Salt Crusted fish

The gorgeous blue shimmering pattern of mackerel.

An old preparation for a new lot.  That lot is my family and hopefully soon yours!  In the 1990's Clarissa Dickson Wright (The blonde of the Two Fat Ladies) with all her ancient recipe collecting knowledge brought to the forefront some amazing recipes.  This is a favorite.  This is up there with smoked fish (cold and hot smoked) for me.

Clarissa uses her favorite fish and other fillings.  Sea Trout and I think dill fronds. So, go nuts.  The only thing that I don't recommend is making the outer crust any more difficult.  I've gone through some "fancy" rehashes of Clarissa prep and it is a lot more fuss for a not-better result.  Try it with Snapper and hot chilis if you wish, just keep the exterior simple in the name of kitchen sanity and anti-wastefulness.

I used quite possibly the most sustainable of all Ocean fish that has a horrible reputation for being "fishy" - that fish is Mackerel.  It is abused by being canned and used as a feeder fish for all sorts of animal foods and the impoverished.  I would like to clear this fish's good name because this fish has a few things going for it 1.) its numbers are VERY high and doing well.  This can't be said for many fish on the market. 2.) This fish is cheap because very few folks understand how incredible it is 3.)  This fish tastes smoked and buttery. 4.) This is a "fatty" fish meaning no saturated fats and high in Omega 3 fatty acid, good for your hair, skin, heart, blood circulation, especially the brain and a load of other things including anti-cancer properties. This fish must be eaten the day of catch or immediately cured or frozen.  It is highly recommended by another favorite chef of mine, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall (of River Cottage fame) for smoking, drying, curing.  He does all this with it and even cooks it directly on the beach.   I figured this fish would really shine with this old-styled prep Clarissa gave me since Hugh uses it in simple applications.  What I didn't know is that this fish would have a smoked flavor BY ITSELF!  I was astonished at how buttery rich and smokey this fish turned out.  Thank God this is an unpopular fish because it was 5.99 a lb.  Making my monster mackerel a whopping 8.50 and could have easily fed 4 very hungry souls. More with sides and what have yous.

For this magic you'll need:

1 to 1 1/2 Cups Coarse Sea Salt
Your choice of fish (preferably an oily or fatty fish like trout or salmon if you don't have mackerel)
1/4 - 1/2 Cup of whatever herbs you wish to use

I cut the head off behind the gill and tossed it in a pot with 1/2 Cup water for the puppy.
I then gut the fish and removed the tail (you can leave the head and tail on for dinner parties as it does a fancy fine job of making you look nifty) and rinsed the stomach cavity with cool water.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

In my pan I placed about a 1/4 -1/2 inch "fish shaped" pile of coarse sea salt. Lay the fish on the salt bed you prepped.

I removed the tiny forefins for ease of eating later.

 Fill the cavity with whatever flavorful herbs, or onions you like.  I used chopped leek and parsley.

Cover the top of the fish in another 1/4 - 1/2 inch of coarse sea salt.

Using very wet fingers sprinkle the salted top with water this will keep the salt from sliding off the top of the fish while it cooks.  It will create a crust which when you remove it will pull the skin with it and unveil the loveliest baked fish you've ever had the pleasure of dining on.

Place in the oven and leave for at least 40 minutes.  You can stab through your salt crust into the fish with a knife to test it and if the tip of the knife is hot then your fish is cooked.  If not put in for another 10 minutes.

The time depends mostly on the size of the fish, but any caramelizing you witness will tell you your fish is done.  This is also a tough recipe to overcook since the goodness is rather sealed in until you crack the crust.

Crack this baby open in front of guests and watch their faces glow like Christmas morning.  (Or of course your holiday what-have-yous) The interior will be soft enough to spoon or spatulate from the skeleton.  Simply remove the spine once visible and be mindful of remaining bones.

I served this with chimichurri (minced parsley with olive oil)  over rice and an over easy egg to spill it's yolky goodness all over my fish and rice.  It was heavenly.  It isn't pictured because we had to smell this amazing food and couldn't handle it any longer.

Apple Ginger Acorn Squash

I have to straddle a fine line to eek some ginger into my life because Jason doesn't like it unless it is soda and even then he likes it far more tame than I prefer it.  This is a good dish to get a ginger fix and still have a lot of savory other things happening to keep the slightly more finicky tongues busy.

What you need:

• 1 large or two small acorn squash
• 1 granny smith apple (peeled and cored then diced in chunks)
• 1/4-1/2 inch little knuckle of ginger
• sea salt to taste
• cayenne (optional)
• a clove of garlic (optional)
• teeny pinch nutmeg (optional)

Preheat your oven to 375.  Oil lightly a pan.  Make sure your acorn squash either does NOT have wax on the exterior or give it a scalding rinse/scrub.  The food wax is the worst.  And if you're in a hurry when buying food it is really tough to see it.  Scratch it with your finger and if you reach the real skin in the scratch, great!  If not, this is very thick wax and may need to be cut off!  It is always best if there is NONE at all.

The easy way to cook squash is to cut it in half, scoop out the interior squish (reserving seeds if you're a gardener in case this is the best squash of your life) place the flesh side down on the pan and bake forever.  Checking every 20 minutes, then decreasing checking time to 15 and the closer to done then to 5 minutes.  It is not a rigid science with the huge variety of sizes these come in. You can't do this method if the wax is stubborn.  It will run down the sides to your pan and then it is on the flesh.  You can skin the squash with a peeler and knife for the crevasses. This way seems painfully intense but, you can then cut 1/2 inch rings and chop the squash into little pieces and it cooks really quickly.

After the squash is half way done... smaller pieces are effortlessly pierced with a fork.  Now it is time to add the granny smith chunks to the pan.  Cook for another 15 minutes until the outside flesh of the apple chunks have a silken but sad looking skin. It should now smell like autumn, and be sweet.

Place cooked lovelies into a tall mixing bowl with abrupt sides (this will keep things from flying out) and using a mixer blend until squash is mashed potato like -apples may most likely remain in chunks and not smooth through.  This is preferable.

You can keep this in an oven dish in a warm oven if it is completed before other things in the meal because this will lose heat quickly!

I served the squash with this:

I slice up some garlic and sautee it in a pan on a low-med heat until golden brown and crispy and then put aside.

I shredded a carrot finely into the remaining oil in the pan and tossing them often I let them darken and then removed them and put aside.

These are Heritage Pork chops which were cooked purely in their own fat, no oil or butter and some paprika I dried and ground from my garden.  After the pork chops are done -they only take minutes to cook and if put into a nice already hot cast iron skillet you are just cooking them until there is a nice caramelizing on the fat of the pork (a good chop will be marbled with fat and may have the caramelizing on the "fleshy" parts as well.  If you like your chops a little well done and cook them a couple minutes (on both sides)  just give a tiny slice to the meatier part on the outer edge.  This slice will firm up and open up looking like a triangle was cut out.  This is a "well" cooked chop.  I prefer mine to still expel a great deal of moisture so I do mine about medium -just touching it with my cooking fork in the center of the meat for firmness and using caramelization as the guide.  A good pork chop will have a PINK tone to it.  It will not be white. The Other White Meat is a campaign for cheap industrialized factory farmed pork. 

After the pork is done I put a TINY amount of butter in the pan which takes a little of the pork drippings off the pan and then I add a handful of pineapple sage cut chiffonade and stir it into the butter until the sage wilts.

I place the sage and garlic chips over the pork.

And a final Pork porn shot.

Oven roasted herbed potatoes and carrots with pan fried Zucchini spears

When it comes to dinner, I like things savory, spicy and hearty.  So, when I am imagining a menu, I try and find things that satisfy these cravings but are also simple and relatively quick to make.   This entry is going to detail one of my very favorite easy-to-cook meals.  I sometimes refer to these as "man meals" because they can be made just as easily on a camp stove as a regular oven, and bachelors with virtually no cooking skills can throw together a meal that is sure to impress a dinner guest.

There are four components to this menu:  roasted root veggies, pan fried zucchini, mixed greens and a ketchup-like tomato sauce for dipping.

First, the root veggies:

• Pre-heat oven to 475 degrees
• Cut your veggies (I used garlic, potato and carrot) into evenly-sized sections that will cook at approximately the same pace -- so if it's potatoes, they should be slices less than a half inch thick, same goes for carrot rounds, and any others.  Veggies that go great in this dish are rutabagas (peel them first), parsnip, carrots, potatoes, onion, hot peppers, and garlic cloves.
• Put your mix of cut veggies in a large mixing bowl and add 1-3 Tbsp of sunflower or safflower oil (enough to coat your veggies)
• Add finely chopped fresh herbs (rosemary, marjoram, thyme) in equal amounts to the the mix -- you want enough to see a speckle of each kind of herb on every piece of veggie
• Add a tsp of coarse sea salt
• Mix the herbs, oil, and veggies together until they are evenly coated.  Make sure that no veggies are dry or without herbs (you can grate some fresh black pepper over it here, or sprinkle hot pepper seeds to make it extra spicy)
• Lightly oil your cookie sheet with sunflower or safflower oil.  Pour the mix onto a cookie sheet in a single layer, meaning that there are not veggies stacked on top of one another, and place in oven for 35 minutes, turning once 15 minutes in

Once this is in the oven for 15 minutes, it's time to make the pan-fried zucchini!  Don't do it too early, or it will get soggy.

• Start a pan warming up to medium high heat
• Add 1 Tbsp of sunflower or safflower oil to the pan -- make sure it doesn't smoke as this means the pan is way too hot.
• In a small, flat mixing bowl, pour in whole wheat (not enriched!) flour about an 1/8th of an inch deep
• Add 1/2 tsp of cracked black pepper, and any savory dried herbs like oregano, basil, rosemary and thyme -- you can use an Italian or herbs de provence mix.  The herbs should be about 1 tsp worth.  Mix it until the flour and herbs are a uniform consistency.
• Cut a single zucchini into long, flat sections.  If the skin is at all tough, peel it first.
• Run each piece of zucchini under water for a moment so it is moist, no need for egg-- then dip it in the flour/herb mix so it has a thin coating of the flour/herb mix
• Place the zucchini in the hot oiled frying pan and let them cook until the bottom is browned.  You want the flour to be completely cooked.
• Once done, place the pieces on a paper towel, resting on a plate to absorb excess oil.  If the timing is right, the root veggies in the oven should be ready to come out shortly.

Lastly, time to make some ketchup-like tomato dip.  This is optional because the other stuff is already super tasty.  I like it because it gives the meal more color and flexibility.

• In a small bowl, add 1/2 Cup of crushed canned tomatoes -- make sure it's 100% tomato and nothing else
• Add a pinch of allspice, clove, coriander, plus an even smaller pinch of something spicy like cayenne or dried hot peppers -- if you have a garlic powder you trust, add a pinch of that as well.
• Add 1/2 tsp of coarse sea salt
• Add 1 tsp of sugar, or honey  (you may want more depending on your taste, but mix first and let it sit before adding more -- too much sweet is no good)
• Mix thoroughly and either serve cold, or heat the mixture and serve hot

The last element is putting a nice bed of fresh raw greens on the side.  I recommend arugula, mustard, butter lettuce, cress, and turnip greens.   I'll make a note in a later potlicker on how to make your own "greens bed" in the back yard.

So, once it's all done, plate it up and serve to whomever you want to be impressed with your mad cooking skills.