- [Alvin] Thank you to Bokksu
for sponsoring today's episode.
Bokksu is a premium Japanese snack box that works with
family businesses all over Japan to deliver a new theme
of authentic treats every month.
This month's theme is all about cherry blossoms,
and I'm already loving the taste and look of these snacks,
especially some of the mochi, the rice crackers,
the spicy savory puffs, and this cream sandwich.
Head to the link in my description and use code ALVIN
at checkout to get $15 off your next Bokksu order.
(speaking Japanese)
Hello there.
Welcome back to another episode of Anime with Alvin.
Today, I'll be attempting to recreate the massive
seafood feast cooked by Nicolo in Attack on Titan.
We're only able to see the entire spread
for a few seconds in the show, but from what I've gathered,
this involves quite a different variety of seafood,
including scallops, mussels, clams, shrimp,
salmon, and of course, lobster.
Let's get started.
A lot of the dishes in this feast seem to incorporate
much garlic and shallot, so to make sure that we have enough
I'm mincing up one whole entire head of garlic
and thinly slicing one shallot.
This will be the base for many of the dishes to come.
The first dish I'm starting on is a mussel dish
that seems to be in a tomato or red sauce base.
So in a large pan over medium heat,
I'm cooking two tablespoons of our chopped garlic,
half of the shallot in about two tablespoons of olive oil,
letting of them hang out in there until they start to sweat
and adding a half a teaspoon of chili flakes.
Once the chili has released their nice flavors
and colors into the oil, in goes two tablespoons
of tomato paste.
Needs to be cooked out so that the rawness doesn't stay in.
This gets deglazed with a quarter cup of dry vermouth,
followed by a cup of crushed tomatoes.
Season to taste with salt, which in this case
was about a half tablespoon.
Once everybody's having a good time in the sauce,
then goes one and a half pounds of mussels,
freshly acquired from a local seafood purveyor.
After a good stir, this goes to simmer and hang out
for another five minutes, just until the mussels
have started to open up.
The second issue we're working on looks like a variation
on clams casino, in this case scallops casino,
a very delicious baked seafood dish that involves cheese,
and in this case, breadcrumbs.
To make our mixture, we're cooking the rest of the shallots
and another two tablespoons of the garlic
in two tablespoons of butter, sauteing just until fragrant
and translucent and then adding two tablespoons of flour.
This is now followed by a half cup of whole milk
along with a quarter cup of white wine
and then brought to a boil while whisking the whole time.
After about a minute or so, this gets removed from heat
and in goes two cups of bay scallops,
which have been drained and patted dry,
along with a half cup of grated mozzarella cheese.
We don't really wanna overcook this
because this is going to finish cooking in the oven.
Once this mixture has cooled, we have some beautiful
scallop shells that we had to acquire separately,
but will be a great vessel for which in
our mixture will hang out.
Each one gets packed with an even amount
of the scallopy cheesy mixture
and we move on to our breadcrumb topic.
In a bowl, a cup of breadcrumbs gets combined
with the rest of mozzarella cheese and kneaded together
so that the cheese can get evenly incorporated
throughout the breadcrumbs and evenly divided
on top of each of our little scallop shells.
Since we have a lot of food to get through,
this will get cooked towards the end.
All right, moving on.
One of the other dishes shown in this spread
seems to be a yellow colored risotto that involves seafood,
so we're gonna go with a risotto-inspired rice dish.
On top of this dish seems to rest a few scattered handfuls
of small seared scallops and shrimp,
so we're gonna start with that first.
In a medium saucepan, we're sauteing a half a pound
of baby scallops in a tablespoon of butter.
To get some nice color, we're also adding
a half teaspoon of chili flakes.
This is pretty quick 'cause these scallops are really small.
Once those have exited the pan, in go a pound of shrimp,
shelled deveined but with their tails on,
as shown in the reference material.
These get seasoned and seared until they've been barely
cooked through and then removed.
We have some really well made store bought fish stock
that we're going to infuse with a few pinches of saffron
for both flavor and to get a nice beautiful yellow color.
To start our rice dish, we're cooking one and a half cups
of arborio rice in the remaining flavor in the pan,
along with another tablespoon of butter, until the edges
of each grain of rice have started to become translucent.
To cook this rice, we're lading in a ladleful or two
of the stock a bit at a time until the rice has enough time
to absorb it and that it looks a little bit sticky,
upon which we're gonna add another ladleful.
This process gets repeated until there is no stock left
and to finish, we're gonna grate about half a cup
of Parmesan cheese.
Now, I know seafood and cheese usually don't
go together well, but in the seafood risotto we made
for One Piece, the Parmesan added a layer of flavor
that we couldn't get without it.
Once that's luxuriously mixed in
and two tablespoons of butter are added to finish,
our risotto-inspired rice dish is ready.
This gets mounded onto a plate and the seafood we seared
earlier gets carefully arranged in a clockwise pattern.
There's also mussels on this, so we're gonna borrow a few
from that dish made earlier for this one.
But wait, there's more food.
Two pasta dishes, to be exact.
So in a large pot of boiling water,
we are heavily seasoning it with salt
and cooking a pound of linguini and a pound of penne.
Pretty standard, just according to package instructions,
but minus two minutes, 'cause they're gonna be
cooked in sauce.
The show visually hints that this is clams linguini
and some sort of penne pasta with salmon.
To prep our salmon, we have a one pound filet
that we're gonna take the skin off.
We're making an incision towards the short end of the salmon
and trying to pull through with a thin boning knife.
The skinless filet gets cubed up and sent to a hot pan,
seared in some olive oil and salt
until barely cooked and removed.
Prep our clams for the linguini.
We need to get as much of the grit and sand out of them
as possible, so in a large stainless steel mixing bowl,
in goes a heavy handful of salt with some hot water,
just enough to dissolve, and diluted with enough cold water
to cover one and a half pounds of clams.
This helps the clams expel any grit, sand,
or stuff that they have inside that would not
be fun to eat afterwards.
We're gonna let this sit for about 30 minutes,
just to give them enough time to do their thing,
but in the meantime we can get started
with the rest of the sauce.
In a large pan over medium heat, we're cooking the remaining
two tablespoons of minced garlic along with half a shallot
and a half teaspoon of chili flake, just until aromatic,
and then searing a pound of shrimp, because in the show,
there is clearly shrimp on top of the clam pasta.
Quick sear, these exit the pan,
and to deglaze, a half cup of white wine and a half cup
of seafood stock, scraping the bottom of the pan
to release all the fond and the good stuff back in.
Then in goes the pound and a half of the clams
that have now been degritted and will cook in this mixture
for about 10, 15 minutes on low heat,
just until they've opened up.
Onto the cream sauce.
Into a medium saucepan goes eight ounces
of mascarpone cheese, which gets slowly melted
over low heat, followed by the zest and juice
of one whole lemon.
Once the inevitable seeds that fell in get taken out,
two cups of frozen peas or freshly cooked peas
go straight in.
Those seem to be those green circular bits
in the pasta from the show.
Our previously seared salmon returns to the pan
to join the party and we're gonna let that hang out
off heat just until ready to mix the pasta.
Our clams have opened up at this point and have started
to say hello, so we're gonna take those out,
and in the remaining sauce and liquid,
toss in all of our cooked linguini.
Right at the last second, we return our previously seared
shrimp and those clams back into the pasta.
Same goes with the cooked penne, back into our cream sauce
with salmon and peas.
Since we're about to serve, our scallops now go under
a low broiler for about five minutes.
All that's left is the star of the show, the lobster.
We have acquired a beautiful fresh three-pound lobster.
In order to maintain its structural integrity
after it cooks, we're gonna stick a wooden skewer
down each side of its tail to hold it straight.
This gets plunged into a pot of salted boiling water
for about three minutes.
Three for the head side, three for the tail side,
'cause this does not fit entirely in the pot.
Once the shell has done its magic trick
of turning it into a beautiful orange color,
this gets removed right onto a softened copious bed
of romaine lettuce, and right next to it,
just a lemon wedge or two.
To finish plating and garnishing our seafood risotto-like
inspired dish, it's a couple of sprigs of spring onion
followed by a nice parsley sprig right in the middle.
Our pastas get plated up with extra seafood
from the dish right on top, just for presentation purposes.
The clams linguini does get a sprinkling of parsley
and one really nice looking basil sprig on top.
Scallops have emerged from the oven, golden brown and crispy
with the breadcrumb topping and cheese nice and bubbly.
These seem to get finished with some dehydrated shrimp
and a few parsley leaves in the show.
The mussels get plopped down right into a large plate
with a rim and a little green parsley on top as well.
Why not?
I present to you our version of Nicolo's seafood feast
from Attack on Titan.
Starting on the left, we have our risotto-inspired
seafood dish with shrimp and saffron,
our scallops casino-like dish, mussels in a tomato sauce,
clams linguini with shrimp, a whole boiled lobster,
finally, a creamy seafood pasta with salmon and frozen peas.
Let's start with the lobster.
Yeah, I definitely undercooked this.
It needed two more minutes on each side,
which brings the total up to about 10 minutes or so.
I've been actually waiting to try the scallops
for this entire time.
The crunch on top and the cheesiness goes well
with that beautiful juicy seafood on the bottom.
Sticking to some mussels here.
Ooh, this tomato sauce.
That's my favorite part of this dish.
The risotto has been sitting for a little bit,
so not as sticky and gooey and delicious as it should be.
We do have a lot of food,
so let's invite the crew to hang out.
Oh, here comes Andrew.
Overall, gotta say, have a lot of respect with restaurants
that serve a lot of seafood dishes.
The timing window for its deliciousness is very tricky
and definitely have missed it by a lot of these dishes
from sitting out from making six of them.
However, we did cook up a feast,
which means we need to feed a lot of people,
and for someone like Sasha, who's never seen seafood,
let alone the ocean before,
I can see why this would be a memorable experience.
Thanks again to our friends at Bokksu
for supporting this episode.
Japanese snacks are on a whole 'nother level,
so it's pretty cool to experience
the real authentic stuff at home.
This month's theme is Sakura Story,
a limited edition collection celebrating
the famous cherry blossom season in Japan.
Some of my favorites were the mochi, the rice crackers,
the savory fried puffs, and the rice cracker cream sandwich.
It even comes with the little culture guide
that tells you more about the theme, the flavors,
and where the snacks come from.
If you want to experience sakura season from home
and support our channel, click the link in the description
and use code ALVIN at checkout for $15 off your order.
(smooth music)