COVER
ABOUT THE BOOK
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
TITLE PAGE
«1» WHY SHOULD WE EAT MORE FISH?
«2» CHOOSING, PREPARING AND COOKING YOUR FISH
«3» BASIC RECIPES: STOCKS, SAUCES, FLAVOURED BUTTERS AND DRESSINGS
FISH STOCK
SHELLFISH STOCK AND SHELLFISH REDUCTION
CHICKEN STOCK
COURT-BOUILLON
A COURT-BOUILLON FOR POACHING SMOKED FISH
VEGETABLE STOCK
VELOUTÉ
HOLLANDAISE SAUCE
PASTIS AND FENNEL HOT BUTTER SAUCE
MALTAISE SAUCE
MUSSEL SAUCE
SEAFOOD SAUCE
BEURRE BLANC
BEURRE ROUGE
OLIVE OIL MAYONNAISE
MUSTARD MAYONNAISE
FENNEL MAYONNAISE
TARTARE SAUCE
AÏOLI
SAUCE VERTE
ROUILLE
HARISSA
CHARMOULA
SALSA VERDE
MONTPELIER BUTTER
ANCHOVY BUTTER
MUSTARD BUTTER
GARLIC BUTTER
PINK PEPPERCORN BUTTER
GARLIC AND ROASTED HAZELNUT BUTTER
CORIANDER AND HAZELNUT BUTTER
PRAWN BUTTER
NOISETTE BUTTER
LEMON OLIVE OIL
OLIVE OIL DRESSING
MUSTARD DRESSING
PRESERVED LEMONS
YEAST AND BEER BATTER
TEMPURA BATTER
KACHUMBER (TOMATO AND CORIANDER) SALAD
SHALLOT VINEGAR
SALT COD
BRANDADE
QUATRE ÉPICES
EGG PASTA DOUGH
«4» SOUPS, STEWS, PIES AND SEVERAL MIXED SEAFOOD RECIPES
FISH SOUP WITH CROÛTONS
SHORE-CRAB BISQUE
MUSSEL, LEEK AND SAFFRON SOUP
PANACHE OF JOHN DORY, TURBOT AND RED MULLET WITH YOUNG SUMMER VEGETABLES
CLAM CHOWDER WITH COD
BOUILLABAISSE
LOBSTER, TURBOT AND MUSSELS WITH STAR ANISE NAGE
BOURRIDE OF RED MULLET, BRILL AND SALT COD
COTRIADE
A MEURETTE OF PLAICE AND LEMON SOLE WITH BEAUJOLAIS
THAI SEAFOOD SALAD
SEAFOOD RISOTTO
CHARLES FONTAINE’S FISH PIE
TEMPURA OF SEAFOOD WITH ROASTED RED CHILLI AND ONION PICKLE
SEAFOOD THERMIDOR
HAKE AND POTATO PIE WITH A GARLIC, PARSLEY AND BREADCRUMB CRUST
FISH PASTIES WITH FRENCH TARRAGON
FISH CAKES
«5» OILY FISH: HERRING, MACKEREL, SALMON, SEA TROUT, WHITEBAIT AND EELS
HOT SMOKED EEL WITH LENTILS, SAUERKRAUT AND PINK FIR APPLE POTATOES
FILLETS OF EEL WITH TERIYAKI MARINADE
HERRINGS IN OATMEAL WITH SALAD LEAVES AND TOMATO
HERRING BEIGNETS WITH OLIVE OIL, MARJORAM AND CRACKED SPICES
PAN-FRIED HERRING MILT ON TOASTED BRIOCHE WITH NOISETTE BUTTER, CAPERS, SALAD LEAVES AND CHERVIL
GRILLED HERRINGS WITH MUSTARD AND ONION SAUCE AND FISH SAUSAGES
CHILLED FILLETS OF MACKEREL WITH CIDER AND AROMATIC HERBS
HOT MACKEREL SALAD WITH LETTUCE, LEMON GRASS AND CORIANDER
MACKEREL ESCABÈCHE
MACKEREL RECHEADO
FILLETS OF MACKEREL WITH DILL AND NEW POTATOES
SALMON MARINATED IN DILL
SALMON STEAKS WITH MUSCADET, WATERCRESS AND DILL POTATOES
HORSERADISH AND MUSTARD SAUCE
SALMON EN CROÛTE
ESCALOPES OF SALMON WITH A SORREL SAUCE
SMOKED SALMON WITH SCRAMBLED EGGS
PAN-FRIED TROUT WITH GARLIC AND BACON
POACHED SEA TROUT WITH MAYONNAISE, NEW POTATOES AND CUCUMBER SALAD
SEARED SMOKED SEA TROUT WITH CHIVE DRESSING
BRAISED FILLET OF SEA TROUT WITH BASIL, CELERIAC AND CHAMBÉRY
MARINATED SEA TROUT WITH LIME AND PINK PEPPERCORNS
DEVILLED SPRATS WITH RAVIGOTE SAUCE
DEEP-FRIED WHITEBAIT WITH LEMON AND PERSILLADE
«6» MEDITERRANEAN FISH: BREAM, GURNARD, MULLET AND SEA BASS
BAKED RED BREAM AND FENNEL WITH ORANGE AND PROVENÇAL HERBS
GRILLED VEGETABLES
POACHED QUENELLES OF GURNARD WITH PRAWN SAUCE
GURNARD WITH BOUILLABAISSE SAUCE AND HARISSA POTATOES
GRILLED RED MULLET WITH AN AUBERGINE AND PESTO SALAD
DEEP-FRIED RED MULLET WITH LEMON GRASS, CHILLI, GARLIC AND GINGER
STIR-FRIED SPINACH WITH GARLIC, GINGER AND CHILLI
GRILLED GREY MULLET WITH GARLIC, LEMON AND THYME
STEAMED GREY MULLET WITH GARLIC, GINGER AND SPRING ONIONS
CHAR-GRILLED GREY MULLET WITH SLIVERS OF GARLIC, CHILLI AND VIRGIN OLIVE OIL
GRILLED SEA BASS WITH BEURRE BLANC AND MARSH SAMPHIRE
ROAST SEA BASS WITH BRAISED RED CABBAGE AND RÖSTI POTATOES
GRILLED SEA BASS WITH STRAW POTATOES AND SALSA VERDE
GRILLED WHOLE SEA BASS WITH PERNOD AND FENNEL
«7» ROUND FISH: THE COD FAMILY, MONKFISH AND JOHN DORY
ROAST COD WITH AÏOLI AND BUTTER BEANS
CLASSIC COD IN PARSLEY SAUCE
KEDGEREE
SMOKED HADDOCK WITH SAVOY CABBAGE, LEMON AND NOISETTE BUTTER
HADDOCK BOULANGÈRE
BAKED HAKE WITH LEMON, BAY LEAF, ONION AND GARLIC
WHITE-COOKED LING WITH SPRING ONIONS, CHILLI AND SZECHUAN PEPPER
SALT POLLACK WITH MAYONNAISE, CHILLI AND CANNELLINI BEANS
WHITING AND POTATO BHAJI
CHAR-GRILLED JOHN DORY WITH CORIANDER, SAFFRON AND KUMQUATS
FILLETS OF JOHN DORY WITH OLIVES, CAPERS AND ROSEMARY
PAN-FRIED FILLET OF MONKFISH WITH THE NEW SEASON’S GARLIC AND FENNEL
MONKFISH WITH SAFFRON AND ROASTED RED PEPPER DRESSING
TANDOORIED MONKFISH WITH TOMATO AND CORIANDER SALAD
CARPACCIO OF MONKFISH WITH LEMON OLIVE OIL
«8» FLAT FISH: BRILL, HALIBUT, PLAICE, SOLE AND TURBOT
A CASSEROLE OF BRILL WITH SHALLOTS AND WILD MUSHROOMS
FILLETS OF BRILL WITH STIR-FRIED SPINACH AND CORIANDER
FILLETS OF BRILL IN MADIRAN WITH YOUNG BROAD BEANS
CEVICHE OF BRILL
SPINACH WITH BUTTER
ESCALOPES OF HALIBUT WITH DILL, CARROTS AND CELERY
GRILLED SCORED PLAICE WITH GARLIC, OREGANO AND LEMON JUICE
CHAR-GRILLED WHOLE DOVER SOLE WITH SEA SALT AND LIME
DOVER SOLE À LA MEUNIÈRE
GRILLED POTATOES
CHAR-GRILLED FILLETS OF DOVER SOLE WITH CORIANDER, CUMIN AND CHILLI
DEEP-FRIED GOUJONS OF LEMON SOLE WITH TARTARE SAUCE
FILLETS OF LEMON SOLE WITH A VERMOUTH SAUCE AND WHOLEGRAIN MUSTARD
ROAST TRONÇON OF TURBOT WITH HOLLANDAISE SAUCE
A RAGOUT OF TURBOT AND SCALLOPS WITH CHICORY, FRENCH TARRAGON AND NOILLY PRAT
«9» LARGE FISH: SKATE, SHARK, SWORDFISH, TUNA AND CONGER EEL
SKATE WITH BLACK BUTTER
SKATE, LEEKS AND WILTED LETTUCE WITH A CIDER VINEGAR AND BUTTER SAUCE
SKATE MAYONNAISE WITH A VEGETABLE SALAD
GOAN SHARK CURRY
SHARK, WHELK AND OCTOPUS SALAD WITH LEMON, GARLIC AND OLIVE OIL
CHAR-GRILLED SWORDFISH STEAKS WITH SALSA FRESCA
SASHIMI WITH SOYA AND JAPANESE HORSERADISH
CHAR-GRILLED TUNA WITH OLIVES, LEMON AND SORREL
GRILLED TUNA SALAD WITH GUACAMOLE
CONGER EEL WITH HARICOT BEANS, SMOKED HAM AND GARLIC
«10» CRUSTACEANS: CRAB, LANGOUSTINE, LOBSTER, PRAWNS AND SHRIMPS
CRAB IN FILO PASTRY WITH A RICH TOMATO SAUCE AND BASIL
CRAB FISH CAKES WITH A TOMATO, CRAB AND BASIL DRESSING
FRESH CRAB SALAD WITH TARRAGON MAYONNAISE, CUCUMBER AND ENDIVE
SPIDER CRAB WITH PASTA, PARSLEY AND CHILLI
CRAB, SAFFRON AND LEEK QUICHE
DEEP-FRIED SOFT-SHELL CRABS WITH CHILLI SAUCE
GRILLED LANGOUSTINE WITH CREAMED GARLIC AND CHIVES
LOBSTER WITH MAYONNAISE
GRILLED LOBSTER WITH FINES HERBES
SAUTÉED LOBSTER WITH SAFFRON AND CHAMBÉRY
SPECIAL SALAD OF LOBSTER, AVOCADO, GREEN BEANS AND DUCK LIVERS
LOBSTER À L’AMÉRICAINE
LOBSTER RAVIOLI WITH BASIL AND SPINACH
STIR-FRIED PRAWNS
PRAWN COCKTAIL WITH MALT WHISKY
SALAD OF PRAWNS, ROCKET AND PARMA HAM
PRAWN TERRINE WITH COURGETTE SALAD
PRAWN JAMBALAYA
CHAR-GRILLED TIGER PRAWNS WITH LEMON GRASS CHILLI AND CORIANDER
FRUITS DE MER
COOKING AND ASSEMBLING THE FRUITS DE MER
«11» SHELLFISH: COCKLES, CLAMS, WINKLES, MUSSELS, OYSTERS, SCALLOPS AND SQUID
HOT SHELLFISH WITH GARLIC AND LEMON JUICE
MOULES ET FRITES AND MOULES MARINIÈRES
MUSSELS IN THE SHELL WITH LINGUINE, GARLIC AND PARSLEY
GRILLED MUSSELS WITH PESTO
MUSSEL, COCKLE AND CLAM MASALA
OYSTERS WITH BEURRE BLANC AND SPINACH
OYSTERS CHARENTAIS
STEAMED SCALLOPS WITH GINGER, SOY, SESAME AND SPRING ONIONS
SCALLOPS WITH NOISETTE BUTTER
SAUTÉED SCALLOPS WITH BASIL, SAFFRON AND PASTA
SAUTÉED SCALLOPS WITH LENTILS AND CHARDONNAY
CHAR-GRILLED SQUID WITH A PEPPER MARINADE
SAUTÉED SQUID WITH OLIVE OIL, GARLIC AND PARSLEY
PILCHARDS GRILLED OVER DRIFTWOOD WITH A TOMATO, RED ONION AND BASIL SALAD
THE CLAMBAKE
LISTING OF AMERICAN, AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND FISH
ALTERNATIVE FISH
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
COPYRIGHT
Special thanks to Paul Ripley, David Pope and the other chefs at The Seafood Restaurant for all the time spent recipe testing. Particular thanks to Jane Rees, who typed most of the manuscript. Thanks to Heather Holden-Brown, Anna Ottewill and Frank Phillips at BBC Books for all their expertise, and their considerable patience with my failure to meet deadlines; to Graham Kirk and Louise Pickford for their sensitive interpretation of my dishes in the photography and to Barbara Mercer for her attractive and clear page design.
Lastly, thanks to the director of the television series, David Pritchard, the source of most of the ideas for the series, and consequently the book, for many hours spent talking about fish, fishermen and seafood in the London Inn, Padstow – and the source of some irritation to my wife, Jill, who cannot see why men have to have a couple of beers before they can talk about anything!
The following is a list of all the fish and shellfish used in the book giving an alternative to use if you can’t get hold of the one in the recipe. The alternatives are not necessarily the most similar fish biologically but rather ones that work almost, if not equally, as well.
EEL: MACKEREL
CONGER EEL: SHARK, SWORDFISH OR TUNA
HERRINGS: MACKEREL OR PILCHARDS
POLLACK: COLEY, OR LARGER WHITING
WHITING: HADDOCK OR COD
MACKEREL: HERRING
SALMON: LARGE SEA TROUT
SEA TROUT: SALMON OR TROUT
SPRATS: SARDINES
WHITEBAIT: SAND EELS
JOHN DORY: BARBECUED DISHES – SEA BASS: OTHERS – TURBOT OR BRILL
RED MULLET: ANY OF THE BREAM FAMILY OR SEA BASS
SEA BASS: GREY MULLET OR RED MULLET
RED BREAM: JOHN DORY
COD: HADDOCK
GURNARD: SEA BASS OR WEEVER FISH
MONKFISH: CHAR-GRILLED RECIPES – SWORDFISH; OTHERS – TURBOT OR JOHN DORY
HADDOCK: COD OR HAKE
HAKE: HADDOCK OR COD
LING: MONKFISH
SWORDFISH: SHARK OR TUNA
SHARK: TUNA, SWORDFISH OR CONGER EEL
TUNA: SWORDFISH OR MONKFISH
DOVER SOLE: WITCH SOLE, SAND SOLE FILLETS OF DOVER SOLE – MEGRIM SOLE, LEMON SOLE, WITCH SOLE
LEMON SOLE: MEGRIM SOLE, WITCH SOLE, PLAICE
BRILL: TURBOT, LARGE JOHN DORY
HALIBUT: TURBOT
PLAICE: LEMON SOLE, DABS, WITCH SOLE, FLOUNDER
TURBOT: BRILL, JOHN DORY
SKATE: ANGEL SHARK, PORBEAGLE SHARK
SQUID: CUTTLEFISH
OCTOPUS: LARGE CUTTLEFISH
CUTTLEFISH: SQUID
BROWN CRAB: SPIDER CRAB
SHORE CRAB: SWIMMING CRAB
SPIDER CRAB: BROWN CRAB
SWIMMING CRAB: SHORE CRAB
WHELKS: OCTOPUS
SCALLOPS: SLICES OF MONKFISH
QUEENS: SCALLOPS
PRAWNS: ANOTHER SPECIES OF PRAWN
PRAWN SHRIMPS: SMALL PRAWNS
LANGOUSTINE: LARGE PRAWNS
RAZOR-SHELL CLAMS: ANY OTHER SPECIES OF CLAM
CLAMS: COCKLES OR MUSSELS
MUSSELS: CLAMS OR COCKLES
WINKLES: SMALL MUSSELS
COCKLES: MUSSELS OR SMALL CLAMS
OYSTERS: MUSSELS OR CLAMS
LOBSTER: SPINY LOBSTER
SEA URCHINS: SCALLOP ROE
Imagine it is early spring and you have just arrived in Padstow. You have passed through the narrow lanes and slate walls of Cornwall, seeing only the odd tree, bent over to one side by the Atlantic gales, and the village churches across the open fields. You’ve taken more time to get there than you planned having stopped at St Issey and caught sight of the estuary for the first time. Then finally, here you are; the sky is a pale blue, the sand spreads all the way across the estuary with the Camel river to one side. Can you really still be in England?
Away from the quay, with its view across the estuary to the sand dunes at Rock, past the lobster pots with the smell of filmy seaweed still clinging to them, you walk into a seafood restaurant for Sea Bass with Beurre Blanc, Moules Marinières, Helford Oysters or some Razor-Shell Clams with Garlic Butter. You will be longing for some fresh ozone-scented seafood on such an optimistic sort of day before you’ve even sat down.
This book is about that sort of exhilarating experience. It encompasses not only recipes but my enthusiasm for fish cookery. I make no claims for a comprehensive coverage of all species of fish, only the ones that I love and the recipes that I think bring out the best in them: just a taste of the sea.
Since I started my own restaurant in Padstow, Cornwall in 1975 I have witnessed, with amazement, how seafood has grown in popularity. At first I sold grilled plaice and lemon sole, sea bass, mackerel, lobster, crabs, crayfish and the occasional scallop – and that was about it. I would never have dreamt of selling fish like cod or haddock because that was what fish and chip shops sold. Now there is literally not a fish that swims in our waters that I can’t sell. To give you an example, not long ago I went out on a trawler and found a species of fish called dragonets in the nets, a fish I didn’t know about. They’re a bit like monkfish in texture and taste, but very small and a beautiful yellow and blue colour. I brought some back, skinned them, filleted them, deep-fried them, put them on the menu with some chilli sauce and we sold them all that night. So a species, totally unknown to the people that were eating it, including a Michelin Guide inspector, was enormously popular. If I’d put the dragonets on the menu 20 years ago I’d have thrown them away. I can sell any fish now: gurnard, weever fish, conger eel, trigger fish and I put this down to the fact that people are at last beginning to appreciate how bountiful the mackerel-crowded seas around us are.
Coupled with an interest in eating seafood has been a growing understanding about the important part played by fish and shellfish in our diet. A book called The Eskimo Diet notes a correlation between the declining consumption of oily fish, like herring, in Europe and North America and the increase in diseases due to eating too much saturated fat. Fish is what you might call protein without tears, it’s completely lean and easily digestible with none of the side effects of fatty meat. Indeed, it seems clear that oily fish might reduce high levels of cholesterol caused by eating too much meat and dairy products. Even non-oily fish, such as tuna, trout, salmon, mullet, sea bass, squid and even mussels and oysters, contain the cholesterol-reducing fish oil known as omega 3.
I must say I’m optimistic about the future of fish cookery and our continuing interest in fish, but we still have a long way to go. There are still an awful lot of people who are indifferent to seafood. I find it interesting to try to analyse why this is. I still think one of the main problems is one of perception. Fish and shellfish are still regarded as being, in some way, not quite a full meal. I noted a comment in Jane Grigson’s excellent Fish Cookery, written in 1973, which is still, I’m afraid, all too relevant today.
The writer remarked that ‘fish could not be served as a main course when men were present as they needed steak or some other red meat.’
The incorrect belief that fish is not as nourishing as meat persists.
Fish bones are another reason mentioned to me for why people don’t like fish. Speaking as someone who’s spent a whole morning in the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford having a kipper bone removed from his throat, I should have given up fish long ago. But I haven’t, and anyway, there are plenty of fish which don’t have any small, throat-stabbing bones in them: flat fish, monkfish and all of the shark family, to name but a few.
The smell of fish is a problem to some. I do a number of demonstrations in local schools every year and children usually complain about the smell. This could be where poor fishmongers or perhaps poor turnover of fish is to blame. I’m always at pains to tell people that fresh fish doesn’t smell fishy. But if you look round one or two fishmongers and even large stores at the quality of fish they have on sale I’d be tempted to agree with those people who dislike the smell. Poor, sunken-eyed, flabby fish all sold at astoundingly high prices are fortunately not representative but definitely not acceptable.
I think the main reason for our reluctance to eat more fish is a lack of handed-down information. I was brought up in Oxfordshire, about as far from the sea as you can get in the British Isles, and I recall the fish that we had to eat in those days being dull. The transport of fish then was far less efficient than it is now. Fish was what everyone ate on Fridays; it was something that no one really looked forward to. I imagine most people have had similar experiences, unless they were brought up on the coast. I was brought up on a farm. I knew how to pluck chickens, remove guts from various animals. I saw pigs being slaughtered and all the bits made into something: brawn, chitterlings, hams. We had rabbits, partridges and pheasants and ate them regularly; my mother is a natural cook. Apart from the odd salmon, fish was not a great part of my experience except when we went to Cornwall every summer for our long holidays. It was almost like going to another country; the fish, the lobsters, the crayfish, the enormous crabs were so exotic.
Through lack of handed-down information many of us suffer from ignorance as far as fish preparation is concerned, so that when we’re faced with a whole fish we don’t know what to do with it. And because we don’t know what to do with it, we lack imagination about the possibilities it offers.
One of the fishermen who catches sea bass for us describes his favourite way of cooking fish as being to fry them with mushrooms and tomatoes, rather as though he were frying bacon and kidneys. I wouldn’t be surprised if the majority of people in this country considered that to be appetizing. But there is so much more he could do to cook those bass so as to pass on the excitement and quality of a beautiful fish. Think of roasting the whole fish and serving it with some beurre blanc, or grilling it and serving it with some basil, lemon juice and virgin olive oil with maybe a bit of rough sea salt sprinkled over it.
But I do have every reason to feel optimistic. One day, while we were filming the television series that this book accompanies, we went into a café just opposite the fish market in Newlyn and, having been excited by all the beautifully fresh fish in the market, we asked if we could have some simply cooked cod for breakfast. ‘We don’t serve fish here, it’s a fisherman’s café,’ came the astonished reply.
We left feeling a little despondent – but you can either respond by thinking, ‘this is an example of how indifferent we all are to fish in these islands’, and be generally depressed and demoralized about it, or, you could think, ‘okay, this is how it is now, but it isn’t going to last for much longer’. And the more I think about it, the more I realize the truth in the latter viewpoint.
We are going through a revolution in our eating habits in this country and within the next 25 years I am confident that you will be able to find shops selling fish anywhere in the British Isles where there is a fishing community as well as plenty of seafood restaurants. We tend to think there’s something wrong with us as a nation because we don’t appreciate and make use of our natural resources, like fish. I think over the past hundred years or so people forgot how to enjoy eating. We moved away from fish in our diets partly as a result of the Industrial Revolution when much of the population moved from the countryside and coast to the cities, leaving behind a whole tradition of living off the land and sea. Of course, some people still eat well off the land to this day but most of us have lost sight of our natural culinary heritage.
I want to reverse the unhappy situation on this island where three-quarters of the fish caught are exported. I want to show you the unrivalled advantages of a diet containing fish. I have already stressed the invaluable health benefits but really hope to persuade you to eat more fish through the dishes themselves. By sampling just one of the recipes in this book, I think you will be bowled over not only by the marvellous flavour and texture of fish but also by the simple pleasure, ease and satisfaction there is in cooking with fish. Believe me, a whole new experience awaits you!
The success of British cooking depends on the very best ingredients being treated in the very simplest way and when that happens I think there is nothing to beat it in the whole world. The problem with British food is that it really doesn’t lend itself to commercial cooking and its downfall has been that the most indifferent raw materials when cooked simply, taste boring. If you have to use indifferent ingredients then you need to have a more inventive cuisine to go with it. Nobody could claim that farmed carp has much taste to it, but put it into a Thai or Chinese context with ginger, garlic, chilli, soy sauce and lime, and something very acceptable is produced. In British cooking we always rely on the quality of the ingredients and if it isn’t there, the cooking is not worth consideration. When indifferent ingredients are badly cooked, you have something truly awful, and that is what a lot of British cooking ends up being.
But the basic idea is what influences my cooking: keep the cooking simple and keep the ingredients good. I spend far more time in my restaurant on checking the quality of the fish, shellfish and vegetables than I do on inventing new dishes or endlessly refining a stock or a sauce. Much as I enjoy elaborate French food, I enjoy, far more, dishes like plain grilled lobster with herb butter, turbot with Hollandaise sauce, salmon with mayonnaise, plain boiled crab and mayonnaise, skate with black butter and plain grilled Dover sole. If they’re accompanied by a dish of freshly dug new potatoes and followed by a bowl of Cornish strawberries, I’m even happier.
My recipes reflect my enthusiasm. Most of them are easy to make and most of them are not over-endowed with ingredients. But they all require the very best raw materials and if you haven’t got the very best raw materials, you’ll wonder what all the fuss is about.
All weights and measures in the recipes are written in metric and imperial quantities. The translation, however, from one to the other is not precise, therefore you should use either metric or imperial, and not a combination of the two.
Any unusual cooking implements like mortars and pestles, conical strainers or fish scalers are described in Chapter 2.
Ingredients are listed in the order in which they are used in the methods.
Most of my cooking is done with unsalted butter these days. This is because salted butter tends to increase the amount of salt in a recipe and because I prefer the flavour. Nevertheless, sometimes it doesn’t really matter which you use, in which case the recipe will say butter rather than unsalted butter. Salted butter is still significantly cheaper than unsalted because it keeps much better.
I use the South-east Asian anchovy essence called Thai fish sauce or nam pla in a large number of my recipes. It has a clean salty taste and I like to use it in place of salt because it enhances flavours without actually being noticeable itself. I use a brand called Squid which we have found to have the cleanest taste. It also seems to be the type most easily found in Britain.
Thai fish sauce has a much better flavour when it has been recently manufactured. You can tell how old it is simply by checking its colour. It is always dark brown in colour but the fresher it is, the lighter the brown.
If you can’t get hold of fish sauce, just use salt. Alternatively, you can use anchovy essence.
This herb, a member of the parsley family, has the same flavour as celery leaves but is much stronger. So strong, in fact, that a little goes a long way but it is a valuable flavouring herb in stocks and robust sauces.
In the recipes, I specify olive oil for general cooking when the flavour and expense of a fine olive oil would be wasted. I specify extra virgin olive oil when the aromatic flavours of a good oil are all-important.
By olive oil I mean general purpose blended olive oil, by extra virgin olive oil I mean oil produced by the first cold pressing of the fruit. I use about five different oils for different purposes. I tend to go for a good extra virgin Italian oil for using warm in my fish dishes and a French extra virgin for dressings for salads. The Italian tends to be stronger and more vigorous in flavour, the French softer and more subtle.
I’ve used Dutch chillies throughout this book because the heat factor is consistent. If you are not able to get hold of these, bite the very end of the tip off the chilli you use to taste for strength before using.
I have often suggested wines to accompany the dishes. They are all very reasonably priced wines, available from off licences and supermarkets – and won’t break the bank. On the whole, I’ve recommended white wine accompaniments but occasionally a light red wine instead that will go wonderfully well with that particular dish.
I have been experiencing some difficulty in trying to describe a measure for herbs in my recipes. The expression ‘a small bunch of parsley’ smacks a little of ‘how long is a piece of string?’ So I have specified the amount of herbs in a recipe by the tablespoonful. This means that you will have to guess roughly the amount of herbs to buy to produce a tablespoon. This might be a bit frustrating for you but at least it does ensure that exactly the right amount of herbs are put into the recipe. As a guideline 25 g (1 oz) of parsley on the stalk generally produces 8 tablespoons of chopped parsley.
It is a good idea to invest in a salad spinner for washing and drying your herbs as well as your salads. Coriander and parsley both tend to be dusty and therefore gritty. They particularly benefit from being washed and dried.
One of the hardest parts of organizing a cookery book is trying to fit the dishes into logical chapters. The last time I wrote a fish cookery book, the chapters were based on the courses of a meal but this didn’t work particularly well because so many fish dishes can be served as either a starter or a main course. I thought about making the recipes follow the seasons but this is particularly difficult with fish as seasonal variations vary in quality everywhere and I have always found cookery books based on the seasons to be particularly irritating to follow. I thought about an alphabetical list of fish but that seemed so uninspiring, so finally I thought that perhaps, by being illogical, I might get a more logical order! So I have grouped the fish in ways that seem to fit together. Oily fish seem to be a group to me as do flat fish, and fish I associate with the Mediterranean, the sort I would cook on a barbecue. In one group I have considered appearance, in another their cooking qualities; illogical, but it seems to work.
I know, because people often tell me, that choosing fresh fish is not as easy as it should be. I have always told people to trust their instincts – if the fish looks shiny and attractive, it will probably taste good. But it is a bit like asking somebody who doesn’t know much about wine to comment on the quality of a new vintage. It is very difficult unless you have spent years and years tasting all kinds of wine and have built up a fund of knowledge of colours, tastes and smells. So let me run through a few general points you need to look out for when buying fish.
A food writer visited my kitchen not long ago and paid me, what I consider to be, a very high compliment. She said, ‘it’s extraordinary but your kitchen doesn’t smell of fish.’ Fresh fish doesn’t smell fishy. It has a smell in the same sort of category as green fields in spring or indeed dried sheets, taken off the washing line in a country garden on a breezy day. The appearance of the fish should be bright and shiny, it should be firm to the touch and, perhaps most important, if you lift up the gill cover, the gills underneath should be a lustrous pink or red. There should be no sign of brown in them and they should not look washed out. The eyes of the fish should be clear and bright and not dull or red and the scales should be tight.
An extra bit of advice to add about choosing fresh fish is that it’s much easier to make judgements about one thing by comparing it with another. I would suggest you look for the nicest looking fish on the slab and, when you have found it, use it as a yardstick to judge the others. You can then ask yourself, ‘Why are the other fish less fresh-looking?’ The fish that looks better than the others is the fish to buy. So don’t be too dogmatic about choosing fish. Here I’ve listed all the fish used in the recipes and given some alternatives if the specified fish is not available or is not in the best condition. You’ll get much better results, for example, by using haddock instead of cod in a recipe if the cod doesn’t look too good, even if the recipe specifies cod.
If you see something on the slab which looks fresh but is unknown to you, go ahead and buy it, although I don’t expect you to be quite as foolhardy as I was when I once bought jellyfish. I had had jellyfish in a Chinese restaurant where it was served as a salad with a julienne of chicken, cucumber with coriander, and soy sauce. So enthusiastic was I about this dish that I was determined to try and make it myself. I asked one of the net fishermen to bring me some in. They started off about the size of footballs but when I boiled them, they reduced in size by about 90 per cent. Then I thinly sliced what was left. When I ate them though, it was a bit like eating a bunch of stinging nettles, the whole of my mouth came up in a wild rash. But I would still suggest you try anything that you see in a fishmonger’s because they’re not going to sell you jellyfish that sting your mouth!
I know that, sometimes, fish can be startling in their uncouth appearance and I’m no less affected by the look of unfamiliar fish than anyone else. I have been taking winter holidays in Goa on the west coast of India for the last four or five years. I go to the same hotel, where the food is excellent and where I’ve struck up a very productive relationship with the manager, who used to be a chef. He has taken me round the local fish market a couple of times and I must say the first time I went round it I was overwhelmed by the sight of so many strange fish. I have to admit that the smell was pretty overwhelming too; not of stale fish but, on the one hand, of a dried fish which has a particularly pungent odour, and, on the other, the smell of tropically heated fish guts. Everyone has the same mixed feelings when going to markets in India; fascination and excitement about how exotic it all is, but also a dread of some of the smells and sights. Having been to the market a couple of times I began to see patterns emerging in comparison with our own fish and thanks to Rui, my guide, I soon began to feel perfectly at home there. What became clear to me was, that although the fish looked strange to me, it could be classified in the same sort of way as our own fish and, indeed, adapted to the same sort of dishes that appear in this book. I don’t think there is anywhere in the world that I could now go and not feel at ease in buying fish and cooking it in ways that I know.
It is always best to buy whole fish at the fishmongers where it can be filleted or skinned by an expert, and where you can get a good look at the quality of the fish before you buy. It is much easier to tell the freshness of fish from a whole fish than a ready filleted one. A whole fish is also fresher because once it has been filleted it tends to oxidize and will never taste as fresh again.
Anyone with a serious interest in fish will always find a dedicated fishmonger to supply them. I know that fishmongers have been closing in their dozens over the last few years but I don’t myself think that this is so much to do with a waning interest in fish as the fact that people are now buying fish from other sources, notably supermarkets, which have had a radical effect on the way we all shop. Supermarkets have been responsible for the demise of many small shops but no one can deny the extraordinary improvement in the supply of good-quality and wide-ranging food that they provide. I think that a dedicated fishmonger will survive. You only have to compare the enormous variety of fish and shellfish in a good fishmongers with what is still on offer at most supermarkets to see what I mean. Both types of outlet can exist side by side, on one hand, the convenient pre-packed supermarket product, on the other, the skilfully prepared, carefully chosen fish and shellfish of the fishmonger.
Apart from actually buying fish and shellfish you can always go and catch your own. It always seems to me extraordinary how little shellfish is gathered from the beaches which exist around our coastline. I’m an avid picker of shellfish from the beach and what could be more satisfying than going and collecting your food, coming home and cooking it, appealing, I guess, to some deep-rooted hunter-gatherer instinct?
I wrote, in my last book, that I find cleaning and filleting fish is a very relaxing pastime. It’s a job where my hands and brain are working in complete co-ordination because I’ve done it so often before. The feeling that I’m doing something right when I’m doing this job is one of the great pluses about being a cook; there’s something about working with my hands that makes one happy, optimistic and calm. I watched a Filipino fishmonger fillet a yellow-finned tuna in Sydney fish market once. I videoed it as well because it was so beautiful. He was like a surgeon, parting the flesh from the bone with such apparent ease that it looked like the simplest job in the world. I love to watch the filleting of large cod on the fish market in Plymouth, or the swishing off of sides of salmon in a salmon smokery with one sweep of a long-bladed, serrated knife, or watching fishermen at sea gutting flat fish. A single cut and a flick and all the guts are removed. All these things are so fascinating. At the restaurant, we never achieve the speed or perfection that these people do because they are doing one job all the time, whereas we have to do hundreds. Nevertheless, the preparation of fish in our kitchen is one of the most important parts of our jobs and all the chefs have to attain a pretty high level of skill to avoid wastage.
Domestic fridges are not ideally suited for storing fish, they are usually set at about 5°C and fish should be stored at about 0°C with plenty of ice to provide a moist atmosphere.
Despite this, I have found that it is possible to keep fish quite successfully in a domestic fridge if it’s only for a short time and if you follow this procedure. Put the fish in a shallow dish and wrap both the dish and fish in cling film. Then, dot cubes of ice around the top of the cling film and put the dish in the coldest part of the fridge.
Whole fish keep better than filleted fish which is why, at the restaurant, we always buy fish on the bone. Once a fish has been filleted the cut surface tends to oxidize and turn an unappetizing yellow colour. You can slow down this process by wrapping the fish as I’ve suggested, but the oxidizing and discolouring will still take place, albeit at a much slower pace.
It is not worth keeping fish for more than a couple of days. If you’re going to keep it any longer, you would probably do better to freeze it. Some fish freezes better than others, the firmer the flesh, the better it freezes. So Dover sole, turbot and monkfish freeze very well and bass, lemon sole and plaice freeze less well. If you are certain that the fish is very fresh and no more than a day or so old when you get it, then I can see nothing wrong with freezing it, as long as you use what you have frozen within a week or two. Ungutted fish freeze best of all as long as they’re perfectly fresh when you get them.
The problem with buying frozen fish is that you don’t know how long it’s been frozen for and over a period even fish stored at the lowest temperatures will deteriorate. This is particularly the case with oily fish like mackerel or herring. Something seems to happen to the oil in them, it turns slightly rancid even after a short period of freezing.
When defrosting fish, give it plenty of time to thaw. The best method is to put it in the fridge straight from the freezer.
If you buy fish ungutted it is essential to remove the guts as soon as soon as possible otherwise they will start to taint the flesh around the stomach. It is not a bad idea to remove the scales at the same time, even if you’re not going to eat the fish for a while. They’re much easier to get off while the fish is still moist. If you let the skin dry at all, the scales are very hard to get off.
TRIMMING
Snip off the fins with kitchen scissors. This is particularly important with spiky fish like bass. There is not a chef in my kitchen who has not caught his knuckle on the spines of a bass!
SCALING