Category Archives: Fish

Polenta………& learning to love it.

01 Thursday May 2014

Posted by in Fish, Main Courses, Techniques, Vegetable Dishes

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I know that there are plenty of you out there who are as I previously was with Polenta. You started off curious so tried it in various restaurants and found yourself underwhelmed. It was allright, but you couldn’t see what the fuss was about.

Not types to give up, and armed with the opinion that Italians know about food, so it would be worth giving it another chance, you have a go at cooking it at home. Armed with an authentic Italian recipe from a reliable source you boil, and stir, and stir, and cool, and cut and reheat with a sauce………and still find yourself unexcited.

So you abandon Polenta for a number of years…..

…….then when you have forgotten all about it you are served in a restaurant to accompany the meat, a golden cake lightly browned and crisped on the edges and creamy in the centre. Filled with tiny strips of fried bacon and diced vegetables, flavoured with garlic and chicken stock. It is absolutely delicious. It takes you some time to realise that the main ingredient is the polenta that you have up to now been unimpressed by.

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A re-evaluation is obviously in order. This is where the path to loving Polenta starts, let me lead you through my trials to success and enjoyment.

Firstly the Polenta itself. I read somewhere that it is only good during the first six months after it is milled. I have tried fresh and It does have a slightly more corn flavour, but not so much that it makes that much difference. Having said that any dried goods – beans, lentils, quinoa, rice, flour, and polenta should not be kept for more than a couple of years and preferably used within a year. These are products where the use by dates should be taken note of, you won’t get food poisoning but the grains lose their ability to reconstitute and stay dry and hard and of course the flavour of them slowly fades.

Cooking liquid. I have read debates as to whether water or milk are the best and most authentic cooking liquids, but I am not impressed with either. Let’s face it, polenta is a pretty bland grain, and so any extra flavour that can be added should be. I like to cook the polenta in a light stock, either chicken, veal, or if you are vegetarian, a vegetable stock.

Stirring. Every recipe I have come across, and the instructions on the polenta packet, tell you to bring the liquid to the boil, whisk in the polenta, stir until boiling again and then keep stirring for forty minutes with the heat turned low. Well, I haven’t got the time or patience to stand around stirring for forty minutes and I suspect neither do Italians or you. I find that stirring from time to time during the first ten minutes will do, then turn off the heat, cover with a well fitting lid and leave it to continue cooking in its own steam for forty minutes. Alternatively once it is back boiling after adding the polenta, pour into a slow cooker and continue cooking on a low setting for half an hour, then turn of the cooker and leave the polenta to cook in the residual heat for another half hour.

BASIC RECIPE – for 8-10 servings

350 grams polenta

1.75-2 litres light stock

salt and freshly ground black pepper

If you want a very firm polenta for leaving to cool and form into a cake, use the smaller amount of stock, and if you want a softer puree consistency for eating immediately, then the larger amount of stock.

Put the stock in a thick based saucepan with half a teaspoon of salt and bring to the boil.

Pour in the polenta in a steady stream stirring continually. Turn down the heat and keep stirring as the polenta thickens, this should take about 10 minutes.

Either put a lid on the polenta and turn of the heat leaving the polenta to continue cooking in its own steam or transfer the polenta to a slow cooker on the lowest setting and leave to cook for 30 minutes before turning off the heat and giving it a stir.

Continue with your chosen recipe.

POLENTA AND VEGETABLE CAKE – Pictured above

I make this when I have a lot of people to feed as almost all can be prepared the day before, all that has to be done on the day is slicing the loaf and putting it onto a hot tray in the oven. Plus it is the vegetable and starch all in one.

It is great with something saucy like a stew. Last time I made it was to go with Pork Bourgignon – see previous post on Pigs Cheeks.

If you want to make a vegetarian version of this substitute nut pieces for the bacon and use olive oil for the frying

100 grams streaky bacon – cut into small dice

30 grams bacon fat – cut into small dice

1 clove garlic – finely chopped

1 small onion or half a large one – finely chopped

200 grams vegetables – cut into small dice – choose three or four from the following – carrots, parsnips, peppers, mushrooms, sweet peas, Florence fennel, broccoli, celeriac, butternut squash. Try to mix the colours to make it interesting.

Thick polenta as master recipe – cooked in vegetable stock if making the meatless version.

Heat a thick based frying pan and add the dice bacon fat. Cook on a low heat until it has rendered down and released its fat.

Add the bacon and cook for five minutes.

Add the onions and garlic, stir in and fry for a couple of minutes.

Add the diced vegetables and fry for about 10 minutes until the vegetables are about half cooked and have lost some of their moisture.

Add the vegetable and bacon mix to the polenta while both are still warm and gently mix the whole together. Season with plenty of freshly ground black pepper and check if it needs more salt.

Turn into a small loaf tin lined with cling film. Gently flatten to make sure that there are no pockets of air and smooth out the top. Fold the cling film over the top and put the loaf in the fridge to cool and firm up.

About 45 minutes before you need to serve the loaf, heat the oven to 180 centigrade. When the oven is hot, put in a shallow baking tray containing a couple of tablespoons of tasty dripping or olive oil.

Take the loaf out of the fridge and remove from tin. Peel off it’s cling film and cut into slabs about one and a half centimetres thick.

Put onto the now hot fat in the baking tray. Put back In the oven and roast for about 15 to 20 minutes until browned and crispy at the edges.

WHITE POLENTA PURÉE WITH FENNEL AND ORANGE.

Salmon, White Polenta, Saffron Sauce

White polenta is traditionally eaten with fish in Italy. It has a slightly softer smoother texture. Don’t worry if you can’t find white polenta, this is still good with the more easily available yellow.

Master recipe soft polenta made with white grains.

100 grams Florence fennel – cut into small dice

25 grams butter

Grated zest and juice of one orange

Salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Fry the diced fennel slowly in the butter until cooked but still with a little firmness.

Cook the polenta as the recipe. Add the orange zest and juice. Stir well to mix in.

Add the fennel and stir gently to mix in.

Serve with fish of your choice.

SOUFFLED POLENTA

Use either white or yellow polenta

Firm polenta as master recipe

3 eggs

50 grams finely grated Parmesan cheese

Cook the polenta as recipe and leave to cool a bit.

Heat the oven to 170 centigrade.

Grease an ovenproof dish about the right size to take the soufflé, individual ramekins can be used if you like.

Separate the eggs. Add the yolks to the polenta and beat to mix in.

Add most of the cheese to the polenta keeping back enough to sprinkle on the top of the soufflé. Mix well.

Beat the egg whites until very firm and white.

Fold into the polenta mix trying not to lose too much air about of the egg whites.

Turn into the greased dish and bake for about half an hour until risen and golden on top.

Serve immediately.

 

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Bodega Aranda – Almeria City

11 Monday Nov 2013

Posted by in Fish, Food for One, Snacks and Tapas, Starters, Sweet Things, Vegetable Dishes

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After visiting the central market in Almeria we had worked up an appetite for lunch, and remembered that this ancient tapas bar was not far away.

Having installed ourselves at a table we asked the waitress to bring us a selection of what was good at the moment. She suggested the house salad, a couple of plates of fish and fried potatoes topped with broken eggs and the local made chorizo and morcilla. Perfect we said, not realising what culinary delights lay behind these simple descriptions.

The house salad arrived. Rich green corn salad, walnuts, pine nuts, raisins, and a halo of tomatoes surrounding a mound of blue cheese ice cream. The waitress had a small bowl of dressing – olive oil and sherry vinegar with seasonings – which she poured over the salad, then she cut the ice cream into pieces and gently mixed it with the salad.

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It was heavenly. I am working on a recipe for the ice cream – maybe have it perfected for the next post.

The fish course was next –

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Fillets of baby Cod and Smelts in light batter and fried served with the best Ajo Blanco I have ever tasted. You could taste the slight bitterness of the almonds, a hint of garlic that was not overpowering, the sauce was made smooth with bread and olive oil and balanced with white wine vinegar.

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Jureles en Escabeche. Escabeche is a way of mildly pickling fish. It is gently poached in a broth of olive oil, white wine vinegar and water which is flavoured with onions, peppercorns, saffron and bayleaves. Frequently smoky Pimenton is added as well, but in this dish of small fish it wasn’t needed.

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Next was the Potatoes with Chorizo, Morcilla and broken eggs.

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To finish the meal a succulent large date each, dark chocolate covered raisins and mint tea.

Sweet & Spicy Fish with Pineapple

14 Saturday Sep 2013

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IMG_0533We have the first Yard Long Beans of the season ready in the garden. I get excited about these because even though in appearance they look like an extended French bean, the flavour and particularly the texture are quite different. These beans have a crunchy and crispy texture even when cooked, and a fresh flavour.

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The other crop now ready are the pale green mild chillis. I can eat these straight from the plant and they are super pickled in mild vinegar.

I have to cook a dish that can use both of these ingredients. I bought a fresh pineapple in the market this week, and that reminds me of a fish dish that I had in Thailand some years ago. It was spicy and sweet and a little bit sour from the pineapple. Here is my recreation of that dish.

SWEET & SPICY FISH WITH PINEAPPLE

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Per person

1 clove garlic

1 mild chilli

Piece ginger aprox 2cm x 1cm

1 cm Lemon grass stalk finely sliced

Olive oil

150 grams mixed fish and seafood – prawns, mussels, white meaty fish

Yard long beans

Bean sprouts

Half slice of fresh pineapple 1cm thick

Tablespoon sweet chilli jam/sauce

Teaspoon fish sauce/Nam Pla

20 grams dry roast Peanuts – roughly crushed

1 teaspoon chopped chives

Start with the aromatics, peel and finely chop the ginger and garlic. As thin as you can slice the lemon grass and chilli.

Prepare the fish. Peel and dehead the prawns, cut the fish into chunks, steam open the mussels if using them.

Heat some oil in a wok and add the above aromatics. Cook on a low heat for a few minutes.

Next the pineapple, cut out the woody centre and cut the rest into smallish pieces. Add to the pan and continue cooking .

Add the yard long beans cut into 3 cm lengths.

Add the bean sprouts

The pineapple by this time should have given out some of its juices. Add to these the fish sauce and chilli jam and mix in.

Add the fish, stir to mix with the sauce. Cover and leave to cook for five minutes.

Stir again and look at how cooked the fish is. It will most likely need a few more minutes but be careful not to overcook.

To serve, sprinkle with the crushed peanuts and chives and serve with plain boiled rice or noodles. If you want you can mix these into the pan of fish and pineapple to absorb the flavours in the sauce.

Thai Green Curry with Seafood & Oriental Salad

26 Monday Aug 2013

Posted by in Fish, Food for One, Main Courses, Sauces, Vegetable Dishes

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THAI GREEN CURRY WITH SEAFOOD

I fell in love with Thai cooking on a visit there many years ago, and took copious notes of everything that I ate. Once home I set about recreating the dishes that I had enjoyed while there. I started by buying in the curry pastes, but now that I grow all the essential ingredients on the farm, I make my own, and I am not sure that I could now go back to the bought ones. The difference is the freshness of the taste, that if you do not over process you can have texture to the paste, and also of course that you can balance the proportions of the ingredients depending on how spicy you require it to be.

For a seafood curry, I like spice, but not overpoweringly so, but I still want a good strong flavour of ginger, garlic and lemon grass, so I put with them a milder pale green chilli which still has spice together with a good pepper flavour.

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For the paste – enough for a curry for 4

4 cloves garlic

2 stalks of lemon grass

A piece of ginger, or galangal if you can get it, roughly 5 cm x 2 cm

2 tablespoons Nam Pla – Thai fish sauce

Roughly chop the garlic and pound to a pulp in a mortar.

Take the outer leaves off the lemon grass and cut off the tough base. Finely slice the tender part at the base, usually you get about 2 cm of tender part.

Add to the garlic.

Scrape the skin off the ginger and grate into the mortar with the garlic and lemon grass. Mash with the pestle until a paste adding the fish sauce as you go along.

This paste can be made in advance and be left developing its flavours in the fridge until needed.

For the fish –

Large peeled prawns

Mussels

White meaty fish like swordfish, shark, monkfish, cod, haddock

1 tablespoon each of red and black fish eggs

A large sweet onion or 5-6 spring onions

Large can of coconut milk

Good bunch of basil leaves or Thai parsley

Olive oil for frying

Peel and slice the onion. In a pan big enough to take the curry, soften the onions in oil.

Add the curry paste and fry for a few minutes.

Add the coconut milk and stir well to mix in. Bring to a simmer and start adding the fish.

Keep the curry on a low heat while the fish cooks to ensure that it doesn’t overcook.

The white fish wants to be cut into chunks. If you think that all the fish requires the same amount of cooking, you can add it all in one go.

The fish shouldn’t need more than five minutes to cook.

Lastly add the fish eggs. I had assumed before putting these in hot dishes that they would melt into the sauce, but they don’t and so add colour and texture to fish dishes. They look particularly effective on Salmon with pasta.

Garnish with the chopped herbs and serve with plain boiled rice.

ORIENTAL SALAD

This is adapted from a recipe in Sri Owens fabulous book of Indonesian recipes. I would not call this a fixed recipe as I use whatever is fresh in the vegetable garden. If I plan ahead enough, I get some beansprouts sprouting a few days in advance. They are not available to buy fresh here in Spain, so you have to grow your own. If you cannot get fresh ones, miss them out rather than use the cooked ones that come in jars, the flavour and texture are just not the same.??????????????????????????????????

A selection of the following –

Fresh bean sprouts

French or Yard Long beans – blanched by pouring boiling water over them, leaving them a minute, and then draining and leaving to cool

Chinese leaves or other greens – finely shredded

The following all cut into fine julienne –

Radishes

Carrots

Small tender courgettes

Green peppers

Red peppers

Plus –

Basil leaves – Thai is best, but the usual or Lettuce Basil will do – shredded

Fresh mint leaves

For the dressing – these amounts are for a salad for 4

100 gms roasted peanuts

1-2 cloves of garlic – finely chopped

1teaspoon crumbled shrimp paste or 1 tablespoon Thai fish sauce

Red chilli – to taste – it wants to be quite spicy – finely chopped

1teaspoon soft brown sugar

Juice of a lime

Salt to taste

Put all the prepared vegetables in a dish with the herbs and mix together.

Prepare the dressing. In a mortar pound all the ingredients except the lime juice until a rough paste with the nuts still having some bigger bits for texture. Add the lime juice and mix. Add just enough water to make into a sauce.

Pour over the salad and mix well. Serve at room temperature.

Catalan Fish Stew – Suquet

27 Wednesday Feb 2013

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I thought while I was thinking of fish stew that I ought to share with you the recipe for one that originates from much closer to my home. This is a dish that is quintessentially Spanish. Garlicy Mediterranean fish in a tomato sauce, thickened and flavoured with toasted almonds and saffron, spiced with pimenton picante and served up with chunks of crusty country bread and green salad fresh from the huerta. And just as easy to cook for one or ten.

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For 4

Selection of fish and shellfish.

Monkfish is traditional, but now that it is endangered I choose other white meaty fish –Cod, Hake, Swordfish, Shark, Grey Mullet. Haddock and Conger Eel we don’t get in this part of the Med but would be suitable. Squid – if you are buying squid in a Mediterranean country be aware that there are several varieties of encephalopods and not all of them a tender.  Make sure that it is Calamar that you buy and not Poton which is tasty but requires a long slow cooking. If in doubt the calamares are usually a bit pricier and smaller in size than the poton.

For the shellfish

3-4 largish prawns per person – if they still have their heads and shells they will add more flavour to the stew.

3-4 mussels per person – in their shells

Clams – in their shells

Olive oil for frying

Half a head of garlic – peeled and finely chopped

1 medium onion – finely chopped

50 grams whole almonds

2 pinches saffron strands

1 heaped teaspoon pimenton picante / spicy paprika

3 large tomatoes – peeled, de seeded and chopped or 5 tablespoons passata

Fish stock

Flat leaved parsley – chopped

Prepare the fish. Remove any skin and bones and cut into large chunks. In some restaurants here they leave everything on and also use small fish like Red Mullet, but I find that Suquet is messy enough to eat with getting the shellfish out of their shells and peeling the prawns without having to try to skin and bone fish as you eat the dish as well. Also some fish skin has quite a different and stronger flavour than the flesh and this can ruin a dish.

Clean the mussels and clams and steam them open. Just put them in a frying pan, cover and put on a low heat. Turn them from time to time until they are all open. Put to one side until needed.

Put the saffron in a thick based pan over a low heat and toast to dry the strands and bring out the flavour. Be careful with this as the expensive strands can easily burn.

Put the strands in a mortar with a pinch of salt and grind up.

Put the almonds in the same pan as where the saffron was and toast moving from time to time until they are a light golden brown.

Add to the mortar and grind to a rough powder. You still want some bigger bits in the powder for texture. Put to one side until needed.

Heat the oil in a pan large enough to take all the ingredients for the stew. Add the garlic and fry over a low heat until golden.

Add the onions and fry until translucent.

Add the tomatoes and fry down for 5 minutes, or add the passata.

Put in the fish pieces, the prawns and the almond and saffron from the mortar. Season with the pimenton. Add the strained liquid from the mussels and clams.

Stir all to mix in the ingredients.

The liquid wants to just cover the fish, if it looks a bit dry add some fish stock, or chicken if you don’t have fish.

Cook slowly for 5-10 minutes until the fish is almost cooked.

Add the mussels and clams and chopped parsley.

Heat to warm through.

Check the seasonings and add salt and freshly ground black pepper as required. This is done at the very end as some shellfish can be quite salty and so until it and its stock are added you won’t know how salty the dish is.

Serve with crusty bread and a green salad.

The leftovers with extra clams added make a great sauce for pasta the next day……..

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Spicy Fish Stew & Yuca Dumplings

20 Wednesday Feb 2013

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IMG_0033  Here is the fish stew to go with yesterdays Yuca Dumplings as promised.

Per person

100 gms meaty fish – swordfish, salmon, conger eel, haddock

4 large prawns in the shells

Juice of half a lime

Half a teaspoon turmeric

Quarter of a teaspoon sumac

Quarter of a teaspoon chilli powder or half a teaspoon fresh finely chopped chilli

Quarter of a teaspoon fresh thyme finely chopped or half that amount of dried thyme

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Olive oil for frying

Half a sweet red pepper cut into chunks

Green beans, washed and cut into slices

20 gms sweetcorn, either frozen or tinned is fine

Small jar passata – the recipe can be found in the preserves section

3 or 4 yuca dumplings

Cut the fish into biggish chunks. Put into a bowl with the prawns. You can remove the shells from the prawns at this stage if you prefer, but they do add extra flavour to the dish.

Pour over the lime juice and add all the spices; turmeric, sumac, chilli, thyme, and season with salt and pepper.

Mix well to coat the fish pieces and prawns with the marinade. Leave for an hour for the spices to permeate the fish.

When this time has passed, heat some oil in a shallow saucepan and add the peppers. Fry for 5 minutes or so.

Add the beans and fry for another 2-3 minutes.

Add the passata and stir in. Turn the heat down and let the vegetables cook for 5 minutes.

Add the fish and any juices with it. Gently stir in. Leave to cook for 5-7 minutes until just on the verge of being done.

Add the sweetcorn and the dumplings. Cook for a few minutes to heat them through turning the dumplings in the sauce to coat them.

Serve.

Fishcakes with Passion Fruit Sauce

16 Saturday Feb 2013

Posted by in Fish, Sauces

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A passion fruit is a capsule of readymade sauce– aromatic, sweet and sour with its own distinctive colour and texture in a neat one-person portion sized container.  In Madeira it makes a sauce for fried fillets of fish, but I had in my minds eye/stomach that it would be better if the fish had more texture and flavour to balance the intense fruitiness of the passion fruit. Crispy gougons? Or little Thai style fish cakes? With a hint of ginger, chilli, lemongrass and garlic, but not too much, I don’t want these seasonings to compete with the flavour of the passion fruit. And some finely sliced beans for colour and texture.IMG_0009

Per person

1 passion fruit

120 gms white fish – I used a type of shark which has a nice texture –  swordfish, conger eel, monkfish would all work well

3 or 4 prawns

Pinch of grated ginger

Pinch of grated garlic

Pinch of finely chopped red chilli

Pinch finely chopped lemon grass

Pinch salt

Mangetoute peas or green beans

1 level teaspoon cornflour plus extra for dusting the fishcakes

1 tablespoon beaten egg – it doesn’t have to be a quail egg, the one in the photo just happened to be lurking in the fridge and was the right size for one person. Here in Spain quails and their eggs are not the expensive delicacy that they are in other countries.

Olive oil for frying

Dice the fish and put it into a food processor. Peel the prawns and add to the fish.

Add the grated ginger and garlic, the chopped chilli and lemongrass, and the salt.

Process to a lumpy mix. You don’t want to over process and have a mush, plus you still have a bit of processing to do.

Add the egg. Pulse to mix in.

Add the cornflour. Pulse to mix in.

Add the beans or mangetoute and stir in with a spoon.

Sprinkle some cornflour onto a plate and take a spoonful of the fish mix and form into a small fishcake coating it with the cornflour as you go along.

Do this with the rest of the fish mix. You will have 3-5 fishcakes depending on how small you like them.

Warm some olive oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and when hot add the fishcakes. They will only need about three to four minutes each side by which time they should be a light golden brown.IMG_0014

Serve with the passion fruit pulp as a sauce. You can leave this cold or cut the passion fruit in half and give the halves a quick warm in the microwave before scooping out the pulp onto your fishcakes.

Sardines with Pine Nut and Raisin Stuffing

01 Saturday Sep 2012

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sardines-stuffed-and-bakedI don’t remember now where I came across this recipe for boned sardines that are wrapped around a stuffing of toasted pine nuts, raisins and onions and then moistened with orange and lemon juice before being baked in the oven, but it has been a favourite way of preparing these fish in my kitchen for many years. The combination of the oily fish, with the acid of the citrus and the sweetness of the onions and raisins is very successful – and so summery.

This recipe is for when the sardines are medium to large in size and need to be  gutted and deboned. I use two or three per person as a starter and four or five if it is to be a light main course.

12 medium sardines

1 medium onion – very finely chopped

Olive oil for frying the onions

25 gms pine nuts – dry roasted in a thick based shallow pan

25 gms raisins or currants

chopped fresh flat leaved parsley

fresh bay leaves

100 ml freshly squeezed orange juice

100 ml freshly squeezed lemon juice

Salt and black pepper

Start by descaling the sardines and then cut off their heads, gut them and remove the backbones. Open them out flat.

Prepare the stuffing.

Fry the onions until lightly browned. Add the pine nuts, raisins and parsley and mix well.

Take a small amount of the stuffing and place it at the wide end of the opened out sardine. Roll the fish around the stuffing, starting at the wide end and rolling towards the tail.

Put the fish into a shallow oven proof dish side by side with the tails sticking up. It can be pretty to use individual dishes per person if you have them. I use ramekins that will take two to three fish each if I am making this as a starter, or shallow bowls with four or five fish in each as a main course.

Once you have arranged all the fish, put a bay leaf in between each fish.

For cooking liquid, mix the lemon and orange juice. Pour over the fish to cover half a centimetre up from the base of the dish.

Bake at 180 degrees centigrade for 20 minutes.

Serve with a side salad and fresh bread.

An alternative stuffing is chopped capers, olives and chillies, with a white wine and lemon juice mix for the cooking liquid.

Boquerones en Vinagre

25 Saturday Aug 2012

Posted by in Fish, Food for One, Snacks and Tapas, Starters

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boquerones_smelts……..or Smelts in Vinegar.  The word Smelt does not excite the imaginary palate in quite the same way as the word Boqueron. I assume its origin is from the word boca which translates as mouth and that Boqueron means a mouthful. And a delightful mouthful it is, whether dusted with flour and fried whole or marinated in vinegar as in this recipe which I was describing to my friend Andy while in France last week, and so it brought it to mind to share with you too.

This is regularly served as a tapa in Spanish bars. A couple of the fish will be presented atop a slice of fresh stick bread and sometimes with a good dollop of Allioli between the bread and the fish.

Cut the heads off your fresh smelts and open them out flat by opening along the belly and moving the flesh away from the bones on one side. There is no need at this point to remove the bones or the guts.

In a shallow dish that will take all the fish in one layer, pour enough white wine vinegar to cover the bottom of the dish. Lay the fish with the flesh side down into the vinegar.

Continue with all the fish putting them neatly side by side in the vinegar and then add more vinegar to just cover the layer of fish.

Put in the fridge for an hour so that the vinegar can ‘cook’ the fish.

Remove the fish one by one from the vinegar and remove the bones and guts. Lay in a clean dish.boquerones_en_vinagre

When you have done them all, pour over a generous amount of extra virgen olive oil and season the dish with finely chopped garlic and parsley. I added some chopped fresh green chillis as well, which are not traditional, but I like a bit of spice with my fish. Having a lime farm, and consequently having a lime or two lurking about, I have  used lime juice in place of the vinegar in this recipe which works very well and makes it more of a Ceviche, especially if you substitute fresh coriander for the parsley. Lemon juice should work too, although I haven’t tried it.

Put back in the fridge for half an hour or so for the flavours to develop and then serve with fresh bread.

Mediterranean Fish Soup with Rouille & Aliolli

19 Thursday Jul 2012

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The promised fish soup recipe. The only specialist bit of equipment needed to make this is a Mouli for straining the soup. You can use a sieve but a Mouli makes it much less work and gets more of the flesh of the fish and hence more flavour into the soup. It is a very useful bit of equipment for all soups especially Gazpacho Andaluz and not expensive to furnish yourself with. I have found that the cheaper plastic ones, while not looking so smart hanging in the kitchen, actually work much better than the all metal.

For 8

The body and head of a skate, cut into 3 or 4 pieces

10 large prawns

4 cloves of garlic sliced

Half and onion sliced

Either 250 ml Passata – home made being best, or 250 ml Tomato Frito, or Standard sized tin of chopped plum tomatoes plus 3-4 tablespoons of tomato puree.

The cooking liquid from the skate wings from the previous post if you have done that.

Salt & Freshly ground black pepper

Peel the prawns and put the heads and skins in a pan with the cooking liquid from the skate wings if you have that, otherwise with enough water to cover. Bring to the boil and simmer for ten minutes.

Strain this stock and add to a large pan containing the pieces of skate body, the garlic, and the onion. Add more water to cover the ingredients and bring to the boil. Simmer for half an hour.

Let cool and strain through the coarse blade of the mouli making sure that you get as much of the fish flesh in the soup as you can. It will look a bit grey and unappetising at this point, but do not worry the tomatoes will transform it into a gorgeous red puree.

Return to the pan with whichever version of tomatoes that you are using and reheat. Cook for five minutes. Check seasoning. I have left this until this stage because some of the Passata and Tomato Frito in the shops has a high salt content so you can allow for this at this stage.

Add the chopped prawns to the soup and simmer a minute or two more. Serve with Rouille and Aliolli to stir in to taste.making_authentic_aliolli

I have given you already the recipe for Aloilli made like a mayonaise with eggs. This is  the simpler version using just garlic and olive oil. Put three cloves of garlic in the mortar with a good pinch of salt. Pound to a paste.

Have the olive oil at room temperature. Add a drizzle at a time, pounding well between the drizzles until you have a thick paste. For this condiment I added about 40 ml of oil as I wanted the garlic flavour to be strong, but for an eggless mayonaise keep adding the oil until you have a mayonaise consistency. You should be able to add about 150 ml of oil.aliolli_eggless

Rouille is a spicy condiment made with red chillis and seasonings, but you can easily substitute Harissa the Moroccan Chilli paste. I improvised mine by blending together some roasted red peppers from the freezer with fresh green chilli from the garden and a little olive oil and salt.