Niall O'Connor's key ingredient recipe from Heat 4 of MasterChef 2014
Ingredients
- pork fillet, trimmed of all visible fat (keep trimmings aside)
- 3 large potatoes (roosters)
- red/yellow peppers,
- courgette,
- fennel seeds,
- fresh tarragon (bunch approx 25 leaves)
- flat leaf parsley (3 or 4 sprigs),
- tub creme fraiche,
- chicken stock,
- 1/2 banana shallot
- unsalted butter
- milk
- cider vinegar
- white wine
- olive oil
- salt & pepper
Method
- Begin by trimming all fat and sinew from the fillet of pork. These trimmings will add flavour to your sauce, so keep them! For the challenge, I also took some blade steak and used the fatty trimmings off that, too.
- Preheat oven to 170C. Next get the (peeled) potatoes boiling in salted water til tender. They tend to discolour less if you start them in cold water. Drain well.
- While they're cooking, blister the skin off lightly oiled peppers at high heat. I grilled them, then placed them in a bowl covered with clingfilm for 15 mins to make peeling easy.
- At a slight angle (allowing more surface area) cut 1/2cm slices of courgettes and chargrill them & peeled peppers. Julienne (finely slice) them, lightly season and set aside.
- Push the potatoes through a drum sieve, return to pot, add plenty of butter & some milk (warmed) to desired consistency. For that authentic Masterchef feel, season poorly and have your dinner guests berate you for it. ;)
- Lightly toast fennel seeds in dry pan then crush with mortar & pestle. Oil the pork fillet and rub sea salt & fennel seeds on the outside. The pork should now be sealed on all sides in an oven-proof pan along with trimmings from earlier and transferred to oven for about 12-15 mins depending on thickness of meat. If you have a meat probe, bring the pork to 65c then rest well (8 mins). You are looking for a final core temp of 68- 70C. I went for 68. This will be the most tender. It won't be rare but will have a pink blush to the centre of the meat, but is perfectly safe to eat!! Don't be frightened, once you try it you'll see the difference!
- Now your pork is out and resting, use that pan to sweat finely minced shallot. Then deglaze with cider vinegar (2-3 tblsp) and a good glug of white wine, add some chicken stock and reduce to about 1/2. Strain & finish with some cold butter, creme fraiche and plenty of chopped tarragon/parsley. If you put in the herbs too soon they lose their vibrancy.
- Pass the mash through the sieve again and remember to season. I was surprised during the restaurant service just how much salt it can take, and I erred (way) too far on the side of caution. Remember its unsalted butter. If you want it to look posh, pipe it through a bag with a snipped opening of 7mm. Now quickly reheat veg with a dash of stock and you're ready to serve. Bon appetit!
