Episode 2 MasterChef: The Professionals: Michel's Classics

Only an elite group of chefs holds two Michelin stars.

Michel Roux Jr is one of them.

-One lamb, two fish gone.

-Wahey!

He has given us a taste of how to create the great classics.

-Tonight is the master class.

-Perfect.

Everybody loves roast chicken,

but this recipe is something really special -

a stuffed chicken in salt crust.

The virtues of cooking in a salt crust mean that

whatever you're cooking is encased

and it cooks in its own steam and in its own juices

and therefore stays beautifully moist.

This really is a straightforward cooking technique

and it will enhance any fish or meat that you're cooking.

First job is to make the salt crust

so for that we need flour,

salt - fine table salt

and coarse sea salt.

If it was only coarse sea salt,

you wouldn't be able to get the smooth paste

and it wouldn't hold together.

It seems like an incredible amount of salt in this recipe,

but remember that is just there to encase whatever we're cooking

and it will season, but not over season, the dish.

Egg white...

..and a flavouring, some lovely chopped rosemary,

because I think rosemary works well with chicken. Beautiful.

And now just a little bit of water.

And you work this to a paste.

This salt crust can be used for fish or chicken

or even lamb, a beautiful side of lamb.

It really is very versatile.

It'll always be the same recipe.

Perfect consistency.

Now we need to put that in the fridge,

just to rest for 15, 20 minutes.

So for the stuffing, first off, we need some sausages.

I'm going to add some chives. I love chives.

Gives that lovely onion flavour background to it,

without being too aggressive.

Some breadcrumbs...

An egg...

I'm using morel mushrooms,

but you could use any kind of mushrooms.

And then a few chicken livers.

And just bring all that together.

In it goes.

One more thing I do to this chicken,

which I think adds a lovely dimension to it and a lovely flavour,

is basting it in honey and paprika,

so smoked paprika, which has got a little bite to it.

I think it also adds a lovely colour to the skin.

If you're baking a fish in a salt crust,

I think olive oil and lemon would work wonderfully well.

Viola.

Ready for the salt crust.

Little bit of flour.

It is vitally important

that it is completely sealed

so no steam will escape.

Now it just needs a little bit of egg wash

and the egg wash is there to give it a glorious shine,

and then ready for the oven.

We cook the chicken for an hour and 20 minutes at 200 degrees C,

incredibly high heat,

but it then needs at least 40 minutes resting in a warm place.

That ensures that the stuffing is fully cooked.

Mmm.

I can smell it now. It smells divine.

Here we go. The moment of truth. The chicken!

Yes! Mmm!

So the final thing is to carve.

Mmm. Beautiful.

My word, that looks good.

And not forgetting the stuffing,

which you can carve from the back end there as well.

This is wonderful. It's a dish not just full of technique,

but especially full of theatre,

the perfect dinner party roast.

This classic is a Pochouse Bourguignonne,

a Burgundian freshwater fish stew.

The fish we're using for the pochouse

is pike, char,

trout and perch.

I remember going fishing with my grandfather

and catching all these wonderful freshwater fish

and to make this Burgundian pochouse, this fish stew,

was something really special.

First job is to prepare the fish,

so here we have the pike,

beautiful fish,

that's got quite a reputation.

A real predator of the rivers.

Char.

So this is the perch. Great fish.

I remember as a nipper fishing for these. Delicious.

Now for the base of the stew,

I'm going to add some onion

and a few mushrooms.

I'm going to use a little bit of this smoked bacon.

This is all classical Burgundian flavours.

Next ingredient, the bouquet garni.

Once the vegetables have softened and sweated down,

we're going to add to it

the trimmings of the fish.

All of that

is going to give great, great depth of flavour to this fish stew.

Now's the time to add the brandy.

This is called "deglacer" in French.

"Deglacer" means to deglaze,

to pick up all the sugars that have stuck to the bottom of the pan

and that is the secret to great taste and flavour,

the white wine,

so in that goes.

This then comes to the boil and then it will simmer for about 15 minutes.

Now I'm preparing the garnish to go with this fish stew.

Onions, some mushrooms,

they just go straight in,

lardons,

one more little garnish - croutons.

Rub them with garlic,

put a little drizzle of olive oil and bake them in the oven.

Next step is to pass this base through a fine sieve

to extract all the flavours.

The soup has got to be like an off-white colour, not brown.

Mmm. Oh, you can taste the wine,

you can taste the bacon, the mushroom,

but most importantly, you can taste the fish

and all is left to do now,

to panfry the fish.

Very, very important not to overcook it

and not too much colour. A nice, crisp skin is perfect.

It should be little morsels,

so that the diner can enjoy a spoonful of fish with the stew.

The fish is now cooked. It's got a lovely colour on the skin

and that's it. We can dress.

There we have it - the Pochouse Bourguignonne,

a Burgundian freshwater fish stew.

I'm now going to cook for you Petit Pate de Pezenas.

That's a sweet, savoury mutton pie served with pickles.

These little pies were brought to France by Clive of India

whilst holidaying in the village of Pezenas, he got his Indian servants

to cook these little morsels, and they caught on.

Pickled vegetables are the perfect accompaniment for these pies.

With the meatiness and the taste of the mutton,

they need something that's crunchy, sweet and sour.

The first thing to do is the pastry, because the pastry needs to rest.

Butter, flour, water, salt,

and just worked with the fingertips.

We want the pastry to be crumbly.

Right, there we go.

Now, we need to rest that.

So now for stuffing the meat.

We're using mutton for this recipe

because it has such a lovely, distinct flavour.

Not leaving it too chunky. When you bite into a pie,

the last thing you want is a bit of gristle.

To the mutton we're going to add some mutton fat,

otherwise it's going to be too dry.

Salt,

a generous amount of pepper,

nutmeg,

ground cumin...

Ground cinnamon - not too much,

brown sugar.

Now that the mutton is seasoned,

we need to roll out the pastry.

So we cut out some rings,

which will be the top and the base.

A little bit of egg wash

and this strip here will then be folded...

..to make a cylinder,

which then sits

on top of our base.

And we press down here to seal.

It's the traditional, old-fashioned way of making these pies.

It's very, very tricky.

You have to fill it very, very quickly, otherwise it can collapse

and it must be packed in there.

And that's the perfect shape it should be - a cotton reel.

It's ready to go in the oven.

I'm going to be making two different pickles -

one heavily spiced

and one quite plain.

These little pickles are going to transform the humble pie

into something really special.

The importance of great produce was drummed into me at an early age.

I remember being woken up in the middle of the night by my father

during the summer holidays, who dragged me to the markets.

It was fantastic to see

this Pandora's box of beautiful ingredients

and that excited me as a child,

that gave me passion.

The pie's almost ready, so now's time to plate up.

And finally, the pie.

There you have it - Le Petit Pate de Pezenas with pickles.

A simple sweet and savoury mutton pie

that I think could be served in the greatest of dining rooms.

This classic recipe is Queue de Boeuf Farcie et Braisee au Vin Rouge -

oxtail stuffed and braised in red wine,

the kind of classic that you want to pull up your chair to,

sit down and enjoy a good glass of red wine with.

This is definitely a Roux household favourite. We love oxtail.

Oxtail is a cheap cut of meat,

but like most cheap cuts of meat, it is full of flavour,

but you have to know how to get the best out of it.

Oxtail is sold normally on the bone like this,

huge, long pieces of oxtail.

There's not much meat on the thin part of the oxtail,

But on the fat part of the oxtail,

you can see it's very meaty indeed.

Now we need to remove some of the excess fat

and then we start the tricky process of removing the bone that's inside.

Slowly, slowly with the point of a sharp knife

going around and releasing the meat from the bone.

There we go, that's been released and here we have the meat,

lightly seasoned.

Now for stuffing, I'm using a sausage meat made from pork

and we just shape it and put it in the middle of our oxtail.

Now you could flavour this with smoked bacon

or liver or, actually, what works beautifully well is

salted ox tongue running through it, so it's following a theme.

And...this will fold over quite neatly

and now... I'm going to encase it in...

some caul fat, or crepinette in French.

Now, caul fat is the lining of the stomach.

This is readily available,

most butchers should be able to get this for you.

This will help to keep its shape and avoid the stuffing coming out,

so it's very important that it's well encased

and all that's left is to tie it up

with butcher's string to give it that perfect shape.

Now we need to roast, give this a lovely colour

and then braise in red wine.

So, for that, we have onion, carrot and celery, just roughly chopped.

And to which I'm going to add the little pieces,

or the trimmings of the oxtail.

And I'm even going to add the bones of the oxtail as well

and that's going to add lots and lots of flavour to the dish.

Now, for the oxtail.

It's important to get this nice and golden,

so that you get the natural sugars out of the meat and the vegetables.

A good generous splash of brandy.

A very generous splash of port.

And a good strong red wine.

I think most people associate oxtail with oxtail soup or broth, um,

but this is very much the French way of preparing oxtail.

Now the wine is boiled, we add the veal stock.

Oxtail is really a very tough meat

and it needs that long, slow cooking process,

so it's going to go in the oven at about 120 degrees C

and for three to four hours until it's rendered soft and succulent.

With the oxtail, I'm going to be using the braising sauce.

All that lovely red wine and port and brandy reduction.

So reduced down, passed through a fine sieve...

Simple as that.

That is gorgeous. Perfect. Delicious!

And just for texture, a few parsnip crisps on top.

Stuffed braised oxtail in red wine and port with a creamy mashed potato.

The aromas, the look of it,

brings back wonderful memories of being at home with the family.

This dish is Supreme de Volaille Agnes Sorel.

This recipe was created by the great Escoffier

and named after Agnes Sorel.

Agnes Sorel was King Charles VII's mistress,

but she was also a very keen cook.

This dish is a gently poached chicken breast served with ox tongue,

chicken mousse and a beautiful supreme sauce.

To start, we prepare the chicken supreme

and remove the skin.

We're going to poach it in a chicken stock,

because that's going to add flavour.

Poaching is such a wonderful way of cooking, but it is a skill.

Gentle cooking - that's the secret to poaching.

Next, we make the chicken mousse.

This is probably the most important part of a chicken mousse -

pressing it through the sieve, to get that right consistency.

Now you want to beat this well, so you get a nice, light mousse.

Now I'm going to prepare the mushrooms.

I want them to cook in a little bit of lemon juice, lots of butter

and their own juices.

The mushrooms have got just an ever so slight colour.

And now, we fill this with the mushrooms.

This really is a game of patience and dexterity.

And into the oven this goes.

Just by touch, I can tell

that this chicken supreme is cooked to perfection

and it's staying at that temperature and it will stay moist

and cooked for as long as I want it to.

The sauce for this dish is a classic supreme sauce,

which is a white wine, shallot and chicken-based sauce.

It should be creamy, rich, indulgent, but not heavy.

So the sauce has boiled for maybe two or three minutes,

no more than that.

Mmm. Perfect.

Here we have some chicken jus that I want to reduce down,

boil down, to a sticky glaze.

All that's left now is to plate up.

This is the chicken glaze which I'm going to use to glaze the ox tongue.

So there you have it - Supreme de Volaille Agnes Sorel.

A chicken supreme cooked Escoffier style.

This classic recipe is Beaujolais Berry Jelly

flavoured with white pepper and basil,

served with creme anglaise and an arlette biscuit.

Making fruit jellies using wine is not unusual,

but to flavour it with basil and white pepper certainly is.

It's a little touch that I have brought to this great classic.

I'm going to start with the jelly.

So the wine in a pan

and we're going to set that on to boil.

Always advise to taste the berries and see...

how much sugar is required.

These berries are beautiful.

They're sweet, so I'm going to cut back a little bit on the sugar.

Bring it up to the boil

and we need to infuse it with a little bit of basil

and a few white peppercorns.

Not too much, but enough to give a little bit of a kick, a bite.

Now the gelatine needs to be steeped in cold water to soften it up.

As a child, I remember my grandmother always eating her strawberries

with a dash of red wine and a little twirl of pepper

and I thought she was crazy until I tried it.

Absolutely delicious.

The wine has boiled.

And we have the gelatine here, which has gone all lovely and soft

and into our wine.

This is then passed over the berries, piping hot,

and that heat should be enough to poach the fruit gently.

Now we need to set these and get them into a mould

and immediately into the blast chiller.

Now I'm going to make the arlette biscuit.

So, puff pastry and lots and lots of sugar instead of flour.

It's important to use quite a lot of sugar

and to keep the pastry evenly rolled out in a nice rectangle.

And then, we roll it up.

Nice and tight.

Very important that it should be tight, because otherwise,

it's not going to hold.

And I'm going to wrap this up

and put it to rest in the fridge for at least 10-15 minutes.

Next step, creme anglaise.

A custard cream flavoured with vanilla.

And we release those seeds.

Very important.

The milk is on to boil with the vanilla.

We need the egg yolks and sugar.

When the milk has boiled, pour it into the egg yolks,

mixing it quickly, so that it doesn't burn the egg yolk

and then back into the pan.

This then goes back onto the heat...

..and this is where you have to be very careful

not to scramble the eggs or overcook it.

We know it's cooked when it's nice and thick.

Now back to the biscuits. They've had about 10-15 minutes in the fridge,

so they need to be rolled out and cooked.

This should be a refined dessert,

so the arlette biscuit has to be very thin.

And now into the oven.

While we're waiting for the biscuits,

I can cut a few strawberries up for garnish.

Great.

Yes! Beautiful. That's exactly what I want to see.

Nice, golden, crispy. Perfect.

So now we take our arlette biscuits

and we're going to make a little sandwich.

A little bit of honey, but not too much,

otherwise they're going to be too sweet.

Perfect, crunchy, buttery

and delicious.

The jelly should be set. The biscuits are made. The garnish is ready.

So now we plate up.

Here we have it - the Beaujolais Berry Jelly

with arlette biscuits and creme anglaise.

A feast for the eyes and a feast for your tummy.

All these classic dishes are part of my history and my heritage

and that's why I love them.

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