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For Shields, coastal dishes across nation are
tasty lures
Excerpt from The
Baltimore Sun
Originally published Sep 22, 2004
by Rob Kasper
NAME A STRETCH of North American coastline and
a dish served there and chances are good that John Shields has been there,
eaten that.
From fresh scallops in New England to plump shrimp on the Gulf Coast to
fresh halibut in the Pacific Northwest, Shields has stuck his fork in
it. For the past two years, Shields traveled the Atlantic, Pacific and
Gulf coasts of the United States gathering recipes and anecdotes to put
in his new cookbook, Coastal Cooking With John Shields (Broadway Books,
2004, $32.50). The book is a companion to a series of the same name airing
on public television in April 2005.
The other day as I sat with Shields in Gertrude's, the restaurant in the
Baltimore Museum of Art that he named in honor of his mother, he took
me on a culinary travelogue. At the mention of a particular stretch of
coastline, Shields described his "gotta haves," the dishes he
has to eat when he visits that region.
When the topic was New England, Shields talked about the region's fresh
scallops and its varied recipes for seafood chowder.
"Their chowders are like our crab cakes," said Shields, a 53-year-old
native of Baltimore. "Everybody has his chowder recipe. It may only
call for one potato less than the other guy's, but it is special."
In the Mid-Atlantic, the blue crab is a must-eat, Shields said. His book
contains 13 recipes for crab, including one that stuffs a whole rockfish
with shrimp, crab meat and corn bread. In R months, however, his attention
shifts to oysters. (Tonight at Gertrude's, he will serve a variety of
oyster dishes from the book at Oysterama, a $60-a- ticket book party benefiting
the fight against breast cancer.)
During his travels, Shields also dipped down to New Orleans to enjoy the
practice of topping sauteed soft crabs with a dollop of bearnaise sauce.
Despite the fact that food of Louisiana has been "discovered"
and imitated by the rest of America, the coastal dishes remain undeniably
authentic if remarkably rich, he said. "People down there don't forget
their old recipes," Shields said. "Whether you go to a shack
or Commander's Palace, the old food is treated right. It is their food
and they crave it."
In Florida, Shields feasted on fare on both coasts, the Atlantic and the
Gulf. In Miami, he was introduced to Haitian-style flounder. Cooked with
lime juice, garlic, tomatoes, orange juice and peppers, this ordinarily
bland fish became lively, he said.
The shrimp of the Gulf Coast are exceptionally plump and flavorful, perhaps
the best in the nation, Shields said. In Punta Gorda, Fla., he found folks
who had the delightful habit of cooking these shrimp by dropping them
in warm creole sauce.
Shields lived in San Francisco from 1978-1996 and became acquainted with
abalone, and other once-plentiful local seafood. On more recent visits
to California he was impressed with wild salmon dishes in restaurants
and he was reunited with an old friend, the fish taco sold by street vendors.
In the Pacific Northwest, there are many fans of wild salmon, but folks
also look forward to the arrival of fresh halibut.
"There were signs in Portland [Ore.] saying, 'The halibut are coming,'
" Shields said. "It reminded me of Danny's [a former restaurant
on Charles Street in downtown Baltimore] that used to put signs up announcing
the whales [giant soft crabs] are coming."
One recent spring when Shields was in Portland visiting his sister, he
behaved like a local. He stood in line to buy fresh halibut. Then he and
his sister took the fish home and cooked it with fresh peas and fennel
butter sauce.
The trick to preparing halibut, he said, is not to overcook it. "It
dries out very easily," he said.
But the best way to enjoy halibut, like many of the dishes in his new
book, Shields said, is to visit the region they call home, and enjoy them
a few hours after they get off the boat.
Halibut With Herbed Fennel Butter and Sweet Peas
Serves 4
PEAS:
1 cup fresh or frozen sweet peas
pinch of salt
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon finely chopped fennel leaves
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
HERBED FENNEL BUTTER SAUCE:
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into small pieces (divided
use)
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced shallots
1/2 cup minced fennel bulb
1 teaspoon finely chopped thyme
1 teaspoon finely chopped tarragon
1 large tomato, cored and diced
3/4 cup fish stock (or chicken bouillon)
1/4 cup dry white wine
6 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
FISH:
4 tablespoons olive oil
4 halibut fillets, 6 ounces each
kosher salt
freshly ground black pepper
For the peas: Blanch peas in a pot of boiling, salted water for
about 2 minutes. Remove them and put them in ice water to stop the cooking
process. Save cooking water. Drain peas and set aside.
For the sauce: In a small saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter
and saute the garlic, shallots, fennel, thyme and tarragon, cooking over
low heat for 3 to 4 minutes, stirring often.
Either remove the vegetables from the saucepan or set pan aside and get
another saucepan. In it, add the tomato, the stock and the wine. Cook
over medium heat until the volume is reduced by half. Strain through a
fine sieve. Add the strained liquid back to the pan along with whipping
cream.
With a wire whisk, add the remaining butter a few pieces at a time, stirring
constantly. Continue until all the butter is incorporated and an emulsified
sauce has more. Add the vegetables and stir briefly to warm. Remove the
sauce from the heat. Set aside in a warm spot until the fish is cooked.
For the fish: Heat olive oil in a saute pan. Season the fillets
with salt and pepper to taste on both sides. When the oil is very hot,
place the fillets, skin side up, into the saute pan and cook, over medium-high
heat, for 3 minutes. Carefully turn over the fillets and continue cooking
until just cooked, about another 3 minutes.
Final assembly: When the fish is cooking, reheat the pea water.
Mix the butter and fennel leaves together with lemon juice and salt, set
aside. Drop the peas into hot water and reheat for 1 minute. Strain, then
toss the peas with the butter mixture.
Place fillets on heated dinner plate. Spoon the sauce around the fillets.
Arrange the peas around the fish so that some will spill into the sauce.
- Adapted from "Coastal Cooking With John Shields" (Broadway
Books, 2004, $32.50)
Per serving: 813 calories; 30 grams protein; 73 grams fat; 28 grams saturated
fat; 9 grams carbohydrate; 3 grams fiber; 183 milligrams cholesterol;
349 milligrams sodium
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