Smoked Trout and Celeriac Remoulade with a Twist

Hot off the press!

While I'm busy trying to add the huge backlog of recipes I have, here's one I've just written up... whilst wandering around trying to decide what to have for dinner while the rest of my clan had decided on home-made burgers, I spotted some cold-smoked trout fillets, so decided to have them grilled with some celeriac remoulade. I added a little ground fennel seed to the celeriac, to complement the aniseed notes, and served it simply with some green leaves, for a quick and tasty treat.

You could just use some ready-to-eat hot-smoked trout, as you don't often find it cold-smoked, or use some lightly smoked salmon fillets if you see them. Or even some sliced smoked salmon (obviously, I doubt you'd want to grill that!). If you're feeling adventurous, you can buy fresh trout or salmon and give it a quick smoke yourself (see notes). If you're not counting calories, drizzle the leaves with some good extra virgin olive oil, and add mayonnaise to the celeriac to your taste - home-made is best, of course, but use your favourite if your wrist is feeling too tired to make your own...

Smoked Trout with a Lemony Celeriac Remoulade

Simple but delicious, choose which mayonnaise you use to determine how many calories are in your meal, if you're counting.

Serves 4, easily halved. Calories per serving: 217 if using extra light mayonnaise; if you use light mayonnaise it will be 259 calories per portion; and 339 calories per portion if using full fat mayonnaise – all within range, go for your personal preference!

A really indulgent-tasting meal, with all the classic flavours you’d expect in a remoulade, plus a little twist of freshly ground fennel seeds to complement the flavour of the celeriac. You can grill (broil) your own cold-smoked trout fillet (un-cooked), or use a hot-smoked fillet (ready-cooked) and either serve cold or warm through, whichever you prefer. Don’t worry if you don’t have all the ingredients to hand for the remoulade – the celeriac will still be delicious with the trout if you just toss it in mayonnaise, lemon juice and a bit of seasoning.

If you want to serve this as a starter rather than a fast day meal, use smaller trout fillets, or flake one between two people (you could put the celeriac remoulade in the middle, in a food ring*, and pile the flaked trout on top, with a small garnish of parsley, dill, chives or micro-herbs, and scatter the leaves around the edge – watercress or pea shoots would be nice), drizzle a little extra virgin olive oil over the leaves and serve a little crusty bread, or home-made melba toast if you wish. If you want to serve it as a main meal with a little more substance, simply serve with some steamed or boiled new potatoes (with or without a knob of butter, and a sprinkling of fresh parsley...)

Ingredients
4 x smoked trout fillets (cooked or raw, approximately 125g each) [700]
½ a medium celeriac, 300g after peeling (around 900g to 1kg before halving and peeling, or you could just find a really small one) [63]

For the remoulade sauce
75ml mayonnaise (5 level 15ml tbsp, or use Greek yoghurt and seasoning for clean eating) [full fat – 543, light – 223, extra light – 55; Hellman's is Gluten Free]
1 level tsp Dijon mustard, e.g. Maille (GF), Grey Poupon (not the brown-coloured abomination called ‘French mustard’) [7]
1-2 tbsp lemon juice [8]
½ tbsp capers, chopped [2]
1 tbsp finely chopped cornichons or pickled gherkins [4]
¼ tsp fennel seeds, crushed in a pestle and mortar
1 tbsp freshly chopped fine herbs, such as dill, parsley, chervil, tarragon, chives – your favourites (I used dill and parsley) [1]
Optional few drops of anchovy essence, if you have it to hand [1]
Salt and freshly, finely ground black pepper  to taste [1]

To serve
120g baby leaf and rocket salad (or your favourite leaves) [21]
Squeeze lemon juice [2]
Salt and freshly ground black pepper [1]

Optional
Extra virgin olive oil to drizzle the leaves with, if you’re serving up as a starter! [45 calories per teaspoon]

Method
If you’re using cold-smoked (‘raw’) trout fillets, then take them out of the fridge before you start, and pre-heat the grill (broiler) to hot.

Prepare your remoulade sauce. Mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl bar the salt and pepper, putting only 1 tbsp of lemon juice in.

Peel your celeriac (halving beforehand, if you’re using half a medium to large one – rub the cut side of the half you’re not using with lemon juice, and wrap and refrigerate), and then coarsely grate/shred, or finely julienne using the relevant attachment on a food processor, or a mandolin (or do it by hand). My preference is to finely julienne the celeriac on a mandolin into skinny ‘matchsticks’. Immediately mix the celeriac into your remoulade sauce (to avoid the celeriac oxidising and turning brown) with a good grinding of pepper, stirring/tossing thoroughly (you may find it easiest to do this with your hands) until it’s evenly mixed. Taste, then add extra lemon juice, salt and further pepper if required.

Grill your trout (if cold-smoked) for about 4 minutes, until cooked through, (or heat though your hot-smoked trout if desired) and serve with the celeriac remoulade, and salad leaves dressed with a squeeze of lemon, and optional drizzle of extra virgin olive oil if you’re not counting the calories!


Notes
You don’t need to buy fancy food rings if you want to plate this up the ‘posh’ way - just use half-sized baked bean tins, or steamed pudding tins and carefully cut the top and bottoms off with a tin opener, then wash thoroughly before using. Be careful of any sharp edges.

If you want to hot smoke your own trout / salmon, then use the wok-smoking method (unless you've got the barbeque going!) here but smoke for less time than the chicken breasts - how much time will depend on the thickness of the fish fillets - I would suggest smoking for ten minutes from the first wisps of smoke (after about 5 minutes) then removing it and finishing off under the grill so that you don't over-cook them. You could even brine the fish briefly first (especially with salmon, which will prevent/reduce the white enzymes from seeping out when it's cooked), with 2 1/2 tbsp fine sea salt per 250ml (cup) water (dissolved) - brine for twenty minutes only, then remove, rinse, pat dry and preferably rest for two hours before cooking.