It is always said that fish is good for the brain. While this is essentially true I find the thing about cooking fish dishes that helps my brain the most is the mental exercise involved in doing something interesting with it.
I do not generally follow recipies set by other people unless I want to cook some classic dish that I have never attempted before and so I leave it to my imagination. Sadly after spending a day looking after the storm of destructive power that is a one year old boy, I find my imagination slightly hindered by general brainfail and this leaves me falling back on the standard tried and tested methods that I have stored away in the recesses of my memory. This isn’t to say however that these methods aren’t tasty, what follows are two of my tried and tested favourites.
Mackerel fillets with warm potato salad.
First you need a Mackerel for each person eating. If you have a tame fishmonger handy, get them to fillet the fish for you. If you don’t then trim the fins off with scissors and then place the fish flat on a board with the tail on the right (if you’re right handed). Cut into the fish just above the tail and use the backbone as a guide while you slice towards the gills to take the first fillet off. You need not gut the fish first, you can wash the fillets off after you’ve done. Once you’ve taken the first fillet, turn the fish over and repeat. You may need to use tweezers to remove smaller bones from the fillet after you’ve cut it off.
Now that’s done, heat up a non-stick pan with a little olive oil and butter in ready to fry the fish. Season the skin lightly with salt and place in the pan skin side down. Don’t turn the fish over while cooking, if you need to cook the top of the fillets, get a spoon and use that to get hot oil/butter mix over the fish. While you are frying the fish you should be boiling your potatos.
Once the fish is cooked (skin crispy and colour of the meat changed) take out of the pan and place on a kitchen towel to soak the fat off.
For the potato salad you can either use small salad potatos or small chunks of normal boiled potatos. Once they are cooked, add a couple of tablespoons of mayonaisse and half a teaspoon of mustard for every person eating. I haven’t provided any quantities for the potatos as only you know what an acceptable portion size is.
Chop up a couple of spring onions per person and add to your potato salad then mix in.
Place your potato salad on a plate and lay the fish fillets on top. Go and eat. You may want to vary the mustard quantities as my wife can’t stand this amount but I love it.
Next, Cod with cheesy mash and spicy tomato sauce.
This is pure comfort food, I love it.
Get some cod. I find it highly unlikely that anyone would buy an entire Cod so let’s just assume you have it ready portioned.
Take the portions of fish, season the skin again and cook using the same method as the recipie above. ALWAYS cook fish skin side down. While this is cooking, make your mashed potato (making mash properly is a whole different post) before you mash the mash you add the cheese. Use about a fistfull of grated mature cheddar per serving. When you mix it all up the finished article should be almost elastic, a similar consistency to half set glue.
The sauce is simple. Use passata or chopped tomatoes for the base, if using chopped tomatoes don’t forget to slightly reduce them in a pan to remove excess water and intensify the flavour. Next, add a teaspoon of tobasco per serving and season to taste. Don’t be afraid of giving the sauce a big kick as there is a lot of stodge in the potato for it to cut through.
Big scoop of mash on the plate, sauce round it and fish skin side up on top of the mash. You can add whatever vegetables you like to this but I would suggest broad beans or spinach.
The Cod in this recipie can be substituted for pretty much any white fish, trial and error are the best ways to find out what you prefer.
