Single Langoustine Raviolo with Bisque Emulsion and Brown Butter Crumbs

⏱ 150 min · Serves 4

One glorious, gossamer-thin raviolo hiding a whole langoustine tail and a whisper of scallop mousseline, floated in a foaming shellfish bisque emulsion. It's a proper cheffy plate — the sort of thing that silences a table — and every scrap of shell earns its keep in the sauce.

Per serving: 625 kcal · 36.0g protein · 41.0g carbs · 34.0g fat

Ingredients

• For the pasta: 200g '00' flour
• 2 whole eggs plus 4 egg yolks
• 1 tsp olive oil
• Pinch of fine salt
• Semolina, for dusting
• 12 raw langoustines (or 12 large raw shell-on prawns), heads and shells reserved
• 150g scallop meat or skinless pollock fillet, very cold
• 80ml double cream, very cold
• 1 tbsp chopped chives
• 1 tsp lemon zest
• Salt and white pepper
• For the bisque: 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 1 fennel bulb trimming or 1 celery stick, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• 1 tbsp tomato purée
• 50ml brandy
• 100ml dry white wine
• 1 tomato, chopped
• 1 star anise
• 1 sprig tarragon
• 600ml water or light fish stock
• 50ml double cream
• 60g cold unsalted butter, cubed
• Squeeze of lemon juice
• For finishing: 40g unsalted butter
• 30g panko breadcrumbs
• 1 tbsp finely chopped tarragon or chervil
• Good olive oil, to drizzle

Method

1. Make the pasta: mound the flour, add eggs, yolks, oil and salt, and work to a firm dough. Knead 8–10 minutes until silky, wrap and rest 1 hour at room temperature.
2. Peel the langoustines: twist off heads, remove tails from shells, devein. Keep 4 of the best tails for a garnish and reserve all heads and shells for the bisque. Chill the tails.
3. Bisque: heat the oil in a wide pan, add the shells and heads and fry hard for 5 minutes, crushing them with the end of a rolling pin. Add onion, carrot, fennel/celery and garlic; cook 8 minutes until sweet.
4. Stir in tomato purée, cook 2 minutes, then add brandy and flame or reduce to nothing. Add wine, reduce by half, then tomato, star anise, tarragon and water. Simmer gently 35 minutes.
5. Strain through a fine sieve, pressing hard, then reduce the liquid to about 250ml. Stir in the cream and set aside off the heat.
6. Mousseline: blitz the cold scallop or pollock to a paste, season with salt and white pepper, then trickle in the cold cream with the machine running just until thick and glossy — don't overwork. Fold in chives and lemon zest, then chill.
7. Roll the pasta out to nearly translucent (setting 1 on a machine). Cut 8 discs about 12cm across. Place a spoon of mousseline on 4 discs, press a hollow, lay 2 langoustine tails on each, and cap with a little more mousseline.
8. Brush the borders with water, lay over the top discs, press out all air from the centre outwards and seal firmly. Trim neatly with a cutter and rest on semolina.
9. Crumbs: melt the 40g butter until nut-brown, add panko, toast to golden, then drain on kitchen paper and salt lightly.
10. Poach the raviolo in well-salted barely simmering water for 3 minutes, until the pasta is tender and the filling just set. Meanwhile sear the 4 reserved tails in a little butter for 40 seconds a side.
11. Reheat the bisque to a bare simmer, whisk in the cold butter cube by cube, add lemon juice and blitz with a stick blender to a light foam.
12. Set a raviolo in each warm bowl, spoon the emulsion around and over the top, add the seared tail, scatter brown butter crumbs and herbs, and finish with a thread of olive oil. Serve immediately.