Wild line-caught sea trout, Port of Ness crab, crushed croft new potatoes, hazelnut and a sauce made from buttermilk, crab stock and sorrel Method
Ingredients
80-100g trout fillet
1 whole fresh crab (weighing about 1kg) Lemon juice
For the crab stock
2 carrots 2 onions Celery stick 1 leek Small fennel bulb 300ml dry white wine Thyme Parsley
For the potatoes
200g croft potatoes, washed and scrubbed Cullisse Highland rapeseed oil
For the sauce
200ml buttermilk 100g sorrel Crab stock
Handful of whole hazelnuts
Method
Score the skin of the trout and season with Skye sea salt. Heat oil in a warm pan and place the trout skin side down, pressing down the fish to stop it from curling. Baste the flesh with the oil from the pan. Once the fish has been cooked three quarters of the way, turn the fish over. Add a knob of butter and baste a couple of times. Finish with a squeeze of lemon juice.
Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil, lower the crab into the boiling water and cook for about 8-10 minutes. Once cooked, remove and leave to cool. Once cooled remove the white crab meat, keeping the shells for the stock. The white crab meat is gently mixed through the crushed potatoes.
Pre-heat the oven to 200°C. Place the crab shells in a roasting dish. Roast for about 10 minutes. In a large pan place the roasted shells along with the roughly chopped vegetables, herbs and wine, add around three litres of water, bring to the boil and simmer for about an hour. Strain the stock through a muslin cloth, return to the pan and reduce to half. Simply boil the potatoes in salted boiling water for about 10-15 minutes. Drain, gently crush and coat with rapeseed oil. Season with Skye sea salt. Blend the buttermilk and sorrel together. Heat gently in a pan adding some of the reduced crab stock to taste. Pass through a muslin cloth and return to the pan adding a couple of knobs of butter. Foam the sauce with a stick blender.
Place hazelnuts on a baking tray and toast for about 8-10 minutes at 180°C. Once cooled, finely chop, mixing a small amount through the crab and potato. Garnish the fish with a small scattering of the hazelnuts.
Remove the head, legs and wings from the grouse, checking all feathers have been removed. Wash the bird making sure you get rid of any blood. Dry with a towel. Pre-heat oven to 180°C. Place heather in the bottom of a lidded roasting pan with a rack on top. Brown the grouse in a pan over a high heat. Carefully light the heather until it smokes, placing the grouse on the rack and the lid on. Cook for 10 minutes. If the grouse needs longer, smoke the heather again before returning to the oven. To check the grouse is cooked, squeeze the breast, it should have a nice spring. Rest for 10-15 minutes. Remove breasts and keep the bones for the sauce. Mix salt and heather in a bowl. In a container spread a generous layer of the salt mixture and place the grouse legs on top and cover with the rest of the salt. Cover and refrigerate for three hours. Rinse the salt from the legs and let them sit in clean water for 20 minutes, changing the water after 10 minutes. While the grouse legs soak, warm some duck fat to 90°C. Remove the grouse legs, dry and place in duck fat for about 3-4 hours but checking after two. The legs are ready when the meat comes away from the bone easily. Pan fry for a golden crispy skin. Pre-heat oven to 180°C. Place the bones in a roasting tray and cook until nicely golden all over. Don’t over roast them or they will become bitter. Peel onion, carrot and wash celery. Chop into rough dice and roast in a pot, colouring all the veg. Set aside in a bowl to cool. To the same pot add the bones and chicken stock. You want to get every bit of flavour from both bones and vegetables. Add enough stock to cover the bones and simmer for 1½ hours, add the roasted vegetables and cook a further 1½ hours or until you are happy with the flavour.
Pass the stock through a sieve and reduce until you have a nice sauce consistency. Take off the heat and infuse with heather, checking after 10 minutes. If you can’t taste heather leave for a further 10 minutes. Pass through a fine sieve or muslin and gently warm through, adding your moorberries before serving. Preheat oven to 180°C. Cut stalks off kale and coat with oil, season and place on a baking tray. Bake for three minutes on each side. Remove from oven and cool. Use to garnish the dish.