Chef Maylin Chavez’s Fennel and Leek

By: Executive Chef/Owner Maylin Chavez – Olympia Oyster Bar

Makes 3 dozen baked oysters

Fennel & Leek Mixture:

  • 2 tablespoons smoked goat butter
  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 4 each garlic cloves, minced
  • 3 leeks sliced thin
  • 3 fennel bulbs shaved on the mandolin
  • 1 tsp chili flakes

Nut Crumble:

  • 8 oz of rough torn Levain or French baguette style bread for bread crumbs
  • 4 oz of shelled nuts

Garnish:

  • 1 tablespoon of toasted fennel seeds (toast in oven for 2 minutes)

Gremolata:

  • 1 bunch of parsley
  • Lemon zest of 1 lemon
  • 1 tsp of chiil flake
  • 1 tsp of sea salt

Method for Gremolata:

  1. Combine all ingredients together.

Method for Fennel and Leek

  1. Heat a medium pan. Drizzle olive oil over fennel and leek and garlic, add chili flake once fennel and leek are cooking down, add lemon juice, smoke goat butter and continue to cook on low heat for about 3 minutes, season.
  2. Nut Crumble: Toast day old bread and process in a process not too much to not make it mushy. Toast nuts and do the same. Combine bread and nut and a pinch of sea salt.
  3. To bake: Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Take a sheet pan and add small piles of salt – enough to balance the oysters on. Top each oyster with tablespoon of fennel & Leek Mixture and crumble. Bake for 4 minutes. Garnish a few toasted fennel seeds, a pinch of lemon juice, pinch of gremolata, and one fennel frond plate.

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