Cream of peas with smoked eel or mackerel

'Man has been cooking for centuries. Eating together is an event surrounded by more or less fixed rituals. This applies to a state banquet, but also to an intimate dinner or a déjeuner sur l'herbe. Cooking is love and attention for your ingredients, but above all for being together; it gives food a festive touch. That is what Always Sunday is about. - TEXT WIL DEMANT | PHOTOGRAPHY ANNEMIJN BAX

Cream of peas with smoked eel or mackerel

You will need this:

• 1 smoked mackerel or 400 g smoked eel
• clump of butter
• shallot, chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
• 5 dl fish stock
• 500 g shelled peas
• salt and pepper
• fresh marjoram 1 tbsp, chopped
• 4 croutons of 7 cm diameter
• juice of half a lemon
• cream 1 dl
• egg yolks 2 pieces, beaten loose

This is how you make it:

Clean the mackerel or eel. Gently fry the shallot and garlic in the butter, deglaze with the stock and add the peas. Simmer gently for 10 minutes until the peas are soft. Remove 4 tbsp of the peas from the soup and puree the rest in a food processor. Season the soup with salt, pepper and half the marjoram. Top the fried croutons with the eel/ mackerel. Drizzle some lemon juice on top and heat the croutons in an oven until lukewarm. Whisk the cream through the egg yolks. From the heat, bind the soup with the egg yolk-cream mixture. Place a spoonful of peas in the centre of 4 warm soup plates. Place a canapé of eel/mackerel on top. Garnish with the rest of the marjoram. At the table, pour in the soup.

Wine

Moselle Riesling of some age and with a little residual sugar, for example Rotschiefer from Weingut Paulinshof.

More recipes?

This recipe is from "Always Sunday" by Wil Demandt | CARRERA CULINAIR ISBN: 9789048856015 | € 39,99

Curious about more recipes by Wil Demandt? You can read them in WINELIFE Magazine 75. Order individual issues here!

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