Jamie Oliver's Salmon en Croûte

I recently made this recipe for a group of friends and the feedback was positive enough for it to warrant some writing space on my blog. It is adapted from Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution cookbook (which has great, unpretentious and no-nonsense recipes). It's basically salmon with various toppings including cheese cooked in puff pastry. Salmon has a robust enough flavour to not be overpowered by the savory ingredients of this recipe.

Feeds 6 people
Ingredients

• 800g salmon fillet (I remove the skin but you can leave it on if you prefer)
• 1 package of puff pastry (I use Tenderflake, thawed)
• some flour for dusting
• olive oil
• salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup of tapenade (black olive paste)
• fresh basil leaves
• 2 ripe tomatoes, sliced
• 4 regular size bocconcini (fresh mozzarella), sliced
• 1 egg

Step 1: Preparing the puff pastry

Preheat your oven to 400°F. It's good to work quickly with puff pastry because keeping the dough cold will yield better results. Roll it out using a rolling pin and some flour to prevent it from sticking. Roll it out to the same size as the pan you will be using, roughly 6" by 12".  

Step 2: Preparing the filet and the toppings

Season your fillet with salt and pepper and a little drizzle of oil.

Place the fillet seasoned side down in the middle of the puff pastry. My fillet is extra big because I was feeding many people. 

Spread on the tapenade.

Then place your basil leaves on the fish, along with the sliced tomatoes and bocconcini pieces. Sprinkle with more salt and pepper and drizzle again with olive oil.

Step 3: Baking your salmon

Gather up the edges of the puff pastry around the salmon fillet and brush the pastry with some egg wash.

Place in the over (middle rack worked fine for me, but Jamie Oliver recommends to put it at the very bottom of the oven). Place an empty pan on the rack above your salmon to protect the top from over browning. Bake for roughly 35 minutes and there you have it!