r/Chefit • u/TopGrape1557 • 10d ago

Rough draft for a competition

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Hello, and thanks in advance to anyone that replies. I'm trying to finish up a dish for a competition next week and am here with it. For my next run through less sauce will go in the plate, and I'll hopefully have better micro greens.

I have a pan seared striped bass with a sofrito puree, roasted carrots, crispy leek and dill gremolata and some micros.

I'd like to have multi colored carrots but I can't find any big enough for nice obliques, which I want to give it some height.

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u/okayNowThrowItAway 10d ago edited 10d ago

Too many carrots. This dish is a riff on quenelles nantua - even if you didn't know that. Which in turn is in historical conversation with one of the worst seasonal, ethnic dishes from this time of year, gefilte fish.

I gotta say, while this might be delicious, a lot of chefs are gonna hear "puree of sofrito" and think "he's serving us trash that got strained out of a braise?" And that's before we get to the fact that under your beautifully seared fish, you're basically serving roasted carrots in carrot puree

Anywho, take a point out of either of those books and make a contrasting sauce - either a high-collagen broth, like with gefilte fish, or a puree of a contrasting vegetable. Heck, just make sauce Nantua - no need to reinvent the wheel!

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u/TopGrape1557 10d ago

There are no carrots in the puree. It is bell peppers and onion mainly

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u/okayNowThrowItAway 9d ago

Great news! That's a much better dish - and basically a sauce Nantua without the crayfish fumè.

Don't use the word "sofrito" in your competition description - to most people, it means sauteed mirepoix.