![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Apalachicola Oysters
Jul. 21st, 2008 04:12 pmI did another food challenge, this time the theme was seafood, sesame, and cilantro.
Threw me a bit because I could think of a bunch of Latin/Caribbean recipes with seafood and cilantro, and a lot of Asian recipes with seafood and sesame, but sesame and cilantro both? Especially since I didn't want to sort of cop-out and sprinkle sesame seeds on the food at the end.
So, oysters came to mind, especially with a fake mignonette, using lime instead of wine vinegar, and some olive oil to mellow out the strong taste of sesame oil. Basically lime juice, sesame oil, olive oil, salt, cracked black pepper, chopped cilantro and a minced shallot (chilled for a couple hours to mellow, though a day might have been better). Drizzled a bit on oysters, and the idea was the three ingredients would be equally assertive without one being too overpowering.
After all that intellectualizing, I actually made the stuff and it turned out really, really good. Much better than I guessed, or even secretly expected. Christey and I were with my family and a whole bunch of friends this weekend (like, 12-15 adults and 6-8 kids, I never did get an accurate count) and there were five of us adults who actually loved oysters. We went through two dozen in about 15 minutes.
It almost took longer for Christey to set up and shoot, but the natural light coming in from off the deck is a departure from our usual in-kitchen studio.
More ramblings over at our site on FotoCuisine
Threw me a bit because I could think of a bunch of Latin/Caribbean recipes with seafood and cilantro, and a lot of Asian recipes with seafood and sesame, but sesame and cilantro both? Especially since I didn't want to sort of cop-out and sprinkle sesame seeds on the food at the end.
So, oysters came to mind, especially with a fake mignonette, using lime instead of wine vinegar, and some olive oil to mellow out the strong taste of sesame oil. Basically lime juice, sesame oil, olive oil, salt, cracked black pepper, chopped cilantro and a minced shallot (chilled for a couple hours to mellow, though a day might have been better). Drizzled a bit on oysters, and the idea was the three ingredients would be equally assertive without one being too overpowering.
After all that intellectualizing, I actually made the stuff and it turned out really, really good. Much better than I guessed, or even secretly expected. Christey and I were with my family and a whole bunch of friends this weekend (like, 12-15 adults and 6-8 kids, I never did get an accurate count) and there were five of us adults who actually loved oysters. We went through two dozen in about 15 minutes.
It almost took longer for Christey to set up and shoot, but the natural light coming in from off the deck is a departure from our usual in-kitchen studio.
More ramblings over at our site on FotoCuisine
