Salmon in Phyllo with Hollandaise and Caviar

I originally called this dish Salmon en Croute, which would be technically correct, but I decided I needed distinction between puff pastry dough and phyllo dough, both of which are available in your grocer's freezer, and only the very serious culinarian with a lot of time and patience on their hands should attempt to make this stuff from scratch. Puff pastry, or pâte feuilletée, as the French call it, is the workhorse of the puff pastry world and it serves as the base for many pastry items in both the sweet and savory categories of cuisine. It's good stuff and I have eaten it many times, but for this dish, I prefer the lighter middle eastern cousin, phyllo dough. It can be a little difficult to work with unless you know a few tricks:

• Buy a quality frozen phyllo dough product. Athens is the brand I most commonly use, and I prefer the 9" x 14" sheets.
• Thaw the product for five hours on your kitchen counter without taking the packages out of the box.
• When the phyllo has thawed, remove the plastic wrapped pastry from the box, but do not open it until you are fully ready to begin using the product.
• When you are ready to begin using the pasty dough, you want to work as fast as possible, and not leave the pastry exposed to the open air for very long periods of time. It will become dried and brittle very quickly.
• When you open the plastic package, carefully unroll the pastry sheets so they lay flat on a clean, cool counter top.
• Lay a large piece of wax paper over the pastry sheets, and put damp paper towels on top of the wax paper.
• As you work with the phyllo dough, pull off one sheet at a time, and lay it on a flat, clean, cool counter top. Add sheets of phyllo on top of that to your desired thickness, then quickly return the wax paper and damp paper towels to your stack of phyllo sheets.
• Have melted butter and a pastry brush nearby. You will need it to coat the phyllo dough, once you have finished assembling your dish.

No matter what you are using phyllo dough for, follow the tips above, and you'll find it none too difficult to work with to make amazingly stunning results.

This recipe calls for any fresh salmon, and farm raised is fine, however it is best with fresh coho or steal head salmon when you can get it. You want to ask your fish monger to give you about a pound and a half of salmon fillet, and to remove the skin.

If you forget to have your fish monger remove the skin, it is a relatively simple task:

1. Lay the fillet on a cutting board, skin side down.
2. On the narrower tail end, using a boning knife (click here to see the right shape), make a cut between the skin and the flesh that is deep enough so that you can grab the skin with your other hand.
3. Put your knife at a 45 degree angle to the cutting board, grab the skin with your other hand, and simply hold the knife (almost as if you are scraping the skin) while you pull the skin with your other hand.

If you notice any small bones in your fillet, use a pair of needle-nose pliers to remove them. Then slice your fillet down to four ounce portions.

For the Hollandaise Sauce recipe, I go back to the master, Julia Child, from The French Chef Cookbook, published in 1968, from her PBS series of the same name, and the ninety-eighth show that would have been broadcast sometime in 1965-66.

Finally, my recipe calls for a dollop of caviar. Now, you can go as high or as low as your taste and pocketbook will allow for this ingredient. True caviar is the roe of the sturgeon fish, and the best in the world allegedly is Russian Beluga caviar from the Black Sea, which is no longer imported due to scares of mercuric poisoning.

If I were going to enjoy an appetizer of caviar with the traditional condiments of blinis (small, thin buckwheat pancakes), chopped egg whites, chopped egg yolks and sour cream, with intermittent shots of icy cold vodka, then I would (and have) spend the bucks for a quality grade caviar and enjoy the experience.

For this dish, however, you just want a dollop as a garnish, so any commercially available whitefish or lump fish roe will do, and a wholesome product generally available in most grocery stores is sold under the brand name Romanoff. The roe is commercially dyed red or black, which may turn off food snobs, so if you want to spend more, go ahead. I think for the impact, it's a waste of money.

Ingredients
For the Hollandaise sauce
3 egg yolks, room temperature
2 tbsp lemon juice
pinch of salt
pinch of white pepper
pinch of cayenne pepper
2 sticks of butter, melted

Ingredients
For the salmon
6 4-oz portions of fresh salmon, filleted and skinned
18 9"x14" sheets of phyllo pastry dough
3 tbsp butter, melted
6 dollops caviar

The Recipe
First, prepare the salmon:
Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

Working with the sheets of pastry dough as recommended above, stack three sheets of phyllo together, and dab melted butter with a pastry brush around all the edges.

Then, place the salmon toward the top of the sheets of pastry dough, about two inches from the edge. Fold the top edge of the pastry sheet over the salmon. Then, fold in the two sides of the pastry sheets. Finally, roll the salmon fillet up into the phyllo. Dab a little butter at the final seam, and then place the salmon seam side down in a shallow, buttered roasting pan.

Using a pastry brush, coat the pastry packet in butter, and then complete the process for the other five portions of salmon.

Place the roasting pan with the salmon in the middle of a pre-heated 350-degree oven, and bake until the pasty sheets take on a golden brown, about 25-35 minutes.

While the salmon is cooking, make the Hollandaise:

I'm going straight to Julia on this, verbatim.

ELECTRIC BLENDER HOLLANDAISE SAUCE
For about 3/4 cup serving 4 people

Place egg yolks, lemon juice, salt, and pepper in jar of blender. Cover and blend at high speed for 30 seconds. Un-cover, and still blending at high speed, start pouring in the hot butter by droplettes. The heat of the butter warms the egg yolks, and by pouring very slowly you are giving the yolks time to absorb the butter. When about two thirds of the butter has gone in, sauce should be a thick cream and can pour a little more quickly.

By the way, the addition of cayenne pepper in this Hollandaise recipe is my innovation, and I like a little more than a pinch.

Finally, finish the dish:
Pour a little of the Hollandaise sauce on a dinner plate, place a portion of the salmon in phyllo on top of it, and garnish with the dollop of caviar.