Chowder

While at the fishmongers last Saturday, I also picked up a nice-sized sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). I hadn’t really thought about what to do with it exactly, but the fish looked good, and it is definitely one of my favourite saltwater species. When home, I grabbed my two favourite fish cookbooks, ‘Werken met vis’ (‘Using fish’) by Ruud van Olphen, and ‘The Catch’ by Ben Sargent, and started to browse. I decided to do the Striped bass chowder as presented by Sargent, but had to substitute a number of ingredients – so I think it turned out to be quite a different dish. But regardless, it was excellent! I used traditional, home-made pesto (you know, basil, parmesan, pine nuts, garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper) instead of the broccoli rabe, onions, Brussels sprouts and celery instead of the leeks, pimenton de la vera instead of cayenne, chicken stock instead of fish or clam stock, and added sage and tarragon. Anyway, here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

Pesto
1 plantje basilicum
1 handje pijnboompitten, geroosterd
2 tenen knoflook
50 g Parmesaanse kaas, geraspt
olijfolie, 1ste kwaliteit
zout en peper

Chowder
2 tablespoons olijfolie
1 ui, kleine
15 stuks spruitjes, in achten gesnede
2 stengels bleekselderij, kleingesneden
1 mespunt pimenton de la vera
1 blik italiaanse tomaten, (Heinz)
3 aardappels, lekkere (Opperdoezer, Eigenheimers, etc)
1 potje kippenbouillon, of visbouillon
1 potje water, (bouillonpot)
100 ml slagroom
tijm
salie
dragon
peper
madeira
zeebaars, geschubd, gefileerd en in stukken gesneden

Directions:

1. Pesto Standard SOP.        .

2. To prepare the chowder In a large pot, heat the olive oil. Add the onions, Brussels sprouts and celery, in that order, and cook over medium-low heat, stirring a few times, until softened, about 7 minutes. Add the pimenton and cook for about 20 seconds. Add the tomatoes, potatoes, stock, water, and herbs and spices and bring to a boil. Partially cover and simmer over medium-low heat until the potatoes are tender, about 10 minutes. Add the madeira, cream and bass and simmer until the fish is just cooked, about 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and serve with sourdough pancakes and pesto. The pesto goes in the soup as well as on the pancakes.

Smoked Mackerel

Today is a good day for smoked mackerel. Yesterday, while at the fishmongers, I just couldn’t resist buying two fresh mackerels – I just know how good they are going to be once smoked. But there was no time yesterday to even think about smoking them, what with all the paperwork resulting from a mindless dork ramming his jalopy into the side of my Mini, and the annual family dinner to celebrate my father’s (83rd) birthday. So I just brined them an put the submerged fish in the fridge. Today, there’s barely a whiff of wind, the sun is out, and the temperature is around 6°C, so I decided to fire up the smoker and make some delicious, honest-to-goodness smoked mackerel.

A couple of hours later, I have two beautifully smoked fish. Ready to be pulled for making rillette. The bones and heads go, as usual, in a bowl in the backyard, to feed the wildlife (which then gets filmed courtesy of our infrared wildlife camera…); the rillette goes in the freezer, ready to spruce up any meal that I feel will benefit from it.