scoop of ice cream or crème fraiche. Délicieux!
