THS CWT VIETNAMESEFISHSALAD 2018 01 25

Hey everybody, I'm Chef Trevor, Chef de Partie of Benchmark Restaurants at the Canadian Food and Wine Institute

And today, on a special edition of Cooking with Trevor, we are in the heart of Kensington Market in Toronto

And I'm here with an extra special guest, dynamic young chef, Luke Hayes

Luke, why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself and what we're going to be doing here today. Yeah, of course. Great that you could be here. Really excited to see you

I'm Luke Hayes. I run Lust, which is Luke's Underground Supper Table, and it's one of the world's top underground supper clubs

A supper club. So that's not something somebody would be really familiar with on a normal basis. Yeah

What's different about a supper club than a regular restaurant? So many things. But probably the main thing is that it's going to be in an open kitchen

You're going to meet new people. So everybody's kind of seated together, having a great time

So it's more like an interactive dining experience. It is. It's social. And that's one of the things that keeps people coming back

Alright, Luke. So we've got a bunch of ingredients in front of us today. It looks like we're going a little bit Asian. So why don't you tell our guests what we'll be making today

Yeah, we're definitely going Asian. We're going to be going to Vietnam. We're going to have a Vietnamese fish salad with sawtooth garlic and chili

It's all going to happen with salmon. So let's get started cooking with Luke. So Luke, why don't you tell everyone what we've got in front of us today

Of course. First thing first, we've got some salmon right here. We've got some limes, fish sauce, chili garlic sauce, which I made instead of bought

But you can totally use a store-bought one. Some red onions and carrots, which I gave a quick pickling treatment to

Just a bit of white vinegar. Five or ten minutes. Then rinse it off. It kind of softens them and adds a little bit of brightness

Garlic, peanuts, mint, some sesame seeds, a little bit of the avocado oil, and some sawtooth herb

Luke, why don't you tell us what kind of profile sawtooth has and why it lends itself so well to this dish

Yeah, sawtooth herb is super popular in Vietnamese and Southeast Asian cooking in general

It's a lot like cilantro. Richer, maybe a little bit lemonier. I love it, but obviously sawtooth and cilantro are kind of divisive

So if you don't like it, you could put in basil. You could leave it out. You could just use extra mint and it's going to be good no matter what

Alright Luke, so let's get started with this salad today. Tell everyone how you're going to work with the salmon

First thing is to skin it and then we're going to cube it. Alright, and what type of salmon are we working with

We are working with wild caught salmon from the fishmongers next door

Oh, wonderful. It's all about local and beautiful. Well, we are in the heart of the Kensington Market, which is a wonderful place for fresh produce

In Toronto, you can find anything here. This is one of my favourite preparations for salmon because it's just so fresh

The flavours are really dynamic. They kind of explode in your mouth. And you have so many different textures and so many different ingredients kind of coming together

So that's why I love it so much. And I often find too with salmon, a lot of times people just overcomplicate the presentation of salmon

Salmon has such an awesome flavour all on its own. You never really want to do too much to it

I mean like the ingredients, if they're beautiful, if they're fresh, if they're full flavoured, just kind of enhance them

You don't need to make it into a show. So the preparation here, do we marinate this

Nothing at all. We get the garlic sauteing and then we can kind of add the fish to the pan and get that started

But the next step, we need these crushed. So how about you pop them into the mortar and pestle and do your thing

Sure. And are these just dry salted or roasted? Unsalted but roasted, yeah

Roasted, unsalted peanuts. I love the romanticism of doing it by hand

Really interesting too when you use the mortar and pestle because you really squish out the oils when you're cooking. Yeah

The fragrance is so much better. What's the next step? Well, I'm just squeezing some lime juice

And then if you want to throw in three tablespoons of this fish sauce

It's up to you. If you want to use three tablespoons in this dish, go right ahead. If you want to scale back the saltiness a little bit, just use two or one

And if you love that flavor, like that richness, the umami that it gives, you can always use a bit more too. Perfect

So it's totally customizable and that's another thing I love about recipes like this. If you like it really limey, feel free to add more lime juice

If you love the crunch of the peanuts, you know, definitely add more of them. It's really versatile depending on what you like to cook

One thing we should talk about because a lot of our guests might not be familiar with cross contamination specifically. Yeah

Is before we want to cut these herbs on our cutting board, we definitely want to take a second and wash and sanitize this cutting board

Because we got a little bit of fish on the one side and we really don't want any cross contamination

Especially because the rest of this dish won't be cooked. Exactly. Yeah

So our cutting board is clean and sanitized and we're ready for the next step. Perfect. And that is the cutting of our sawtooth

So what are we looking for picking out sawtooth from the grocer

It's like any herb. You want it to look fresh. You want it to look vibrantly green

You want it to look like it was just picked. And you can kind of tell sawtooth because it literally has little jagged edges along it. Right

So it's like this grassiness and it just looks fresh and beautiful. And we're just going to remove the stem here

About there. Yeah, we're just going to take that off. And I'll pick some of the mint here and we can do that afterwards

And remember everyone, it's not a race. It's about getting everything the same size

And leaving your fingers on. Yes, leaving your fingers intact. We always talk about proper knife skills and how important it is

Do you want to pop it into the bowl? Yes. And then you can chop up the mint. So I'm just giving this a rough small chop like you said

And it smells super fragrant. Very fresh. Like so many of the other things we got from Kensington this morning

So we've done all our chopping. All the prep is done. It's complete. So we're ready for the cooking phase

So what's the first step for cooking today? First step is we're going to saute the garlic for about 30 seconds or a minute

Then add in the salmon. Now I've noticed with the garlic today you haven't really cut this to a pulp or a puree

Which a lot of times on the show we do. I think today you've left a little bit bigger because we want the garlic crunch in this dish

You want the flavor? I mean garlic is a very strong flavor, right

So sometimes you want it to be more hidden in a dish. Sometimes you want it to be bigger like this

Sometimes you just slice the cloves and leave them really chunky. And sometimes you leave it raw

Like in a lot of Sichuan cuisine and a lot of Chinese food. Yeah, it's raw. Certain regional variances will give you raw garlic right in the mix at the last minute

And I love that flavor and that texture that it gives. Alright, so we're going in a non-stick pan with the salmon

Why would we use a non-stick pan as opposed to a regular pan? Because this is more like a gentle saute instead of a hardcore high heat sear. Perfect

So that totally works for this type of thing. Otherwise your salmon is going to stick like crazy

Yeah, we want to really maintain that fish. And you want it to look good

And keep the cubes nice. I hate when it flakes off and looks difficult

And sad. It looks sad. It looks so sad. It looks sad

So I just tossed in a bit of the avocado oil. Yep. Let the pan heat up for two seconds. You always want to hear that characteristic sizzle when you drop something in

It sounds sexy. What can I say? Now do we want to brown the garlic in this case

Not much. Or are we just trying to release the flavor of the garlic? Yeah, just release the flavor

Soften it up a bit. Get rid of that raw flavor and texture. But that's about it. So while this is kind of starting, how about you add the pickled veg. Okay

And you just said you just did this simple with white vinegar? Just a very quick pickle

50% white vinegar, 50% water. Leave it in for 10 to 15 minutes

And it's not really to pickle it. It's just kind of soften it and add a tiny, tiny bit of tang

Then rinse it off under cold water and it's good to go. Yeah, so the chili garlic sauce I made, it's just with dried chilies, some fresh Thai bird's eye chilies

bit of garlic, a little bit of soy. So it's rich, really spicy, a little bit of smoky

But not everybody's going to make it. So you can totally feel free to just go out and buy a jar of like a good Vietnamese chili garlic sauce

It's going to do the job equally well. And I think it's so important to kind of just try out the different flavors

If you're not used to them, see what you like, see what you don't like. And just kind of like have fun in the kitchen

And that's what I love about so many of these different cultures. I mean, I love Southeast Asian, regional Asian flavors, like village by village type of thing

Because everything is different. It's all about just punching above its weight. You have a few different ingredients kind of coming together

Like this, you know, it's carrots, it's onion, it's salmon, it's garlic. But by the time you put it onto a plate and take a bite, it's like, holy shit

I kind of saw all of those things match together. Yeah. Like personally, I'd be good with it about there because it's going to have a bit of carry over cooking

If you want to toss that into the bowl. And we just want all the liquid and moisture from the garlic in there

I've got the sesame seeds right here. All right. Throw in a couple of spoonfuls of those

Then if you want to add the fish sauce lime mix. Then I will put in a bit of the mint

A bit of the sawtooth. All right. Maybe the same amount. We can always add more if we need to

All right. So about there. Yeah, that looks good. Perfect. And we just gently toss it all together

Very gently toss it all together. I think that is absolutely delicious

And I love that you can taste the characteristics of your chili sauce

It really comes through that there's something special about it. Thank you so much

Thank you. There you have it. So it's the Vietnamese fish salad with the sawtooth herb, the chili, garlic, and a bunch of other amazing exotic ingredients

And it really has this characteristic awesome spice to it from that homemade chili and garlic sauce

You really get the characteristic flavor from that sawtooth in there. That very lemony, herbaceous flavor

So bright, right? And it really livens everything up. Even the quick pickling on those vegetables is superb

And the crunch and the sourness with the heat and the sweetness from the mint

Luke, I really appreciate all you've done today on the show for us. Yeah, thank you so much

And your Supper Club sounds exciting. I'd really love to come try it out sometime

It's a date. Wonderful. Well, everybody, that's all we have for you today on Cooking with Trevor

Thank you for joining us on our very special episode here in the heart of Kensington Market with Lust Supper Club superstar, Luke Hayes

Thanks, everybody. Bye