Twice-baked salmon and dill souffles

The first time I ever attempted souffle, the result was a rather nice frittata. It tasted great but it was flat as a pancake - and not a Scandinavian one. (In my defence, I would like to point out that we didn’t have an electric mixer and I was attempting to whisk egg whites to a satisfactory state of stiffness entirely by hand). So I was pleased that the Leiths course would be covering souffle.

In particular we made twice-baked salmon and dill souffles. The advantage with twice-baked souffles is that they are slightly easier and you can prepare them up to 24 hours in advance. We made white sauce and combine it with egg yolks, dill and salmon. We also whisked (with an electric mixer!) the egg whites and then folded it into the salmon mixture. We baked the souffles in ramekins (or teacups or your vessel of choice) in a baking dish with a few inches of hot water. (This stabilises the temperature so they cook more easily). Once we removed them from the over, we waited for them to cool, turned them out on to a baking tray and poured over the sauce (a cream dill sauce in this case) over the top. They then get returned to the oven for 10-15 minutes when it’s time to eat it. Salmon and dill was a great combination but there are plenty of others - cheese and chive is another classic for example.

Duck breasts with apple and blackberry sauce

However, the star of the evening was the duck. We made duck breasts with blackberry and apple sauce from a Viv Pidgeon recipe. We had large juicy duck breasts with the fat and skin left on and started by frying the duck, skin side down. It released an unbelievable amount of fat and we had to keep pouring off the excess fat into a bowl. It’s the first time that I have ever fried something in order to reduce the fat content! When the skin and fat was brown and crisp, we turned the duck over briefly to seal the meat. After this point it can be left in the fridge for up to two days or even frozen, before the final step, which is roasting it for 8-10 minutes. After the roasting, we let the duck rest for five minutes before slicing it on the diagonal and serving, along with a homemade blackberry, apple and port sauce and some lightly boiled green beans. It might not be the way to a healthy heart but this was absolutely superb. I would definitely love to make this for a fancy dinner party and I know just who I would invite for maximum appreciation too.

Next week (tonight actually - how the week has whisked by!) we are making chicken liver pate, melba toast, salmon fillets and broccoli with chilli and garlic.