Yogurt Sauce.

A week of intensive and successful culinary epiphany, my children, so let us get right into this. I was basically perusing the episodes of Good Eats that are available on You Tube and thinking on the excess of dried tarragon I happen to own, one thing led to another, and I decided to try out Alton Brown’s Tarragon Yogurt Sauce. It should be noted that the recipe I link there has a major flaw: it lacks the tempering process which is the point of the recipe’s inclusion in The Yogurt Episode (The recipe starts in that episode at 10:43. Description of tempering at 13:50).

As Mr. Brown describes, using plain yogurt in a sauce conveys a lot of advantages: it is creamy, but low fat, so it acts as a replacement for heavy cream, but it also lends an amazing flavor of its own to the right sauces; simultaneously tangy, light, and fresh tasting, kind of the dairy equivalent of celery. The problem with Yogurt is that. since it is basically primordial cheese, any number of things can cause it to curdle. In fact if any of you have ever opened a yogurt and found a layer of water on top of your yogurt, this is part of the process. It is harmless, your yogurt is still good, but if taken to its eventual conclusion the yogurt will turn into a dense mass of protein (the curd) sitting in a poor of cloudy water (whey). Heat makes this process occur rapidly, so any heated yogurt sauce will turn into a mess of cottage cheese with alarming rapidity unless steps are taken to prevent it. In this case, Mr. Brown shows the viewer how to use starch to prevent curdling, but you can also use fat or any number of other chemical intermediaries.

Last Monday I pretty much followed Mr. Brown’s recipe to put over some nice fish. This is one of my favorite fish preparations because it is super quick and utilizes frozen tilapia which is super cheap. I get them individually wrapped in plastic from BJs, which means you can sink them in their wrappings in a bowl of warm water and have them defrosted in less than five minutes. Other than the fish (I used four filets) you will need:

1c Flour
1 tbsp Salt

5-10 grinds Fresh Pepper

3 tbsp Butter

2 tbps capers

First make some pasta, I forgot this step and it was stupid but not the end of the world. Actually I make gnocchi, which is technically a dumpling. Whatever. Your mom was a dumpling.

Once the fish is defrosted, dump the water from the bowl, and unwrap the fish into the bowl. Have 2 cooling racks ready, and start heating a 10-12in pan on the stove over medium high heat. Combine the flour, salt, and pepper on a large plate and swizzle together with a fork, then shake out so the mixture is flat on the plate. Take each filet and lightly cover with the flour, then knock off the excess and place on the first rack. When all the filets are dine, check the pan by placing a drop of water on. If it skittles all over the place it is too hot, if it just sizzles wildly it is ready, if I looks at you, you have to heat it more. Cut the butter into smaller chunks, then toss into the pan when it is ready. When it is melted it should start to foam up. Gently place in the fish, two or three at a time, being careful not to overcrowd the pan. Turn after a minute or two, the bottom should be golden brown, and the thinner parts of the fish will probably be visibly cooked on the uncooked side. I find two forks make a great way to do the turning, though I suppose people who aren’t ghetto as hell have fish turners or whatever. Once the fish are done on both sides, remove to the cooling rack. When all the fish are done place in an oven set to barely be on, just to keep them warm (do not wrap in tin foil, the steam will melt the crust). Turn down the heat and add the capers, gently frying them for a minute or two.

MEANWHILE, during the downtime from the above you should probably have started Mr. Brown’s recipe, sweating the veggies in a saucier over a medium low heat, stirring occasionally. Once the fish is done and you have a minute to think while the capers fry, make the corn starch slurry. When the capers are done, deglaze the fish pan with the rest of the stock. Bring to a boil and scrape down the pan. When the veggies are done sweating, dump the stock into the saucier bodily, in a bold and manly fashion. Now is the time for spicery, so add the pepper, any salt you want, and copious tarragon. Finally, add the slurry. Return to a boil, stirring vigorously. Mr. Brown says to whisk but my only saucier is nonstick, which is pretty stupid, but it’s what I have, so I used a silicone spatula.

Once the sauce has thickened it is time to add the Yogurt. As Mr. Brown says in the episode, but not the recipe, if you dump in all the yogurt it will curdle from the heat before the starch in the sauce can get to it, so you need to temper the yogurt. This essentially means slowly raising the temperature. You could do this with a ton a whisking and a double boiler and tempering is just way easier. So what you do is kill the heat on the sauce and put your yogurt into a bowl. Then using a whisk or spoon or spatula or whatever, take a little of the sauce, put it in the bowl, and stir it into the yogurt. Keep doing this till the temperature of the yogurt has raised significantly, probably 5-7 doses. Then you can dump the yogurt into the saucier and rapidly stir everything together. Now test the temperature, and if you feel it needs to be warmer to serve, feel free to raise the temperature whilst stirring. This made a great dinner, and I had two filets and half the sauce left over, so I had it over noodles with a side of raw broccoli for work for the next two days. Yum!

But then I made an awesome discovery. The key part of this process, the mechanical functional part, is really just using the slurry to thicken and using the tempering process to avoid curdling during the addition of the yogurt. You can flavor your sauce with pretty much anything, and it is stupid fast to make. The following is a midnight slack I threw together.

Half a box of elbow macaroni

3 large white button mushrooms

A handful of frozen spinach

A cup of broth

A tablespoon of cornstarch

Garlic

Salt

Pepper

Cook the pasta

In a small pot roughly chop the mushrooms, toss in the spinach, salt, and pepper. Sweat until the mushrooms have given up their precious juices and the spinach is heated. Make the slurry, and dump the broth into the veggies. Thicken with the slurry, and place the yogurt into a bowl. Temper the yogurt, and when it is warm add the pasta, stir, and then add the whole shebang into the sauce. Heat until you are happy with the temperature, and eat it out of the pot in bed with a wooden spoon like a cave man.