Arin Alexander Antonio reached into a basket for a slip of paper and pulled out “France.” Reached into another basket and pulled out “fish.”

Lucky for Antonio, France and fish are right in his wheelhouse, giving him a running start at the Around the World with Sodexo competition, held last month at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Six chefs from Sodexo, an international food-service company that runs 26 dining facilities statewide (including UH-Manoa’s), competed at a benefit for the Hawaii Foodbank and the Sodexo Stop Hunger Foundation.

Each chef drew the name of a country and a protein out of a basket. “My passion is for fish and I have a heavy French cooking background,” Antonio said. “I kind of got lucky, I guess. I knew right off the bat what I was going to do.”

The winner was chosen by vote of the diners, and Antonio’s baked opah took first place.

Antonio is executive chef at The Queen’s Medical Center, West Oahu, handling patient meals as well as the dining room. As such he deals every day with dietary restrictions, so he said it was nice to be able to flex a bit with his competition dish.

His opah is a good example of something not too complicated, but with components that elevate it to restaurant level, so for a home cook it’s a manageable project that teaches new techniques. A chance for you to flex, too.

Antonio is a graduate of the Kapiolani Community College culinary program and the Greenbrier Culinary Apprenticeship Program in West Virginia. Along the way he worked in kitchens including Waialae Country Club, Chef Mavro and the El Capitan Lodge in Alaska. He’s been at Queen’s for 2-1/2 years.

His dish incorporates a mousseline and a persillade, two examples of the types of old-school techniques that he finds essential to quality cooking. They may sound all fancy and French and such, but really mousseline is just a puree with cream folded in and persillade is a topping made with parsley (“persil” in French). If you have a food processor you can pull this off.

A mousseline, Antonio said, is especially useful — with varied ingredients it can become a filling, a crust or even a sausage. That said, start flexing.

PERSILLADE-CRUSTED HAWAIIAN CATCH

By Arin Alexander Antonio

• 2 opah fillets (4 ounces each)
• Salt, to taste
• >> Mousseline:
• 3/4 pound shrimp (preferably from Kauai), peeled and deveined
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 tablespoon minced shallots
• 1 tablespoon minced Italian parsley
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1 tablespoon vermouth or white wine
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• >> Persillade:
• 1 cup Italian parsley leaves
• 1 cup breadcrumbs
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1/4 teaspoon chopped lemon zest
• Salt and pepper, to taste

>> To make mousseline: In a food processor, pulse shrimp until smooth, scraping sides of bowl every so often. Remove to a chilled bowl and place in ice bath to keep cold. Add egg, shallots, parsley, garlic, vermouth, salt and pepper. Mix until well combined, then slowly add cream, stirring until fully absorbed (don’t add too quickly or mixture will separate). Chill.

>> To make persillade: Bring small pot of water to boil; add parsley and blanch 10 seconds, then remove to ice water. Squeeze chilled parsley dry, then place in food processor with remaining ingredients; puree until fine. Set aside.

>> To prepare fish: Heat oven to 325 degrees. Spray a baking sheet with cooking oil or line with parchment.

Pat opah dry and season with salt. Place skin side down on baking sheet. Spread mousseline evenly over fillets, then sprinkle with persillade. Bake 10 minutes, to an internal temperature of 145 degrees. Serves 2.

Approximate nutritional information, per serving (not including salt to taste): 800 calories, 29 g total fat, 12 g saturated fat, 460 mg cholesterol, 1,850 mg sodium, 63 g carbohydrate, 11 g fiber, 8 g sugar, 75 g protein.

Write By Request, Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, Honolulu 96813; or email requests to bshimabukuro@staradvertiser.com.