Tuesday 2 July 2013

Dover Sole Meuniere - Old Style French! Monday July 1st 2013

Happy day when I picked up two Dover Sole for 4 quid (Half price at end of play on Sunday in Sainsbury's).

I would usually grill fish but Dovers have rather tough skin with little strong scales that defeat removal, so I always skin this fish then flour and fry in butter and oil.. (the meuniere of the name, is old French for "in the style of the miller's wife"presumably because of the flour it is dredged in . There you go, don't say I don't teach you things.)



Skinning a Dover sole is actually quite easy, the skin rips away easily from the underlying flesh, Just make a little incision above the tail on the dark side, slide the knife tip under the skin to make a little flap. Then grip the skin with one end of a teatowel in one hand, and hold the tail of the fish with the other end of the teatowel and pull the skin up to the nose. Then turn the fish over, ease the skin over the head. Hold the skin with one hand in the teatowel and hold the head under the skin this time with the other, and then rip from nose to tail on the white side to remove the skin all in one piece. Then trim the side fringes with a pair of scissors.

It's probably easier to see than to imagine, have a look at how Jamie Oliver does it:





He does each side individually, unlike me, but it doesn't matter.

Then just dredge each side of the fish in seasoned flour, and fry (not too fast) in a mixture of oil and butter until golden brown.

A true meuniere is finished with more melted butter with parsley and lemon, but we just had a bit of salad and some new potatoes, and home made tartare sauce instead. It's really good, really simple, and yes, lemon sole will work fine, although not as succulent as true dover soles.

Give it a go and let me know how you get on.

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