Poaching Raymond Blanc: How to Cook Well

If you master the basic cooking techniques,

you can build your confidence, cooking skills and repertoire.

Cooking is so easy once you understand the basics.

And there is no better teacher

than legendary Michelin-starred chef Raymond Blanc.

I feel like Picasso! Not quite.

He wants to share what he has learnt in his professional kitchen...

What is the Maillard reaction?

Gives flavour, colour and taste to the food.

..to help you achieve incredible results at home.

That is the kind of dish you will remember all of your life.

Raymond will reveal the secrets behind the simple techniques

at the heart of every dish.

If you go too high, you burn it.

If you go too slow, nothing happens.

It goes beige. Like English cuisine 40 years ago.

From baking to roasting, poaching to frying,

barbecuing and slow-cooking...

Oh, la-la. Oh, la-la. And I mean, oh, la-la.

..and all in his own unique way.

# De dormir avec toi... #

Raymond Blanc taught himself to cook.

Now he will teach you.

What I promise to give you is a deep understanding

of what is happening in your saucepan, in your oven,

and these techniques will help you become a better cook.

Poaching is a gentle way to cook delicate ingredients

by simmering in liquid, from eggs to meat, fish to fruit.

Mastering this technique will result in perfectly sumptuous food

with little chance of overcooking.

Poaching is the amazing transfer of flavours.

There are little miracles happening here.

You conserve the flavour, you enhance it,

and you also keep delicate ingredients in perfect shape.

The most obvious ingredient to poach,

but one that can be tricky to master, is the egg.

It's the perfect introduction to this technique.

In this first recipe,

a poached egg with a beautifully soft yolk

is served on a bed of rich, stewed tomatoes,

topped with crumbled bacon crisp.

A single ingredient is the star of this dish,

but to ensure success, freshness is required.

I think it says it all.

That albumen is so old, it is completely broken,

completely disintegrated through age. OK?

So if you try to poach an egg like that, you hate yourself

and you hate me because I have given you the recipe. OK?

That's a very bad egg. This one? Brilliant.

You can see the egg white

is completely wrapped around the egg yolk.

That's going to poach beautifully.

So, the last thing you want is to boil the water.

If you've got just these bubbles here, rising very, very quietly,

in that beautiful pattern.

One major element which will help the coagulation of the egg white

is vinegar, OK?

A splash of vinegar helps the proteins in the egg

stick together and speeds the cooking process,

forming a perfectly shaped egg.

A little trick as well is to just give it

a little swirl in your water, to create a spiral.

And just slide your egg very nicely in.

Look how perfectly the egg white is surrounding that egg yolk,

and of course, the sign of a great fresh egg.

Not just great cooking, great fresh egg mostly.

And it is lovely to see.

The most important thing to remember is that poaching is not boiling.

If the water boils, the egg will break up and overcook,

but by poaching, the soft egg yolk

will be encased in the firm white pouch.

Obviously, when you have got only one egg for yourself,

it is fantastic, it is brilliant.

Take it with a cafe au lait, all is perfect.

But imagine if you have to cook eggs for 30 guests

or 20 guests or even five guests.

That is a bit more complicated.

For batch cooking and serving the eggs together

straight from the pan, this is a simple tip

and a favourite in restaurants.

Poach the eggs for three minutes,

then plunge them into cold water to stop them cooking further.

And at the last moment, when your guests are all sitting

around the table, you just finish the cooking

for one and a half minutes, and it will be perfect.

With the eggs par-cooked,

the next stage of Raymond's take on the full English.

I am going to do a very simple tomato fondue to go with that egg.

Obviously, guess what?

A Frenchman, for his breakfast, would want a bit of garlic.

Not very much, just a little.

After all, it is for breakfast!

It's not for dinner. OK?

So just crunch it up.

Then a little bit of rosemary.

Tomatoes. Now, it is very, very simple.

What you have to do is bring all these ingredients together

at very, very low temperature.

You don't want to fry your tomatoes, you just want to stew them.

Oops! Fantastic.

How did I do that?

Voila.

Taste your tomatoes, add a bit of sugar if you need to.

That one doesn't need sugar at all. It's absolutely delicious as it is.

To complete this hearty breakfast,

thinly sliced bacon rashers are cooked and flattened in the oven.

This is my bacon. Voila.

It takes exactly eight minutes.

I place it between two sheets of grease-proof paper,

and then compress with two baking sheets.

So it creates some absolutely beautiful,

gorgeous, crispy, tasty pieces of little piggy.

Delicious. And crispy.

With the bacon crisped and the tomatoes stewed,

the eggs are poached for a further one and a half minutes

to reheat and finish cooking them.

Let's put that out of the way.

Breakfast is served.

So we have got our eggs perfectly poached. Voila.

What you could do as well is to make a nice crumble with the bacon.

Piggy, piggy crumble.

And it's perfect.

Look at that. Absolutely perfect.

For me, this dish really shows the best of poaching.

Simple, but also absolutely delicious.

One fresh egg and a pan of water

created the centrepiece of Raymond's mouthwatering breakfast.

Introduce a rich sauce as the poaching liquid,

and the flavours soar.

The next recipe is chicken breast browned in a frying pan

before being poached in a creamy white wine and mushroom sauce.

It shows off the exchange of flavours between meat and sauce,

and also the perfect partnership of two techniques -

poaching to retain tenderness, frying to add colour and flavour.

The dish I'm going to make is one of the great dishes of the world.

Simple, as well. There are a few tricks, mind you,

so you've got to go through them.

Some people might want the skin on, but for poaching,

I think it's better to take the skin off.

The seasoned breast is browned in a beurre noisette,

foaming butter which smells and tastes of hazelnuts.

SIZZLES What a beautiful noise.

What you want to hear is that gentle, lovely sound. Delicate.

So, now I've got some lovely colour.

It's still very rare in the middle here, completely rare.

It browns beautifully, which gives fantastic flavour to the sauce,

and creates a fantastic exchange of flavours, of colours,

but mostly flavours.

That's what I'm really interested in as a cook.

Oh, that's perfect.

Frying has beautifully browned the outside of the chicken breasts,

but poaching will cook the inside.

The meat will poach in a sauce using dried morel mushrooms.

What I have done is to rehydrate those morels,

pour warm water onto it, so that will be the main carrier flavour.

The morels are important, but the wine is as important.

It is Arbois, it's a vin jaune.

That's home. That's my home.

I get very emotional, you know.

You could use sherry if you wanted, dry sherry.

OK, and that's all, very easy.

The wine forms the base of the sauce and poaching liquid.

We want to boil the wine, remove the alcohol, of course.

Don't boil it down to death.

You still need nine-tenths of the volume of the wine.

That is perfect.

Chop button mushrooms for texture.

Squeeze the water from the morel mushrooms,

but preserve the juice for extra flavour in the sauce.

I am not browning my mushrooms, I am just warming them up

and I'm converting the starch into sugar, into flavour.

Add the reduced wine, morel juice

and 200 grams of double cream.

Voila. C'est bien.

It is a very rich dish, but my God.

That will become your star dish for dinner parties. It's amazing.

And now, we are ready for the poaching.

Voila. Completely covered.

The whole process takes no more than seven minutes.

No boiling, no simmering, I want that chicken

to cook so slowly,

that wet heat to go through gently right into the heart of my chicken.

Taste your food all the time.

There will be nothing left soon! It is quite delicious. Amazing.

So, temperature...

right in the middle of the breast, it is 60 degrees, so it is cooked.

I want to finish off the cooking by relaxing the meat.

I'm going to rest them a little bit here, and re-use the sauce.

Very fast speed now. Galloping reduction.

The chicken will be served with sliced leeks.

These can be prepared in advance and heated to serve,

or cooked at the last minute.

Often, one boils vegetables, one boils them to death, actually.

We take away all their goodness, their beauty, their colour,

their taste and texture. All of that goes into the water.

I'm going to show you a little technique which keeps everything -

taste, texture, colour, flavour and nutrients.

This tip is great for any vegetables

that can be quickly boiled or steamed.

Cut into small and even-sized pieces to aid fast cooking.

Add five grams of butter and a splash of water.

When heated, this will create an emulsion,

a glossy blend of two liquids which don't usually mix.

The water will create steam, and the butter adds flavour.

What is fantastic about this technique is,

the leeks are not boiling in plenty of water,

just a tiny little bit of water,

which steams them and will create an emulsion with the butter,

creating a wonderful coating with fantastic flavours.

It should take exactly three minutes.

The leeks are ready just in time to serve.

This is it. This is incredible.

Beautiful sauce. Wonderful smell, wonderful aromas.

So fresh, so clean, so beautiful.

Bon appetit.

OK, so we're going to taste it. This is the best moment of the day,

when you have cooked it, you've worked for it.

Look what the poaching has done. It is absolutely moist.

Lovely.

Fantastic texture with those mushrooms. Beautiful.

Just shows the art of poaching.

That's the kind of dish you will remember all of your life.

Raymond uses ingredients from all over the world in his dishes.

Many of the far-flung flavours come from the fragrant herbs

growing in the kitchen garden at his Oxfordshire restaurant,

Le Manoir.

With over 100 varieties, more than 40 are micro-herbs.

For me, herbs are magic.

They add that little burst of flavour,

when you expect them the least.

Bang! You know?

A bit of Vietnamese mint, or a little bit of slightly sour basilic.

Or a hint of Jamaican thyme inside, whoa!

This idea came from America.

When I first came to America,

I discovered a new world of micro-herbs, about 15 years ago.

The Americans grew micro-herbs which are actually seedlings.

That is what it is.

It's much more rounded, much more gentle, which I like.

So they don't overpower the dish you are creating.

Of course, they look beautiful, so very elegant, dainty.

Get to know them. Taste them.

The sorrel is beautiful.

A bit of acidity would go so well with salmon, with any fish.

Here we've got the watercress, bitter.

I got the earth...

So...c'est la vie!

Food is a wonderful palette of flavours and colours.

The pianist would have all his notes and his keys.

The chef has got at his disposition this incredible palette of flavours.

I want to find a peppery herb, and that will be wonderful,

the purple radish. A fantastic herb with beautiful, peppery, acidic,

slightly sour-sweet notes.

I could easily become vegetarian.

I'm going to graze from now on. No more meat!

Back in the kitchen, herbs from the garden

are used to complement Raymond's next recipe -

poached salmon, rolled in a fragrant dill,

served with a tangy cucumber salad and spicy cauliflower florets.

This is a simple but sophisticated dish of clean, lively flavours.

So many people think that poaching is insipid, tasteless, thin.

I think the world of poaching is marvellous.

Completely exciting, and there are so many ways to poach.

For this recipe, I have here a beautiful salmon.

I don't want too much thickness. I want to open it up, butterfly it.

Like that. Then, season inside here.

It is a slight curing process. But not very much.

A bit of cayenne pepper.

Then dill, and of course,

it's a classical association, salmon and dill.

What you do now is to roll it.

Just tightly turn it around into a beautiful ballotine.

Look at that. Beautiful salmon.

So now I'm going to wrap it up in clingfilm.

Thank God we have it.

Poaching the ballotine or salmon roll in clingfilm

retains the neatly rolled shape and keeps the flavours locked in,

but still allows the heat of the water to travel through the barrier.

Use a good quality clingfilm

because some of them are not heat resistant as well.

Hold your hand still here and you just roll it.

It's vital to make sure there are no air bubbles

or the ballotine will float in the poaching water and not cook evenly.

Voila. The fish is delicate, so you want a delicate cooking method,

because those proteins are not like meat.

Meat is much more dense, it's fibrous inside, there's collagens.

Here, 55 degree maximum.

Beyond that, it's overcooked and then you've got a very dry fish.

Poaching off direct heat will prevent the salmon overcooking.

Simply remove the simmering water from the stove,

drop the ballotines in and poach for around seven minutes.

First, you can see a change of colour.

Remember, the fastest transfer of heat is done with liquid,

not with dry heat. Dry heat stays outside,

it takes a long time to come into the meat or the fish.

Here, the water carries heat much more efficiently.

How do I know that my ballotine is perfectly cooked?

I've no idea, but that little piece of equipment will help me a lot, OK,

to understand what's happening inside that ballotine.

I'm going to check the temperature.

I've got about 40 degrees now, OK, so of course it's not cooked,

but if I rest my ballotine, in one minute, it will be about 55 degrees.

Look. It is now 54.8. Now we have a perfectly cooked salmon.

And then throw it back into ice water to stop the cooking.

I'm going to do two little garnishes for that dish,

two wonderful textures.

One, cucumber, lovely texture.

And the other one, cauliflower with horseradish sauce.

Raw florets, we've got some horseradish cream here.

All that needs is about that. Or a bit more, voila.

So then, you can either use a bit of yoghurt,

but as a Frenchman, I cannot help using creme fraiche.

It is so delicious.

That's why life is worthwhile living, you know.

Food, glorious food!

Adam, do you want a little bit?

No, Adam is health conscious,

he's coming at an age where he's getting a little belly.

Adam!

My lovely Adam!

Now we'll see if I've poached my fish well.

Beautiful, look at that, the middle is barely cooked.

Just right.

Don't forget to remove the clingfilm,

that's one of the major complaints in restaurants.

The best way is to take the point of your knife, just slide it out.

I've just discovered that for myself.

The dish is topped with micro-herbs from the garden,

zingy sorrel and that peppery purple radish.

Oh, look at that, Adam, look. The best part.

Adam, shall we have a little bit of, er, a little lunch here?

Come on.

It's good.

Look, look at that!

Shiny, barely cooked, you can see it.

I know I've got a great dish here.

What it's really missing is a nice glass of Sauvignon Blanc.

-And a French Sauvignon Blanc, not from Shropshire.

-Of course.

-Not yet, anyway.

-All right.

-Can you get me one?

-No.

RAYMOND LAUGHS

Garden herbs added the finishing touches to the salmon,

but in this next recipe they're used in abundance

to infuse the poaching water to add extra bursts of flavour.

Poached peach in an aromatic infusion of citrus fruit and liquor,

served on an icy bed of peach granita.

You take this beautiful peach, completely perfectly ripe.

If you apply a too-strong heat, you will murder it, you will kill it.

But a gentle poaching will create all sorts of fantastic miracles.

First, the poaching liquid.

Wine.

So I want just to boil it a little bit.

That's all, to remove the top acidity and top alcohol.

Yeah, about that.

To the boiled wine, add the same amount of water.

Tres bien. So, two beautiful peaches.

I'm going to remove the top here.

It's like a little cork here, that's the stalk.

But I pop the cork out, then I know when my peaches are ready,

some beautiful little bubbles will come out.

So very gently, delicately, oh, la-la!

Then I will put in my vanilla, but no more than that.

I've got my herbs here, I'm going to put a bit of basilic, a bit of mint.

Oranges, lemons and sugar are also added

to create a sweet perfumed liquor

which will infuse the peaches as they simmer.

Poaching never means boiling.

If you boil, you destroy.

Boiling is aggressive.

It transfers the heat too fast, it overcooks the outside.

All these flavours are extracted too fast.

Poaching is the best vehicle

to pass on flavours across from the herb to the lemon,

the lemon to the orange, the orange to the peach,

the peach to the wine, and they all love each other

to create something which is just divine.

A cartouche, or paper lid,

will keep the peaches submerged in the heady liquid.

So, how you do your cartouche, very, very simple.

Grease-proof paper, fold it.

Fold it again.

Cut here. A little hole here.

Raymond the saint!

The holy Raymond!

Just place it, voila.

And everything can start infusing.

Leave the peaches to poach for 20 minutes.

Let's see what's happening with my peaches.

Oh, it's lovely, it is such a beautiful picture.

You can see now the bubbles are rising from the centre.

The air is pushing the bubble outside of the kernel.

That means it's cooked.

Cool and peel the peaches.

The poaching liquor is simply frozen to create a sweet-scented granita.

It's fantastic, very fresh, very clean.

It is just a melting flake of peach juice.

So now of course comes the moment that the cook loves, OK,

when you actually finish your dish, you are to give it to your guests.

Just put the lemon to hold your granita.

Lemon will be absolutely delicious through it as well. Tres bien.

So then you have your granita.

Oh, this is fantastic.

I just feel like pouring champagne all over,

because then you have your beautiful peach,

perfectly ripe, on the top of it.

A little bit of mint and sugar. That's for freshness.

Voila. This, to me,

it encapsulates all the treasures of poaching.

The heat slowly, slowly cooks this beautiful, tender, ripe fruit,

creating this fantastic exchange of flavours.

Slow, slow, slow, no aggression whatsoever.

And everything is mingled, passed on,

lots of extraordinary flavours -

minty, citrusy, peachy, bit of wine, perfect.

Bon appetit.

As demonstrated with the delicate peach, the art of poaching

can give the lightest of touches to fragile ingredients.

But in this last recipe, poaching is promoted to another level

when teamed with the more robust technique of boiling.

A clever pairing of ravioli filled with an elegant poached lobster

and scallop mousse, served with a light tomato and lobster bisque.

In my mind, I think this dish represents the ultimate of poaching.

So now, I'm going to make my lobster and scallop mousse.

Lobster tail and scallops will be pureed to form

the filling of the ravioli parcels.

First, what Adam has done - thank you, Adam -

is to freeze my bowl.

Warmth is the enemy of any mousses, OK?

BLENDER WHIRRS

I want to puree it completely.

The best way to see it, take your finger,

you take your glasses,

where are my glasses? Always lose my glasses.

OK, now, oh, it's perfect. And then you watch.

Voila, look, it shines.

All the proteins of the fish and the lobster are clinging together.

They're more tasty as well, because you don't need eggs,

because they cling together. Why do you add eggs? I want flavour!

Nothing goes to waste.

For even more flavour and colour, the deep red pigment is scraped

from the inside of the lobster shell to enrich the pale mousse.

So add your cream, little by little. Not too much.

If you add too much at a time, you will whip the cream.

OK, now I'm going to colour the pigmentation of the lobster.

Yes, yes, yes. Look at that.

It is so beautiful, so coral pink.

The remaining lobster tail meat is roughly chopped

to give texture to the smooth mousse.

Then just a quick mix, it's ready.

BLENDER WHIRRS

That's it.

The mousse will be encased in fresh pasta

to create spectacular ravioli parcels.

The rolled pasta can be made up to two days in advance.

I'm going to stretch my pasta, so it's thin. Very, very thin.

It's horrible to see this very thick pasta, OK,

and it's not a very nice texture either.

But a very, very thin pasta, you need to see through it.

So that's the base.

Place a spoonful of mousse in the middle of the pasta,

and cover with another square.

Gently seal the edges and trim away the excess.

Voila.

The ravioli goes into the freezer for 20 minutes.

The frozen shell will protect the mousse when the pasta is cooked.

The ravioli will be served with a lobster bisque.

Its base is a rich tomato sauce with white wine added.

The same tomato fondue that I did for the poached egg.

Exactly the same.

Then I boil my water.

The lobster shells are fried off to extract their natural oils,

which will intensify the flavour of the bisque.

Voila. Don't boil it. When you boil it, everything gets confused.

OK, a slow infusion of flavours, a nice gentle simmer, that's perfect.

And 15, 20 minutes, no more.

Voila. So, you strain it all in here.

And now, with that beautiful jus.

I want a jus, I don't want a sauce.

I want something light, I want something spicy, fresh, tangy.

I'm ready to poach.

Fresh from the freezer, the ravioli is boiled quickly.

This will cook the pasta shell,

but only de-frost the delicate mousse filling.

With the pasta cooked, the boiling water is turned down to a simmer

to poach the lobster and scallop mousse inside.

No boil whatsoever now.

You poach them just delicately,

one tiny little bubble coming up every so often.

It's so delicate. A hard boil will kill it.

What you want to have then is the mousse melting.

Perfectly cooked, melting.

No firmness, just completely dissolving in your mouth like snow.

So, the ravioli are ready. I'm going to lift them out.

They are gorgeous.

The poached ravioli sits on a bed of heated courgette

and carrot ribbons and wilted spinach.

Beautiful here. Tres bien.

A lobster claw tops this striking dish, which is

surrounded by the silken lobster bisque.

Look at this colour, look at those flavours.

So light.

And the final touch from Raymond's kitchen garden.

A little bit of micro coriander here.

Looks so delicate.

Let's have a look right inside the mousse, what's happening here, OK.

Look at that. These little holes here, very light mousse.

This dish really shows off the beauty of poaching.

What it can do. There is nothing insipid about it, I can assure you.

There is so much flavour here. That's the miracle of poaching.

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