- [Narrator] We are Sorted, a group of mates from London
exploring the newest and best in the world of food
whilst trying to have a few laughs along the way.
(group laughs)
We've got chefs, we've got normal (bleep)
and a whole world of stuff for you to explore
but everything we do starts with you.
- Hello, I'm Barry and this is Jamie.
- And this, well this is the bible of French classical
cuisine, it's called Le Répertoire de la Cuisine
and it was written in 1914.
- And it pretty much assumes that you know
all the cooking techniques of that time
before you've read it.
- Should we see how our chefs get on?
Boys, I love these.
You have absolutely no idea what's about to hit you, do you?
- You're not in a gimp suit so that bodes well
- Not yet!
- Aww I don't get to unwrap it!
Got that one at home.
- I have heard of it, I've never read it, I've never seen it
I've never held it. I've heard of it.
- Well, I'm scared.
- It is a reference book for chefs.
- From the 1900s.
- [Reads Aloud] Le bon cuisine le bast--
- Oh no!
It's French
- It sounds like the kind of book you guys should have
and should use and should be able to use very well
as classically trains chefs yourselves.
- Obviously, you've never cooked from it.
You've just referenced it, don't you?
- So the reason they can fit 6000 recipes into this book,
is because there are no ingredient lists,
there are no weights and measures, there's no method,
it's just a list of elements on a plate
that you're expected to have to make,
and, I assume, interpret how to plate yourself.
- We're all on the same page.
- [James] Which page are we on, Jay?
- [Jamie] 108.
We're into the fillet of sole,
or sole category.
- So the recipe here:
Poached and coated with white wine sauce,
garnished with small heaps of carrots, balls of turnips,
green peas, cauliflowers, asparagus heads,
noisette potatoes, alternate the colors.
- I think we've got this. I feel this is fine.
- [Jamie] Ozzie, who's working with us at the moment,
and goes to your college --
- UCB, yeah
- -- he was actually challenged as one of his assignments
to cook the sole renaissance.
- Oh really? Oh, nice. - Oh interesting.
- And so, because of that, we have his interpretation.
We have the lecturer's interpretation,
we've got other images of the way other people
have interpreted this dish.
So boys, we've given you pretty much everything
we think that you'll need,
there's just one thing missing to make this
incredibly authentic.
- Silly. I feel silly.
- Now you're real chefs.
- How do you want to divide this out?
- What if I just pass you ingredients and you cook them?
- Noisette potatoes, let's get those in the go.
- Yeah, we're going to turn these aren't we?
- They aren't Noisettes, potato nuts.
- Okay, I have misinterpreted this recipe then.
- Oh!
- 'Cause I thought it would be
potatoes cooked in brown butter.
- Well I thought they were nut-shaped.
- You really think Escoffier is like
"make some nut-shaped potatoes."
- Beurre noisette means butter that's become nutty brown.
- Yeah
- So, it's a shade of color.
- But why are you?
- James, when was the last time you turned a potato,
- Don't know, don't want to say 10 years
because that'll age me.
- What is turning a potato?
- Isn't it better when potatoes all look like barrels?
And for that reason, there's a turning knife
that looks a bit like this, and you use it
to prepare potatoes so they don't look like potatoes anymore
in fact, they look like barrels of spud.
- How you doing?
- I've turned two nice ones, and one's terrible.
But I'm also going to do some of this
because I'm pretty sure this is also a thing.
I'm waiting to see if you can turn some potatoes
better than I can because mine are terrible.
Mise en place, getting there,
few discussions,
this is where we've ended up.
Potatoes. I've done this to them, kind of ball-shaped.
You've turned them, much better than my two turned.
Which one are we going to go for?
- My ones.
- [Jamie] My ones
- [Ben] My ones
Turn the potatoes is, either way, part boiled in
salted water and then pan-fried in brown butter.
Also got a pan of salted water coming up to a boil.
For those things grown above the ground,
we will do those last. Peas, asparagus, cauliflower.
Turnips are also done.
- [James] They look good.
- Under the ground, cold water. In with the potatoes.
And we're gonna risk.
- Escoffier wouldn't like you.
- No, I know. But he's doing the washing up, so
This is fish stock that we've heated up.
Now we're going to poach the sole. Are we doing fish stock?
Or are we doing court-bouillon?
- Oh. Let's add a few flavors to it.
- Bay, peppercorn, parsley stalks, lemon
into the fish stock so you're poaching in a court-bouillon.
- [Mocking] Court-bouillon
- Herbs and stuff
- Cheers, mate, thanks.
- But we're not going to cook the fish yet, right?
- No. Last minute. A la minute.
Last thing is our white wine sauce.
We're doing a beurre bouillon kind of reduction.
So white wine, reduced down, with a little bit of vinegar,
and then you whisk in cold butter to create a classic
beurre blanc. But the book says white wine sauce.
What are we going to do instead?
- Is it a veloute?
Go on, do it.
- [Jamie Mockingly] Is it a veloute?
- Do we just make a roux? Cook it off, cream at the end
- I think all of that white wine reduced down
with cold butter whisked in to emulsify it or thicken it,
then you nappe over the fish at the last second.
These are all words I haven't used for decades.
They're coming back to me. - Nappe over the fish?
- James, your knife technique is exceptional as always.
- It is not.
- What are you going for?
- Going for a very small dice. Something that we can heap.
So it still looks smart--
- but heap-y
- -- but heap-y.
- So in that extensive recipe that we've talked through,
it doesn't mention anything about the fleuron,
there's nothing about puff pastry.
How do you know it's supposed to be there,
other than us putting the puff pastry there for you?
- Seeing the puff pastry that you had prepared for us
reminded us of dishes that included it.
- [Jamie] So the fleuron was a disc of puff pastry.
It was just assumed to be there.
And the reason was to show off.
You didn't have pre-packed puff pastry back then.
You had to make it yourself.
And because it was such a difficult thing to make,
it was there to show off the skills of the chef.
Just as a little by the way I'm very very good.
- Gute! Or bonne!
- Gute! I am so bonne!
- Are we going to glaze our puff pastry?
I think the answer's yes.
- I thought they were fried, not baked.
I really think they're fried.
- You fry too. I'll bake one.
It doesn't really matter because there's nothing to say
we're really right or wrong. It's just a guide.
- No, no. That's the whole point of the video.
They're going tell us that we're wrong at the end.
- Well, exactly. It doesn't matter what we do.
They're going to tell us we were wrong.
- No. Not if we did it right.
- And this is how a 10-year friendship ended.
[Mocking] No! We should fry the puff pastry discs
No! We should bake them.
- Why has this turned into a battle?
- [Ben] It's not a battle, we're working together on this.
- [James] I don't feel like we are.
- [Ben] Reduction. Into that, we can whisk cold butter
and finish with cream.
Rechauffee? Is that it?
- Oui.
- We can rechaufee at the last second.
So our turnips are nearly done. We can take them out,
they can cool down, that's fine.
- [Jamie] What's your problem?
- Ben speaking French.
- Right.
- Sorry, Ben, sorry.
- I don't think you are.
- I am.
- Je suis desole
- Just stop. Stop
- Excusez-moi!
- Stop.
I'm frying off my fleurons.
Because that's what I think I remember doing.
But Ben assures me that it's wrong.
- Not assure, I just remember the heart-shaped ones
being baked.
- [James] But these aren't heart-shaped, Ben.
- [Ben] Correct. Brown butter, potatoes going in.
Carrots, going into cold water. The beurre blanc has
only a little bit left.
Cold diced butter, a little bit at a time, gets whisked in.
- [James] These are looking nice.
- Oh! Potatoes cooked in butter.
- Sole filets. Thicker at one end than the other.
So traditionally, I remember them being folded over
and cooked like that so you end up with something
that's more even and cooks more equally.
This is a very very fine white fish.
I don't know whether it's supposed to be poached in a
court bouillon, but we've done that because we know
that is a classic option at times.
Taking a lot of care with poaching the fish
because we don't want to boil it,
so just leaving that water just below boiling.
- [Jamie] All right, you've got five minutes
of cooking remaining. Getting very hungry.
- And for our next disagreement, I've got a plate.
- Only thing I was thinking of, is we now know
that the reference to what we're doing has been
provided to us by UCB and I know the plates they use
are just classic round whites.
- [James] Ben, we're using this plate.
I'm going to put some peas in here.
- Reheating the perfectly cooked mise en plate veg
in a pan with some water, little bit of butter,
little season, just brings it back up to temperature.
Gives it a nice glaze.
- [James] Now, alternating colors. How's the fish?
The fish has been in there for [Bleep] ages.
- [Ben] These two are good.
[Electronic Riffs Play]
- [Jamie] Five...four...three...two...one.
- Gorgeous.
Glad we don't cook like that anymore.
- I really enjoyed that.
- It was good fun.
- The best bit is, it now has to be tasted by probably
the least qualified person available to know whether
this is exactly what it should have been.
- [James] I think you're going to enjoy it.
- [Jamie] Do you want to talk me through what we got?
- [Ben] The centerpiece is our sole fillets,
poached in a court bouillon and coated in a white wine sauce
made from a beurre blanc reduction.
- [James] We have some noissette potatoes,
and then we have some very simply treated veg.
We've got asparagus, we've got carrots, we've got peas,
we've got cauliflower and we have turnip.
- [Ben] And we have got a fleuron
which is a crescent of puff pastry which was cooked in a pan
and dipped in chopped herbs.
- I'm actually super happy with it. I think it looks great--
- This is really unusual for you
- --and it tastes good.
Yeah I know but I think it looks really good.
- Well, here I have a few different versions
that were made at your old university.
Let's start with the lecturer's interpretation.
- Interesting.
- Very similar elements. Some elements completely different.
The sole looks very similar, folded over and poached.
And the fleuron looks very similar.
- [James] The sole is grilled as well.
- I wouldn't say that's a heap of --
- That's not a heap of carrots, is it? Come on.
- All right, just have a go at your lecturer.
- Sauce consistency is very similar.
- This is Ozzie. This is his interpretation of the dish.
- [Ben] Crispy skin. They are very different potatoes
then I was expecting from a noisette.
- [James] There's no pastry underneath the asparagus.
- [Ben] With stuff in it.
Interesting.
- We went--
- Very different
- This, we're going to have to zoom in a bit.
Because this is a group shot of all of the groups .
- [Ben] Interesting, so this is like a leaf-shaped
puff pastry disc.
- The thing I find most fascinating
about this whole exercise is
you've made this plate out of that 20-word description,
and then looking at everyone else's,
they've made completely different looking tasting dishes,
using the same ingredients and using the same guideline.
And if that is not a summary of what food actually means,
then I don't know what is.
- [James] We're not judging, are we?
- [Ben] Yeah, but you're judging yourself.
- [James] Yeah.
- Cheers.
- Oh
Oh, buttery potatoes.
I have to say that sauce is lovely and sharp.
You get the slight herb, the herbiness in there,
so creamy, so buttery,
slight acidity sharpness
from the wine reduction, but that is great.
- We did a great job.
- [Ben] I'm chuffed with that.
- And you know, that I would say if we didn't do a good job.
- [Ben] I know you would. Good job, team.
- Well done, boys. That is absolutely awesome.
Are you going to recommend that book to the audience?
- Yeah. The brave ones.
- The brave ones.
We've made these two chefs cook from a few different
cookbooks now,
ranging from the serious to the not so serious.
We've put a playlist of all of them in the link box
down below, and we'd love to know from you
what other cookbooks we should get them to cook from next.
Because I really like these,
and people seem to like them as well.
It takes you outside of your comfort zone.
- More classics.
- That's why we love it too!
- Not just classics, novelty.
- That's a classic.
- Well, you see, that generally involves. Oh yeah, we have
fancy dress in this one as well.
- If you're enjoying these videos and this channel,
then make sure you subscribe and, of course,
ring that notification bell.
- Pause the video and do it now.
- Our latest book, Hero-Veg, is shipping
at the end of this week, so there's still time
to get yourself a copy.
- Find all the information you need to sign up to the club
in the box downstairs.
- I must say, I got really arty with this one.
- You did, didn't you? So macro.
- It is macro. Oh! Look how close up we are.
- You've got some really great apertures in there.
- Shut up.
- Breakfast in bed.
One of the nicest things you can do for someone. Right?
- Yeah!
- All it needs is a thank you at the end of it.
Not a "how did you get into my house?"
- Very Jamie, very Jamie.
- [Jamie] Yeah, tell me about it.
As we've mentioned we don't just make
top quality YouTube videos.
We've built the Sorted Club, where we use the best things
we've learned to create stuff that's hopefully interesting
and useful to other food lovers.
Check it out if you're interested. Thank you for watching,
and we'll see you in a few days.
- I know there was a video recently where you and I stood
next to each other.
I don't think it's aired yet, but God I look short.