Butter

It will kill you. Yes, I know. But when it’s got to be butter, it’s truly got to be butter.

 Two buttery recipes.

Radis Roses with Butter and Fleur de Sel

The first time I tasted French radis roses was the day I moved to Paris, in March of 2003. I knew that "radis roses" simply meant pink radishes, but there’s a little something romantic in the word rose that elevated the radish from a mere root vegetable. They were served to me with a little cross cut in the root end for the golden Normandy butter, and flaky Fleur de Sel salt. Oh my.

Sole Meunière

Ok, theoretically, the star of the dish is the Dover sole, a lovely, pricey, delicate, firm-fleshed fish, found in the cold waters of northern Europe. And I’m sure there are lots of ways to cook it that don’t involve butter (well, surely there must be!), but there’s something symbiotic, synergistic and deliciously synful about butter and this fish, that explains why it’s such a classic.

Buy your fish from a reputable fishmonger. Otherwise, chances are excellent you’ve paid for flounder.

Salt and pepper your beauty on both sides. Heat a sauté pan over medium high heat then drop in a good knob of butter. A couple of tablespoons or so. When the butter foam subsides, gently lay in the fish, starting from the position closest to you, and moving away, so as not to splatter yourself with hot butter. Quickly brown the fish on both sides but don’t burn the butter.

Remove the fish to the serving plate (carefully) and add more butter to your pan. Watch it go brown. Have a lemon ready to squeeze into the browning butter at the precise moment before brown goes to black. It will sizzle like mad so best not to cook this naked.

Remove the pan from the heat and toss in a tablespoon or so of parsley. Pour the whole of it over your fish and add a little more parsley over the top. You might want to have cooked something to go with it, like parsleyed potatoes or green beans. Or you might have wanted just fish. And wine, of course.

Bon appétit!

Photographs courtesy of Jeff McDowell.