Posts Tagged: fish

Main / Recipe / Seafood / YouCook — View Comments
4
Apr 11

Turkish Grilled Fish Wrapped in Grape Leaves

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Fish grilled in grape leaves


We were inspired by a Binnur’s Turkish Cookbook to make Asma Yapraginda Sardalya. We found a jar of grape leaves at a local Persian supermarket and unfortunately couldn’t find fresh sardines so we opted for a fresh larger (mackerel sized) fish at the Korean supermarket. I’ve always been curious as to how to use grape leaf and have always loved Greek/Turkish/Persian dishes with grapeleaf so I was curious to see how it would do with seafood.

On further research, this dish is very popular in Greek cooking and called Psari Fournou me Ambelofia.

Summary


Preparation Time: 20 min
Cook Time: 20 min
Total Time: 40 min
Servings: 4 fish (serves 1-2)
Meal type: Main
Cost: $7.33

Ingredients


Fish on grape leaves

  • 4 sardines (or Whiting fish, in our case), $2
  • 8-10 pieces grape leaves, $5 for a jar 16oz jar; you’ll use about a tenth of the jar)
  • 1/2 cup olive oil
  • juice of 1 lemon, $0.33
  • to taste, salt
  • to taste, pepper

Instructions


Prepare the fish
1. Slice fish down the belly, reach in and discard guts from fish. If it has few scales on it, just run the knife over the skin to remove.
2. Pull out the backbone then wash with cold water and drain.
3. Rub the fish with olive oil and lemon juice, and season with salt and pepper.
The easy way to do this is the combine the olive oil, lemon juice, salt, and pepper in a bowl first, then use a spoon or brush to spread it onto the fish.
Olive oil and lemon juice marinade in a bowl
4. Put the marinating fish in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes in a shallow plate.
Fish in the refridgerator
Wrapping the fish
5. Rinse the grape leaves and cut off the stems
6. Lay down enough grape leaves to cover the length of the fish, matte side up (shiny side down). The difference between the matte and shiny side is minute, but the matte side is the side that the veins of the leaf are slightly raised.
7. Place the fish on the grape leaves, then roll it up nice and tight.
Fish on matte side of the grape leaf
Rolling up the fish in grape leaves
Fish rolled up in grape leaf
It’s okay if the ends of the leaves don’t entirely stick to the wrapped package, but if there is one that is sticking up too much for your liking, you can take some of the stems you cut off and poke them through to hold the leaves down.
Fish rolled up in grape leaf with stems holding leaf shut
8. Brush some olive oil all over the grape leaf.
9. Preheat the grill or oven to medium-high, or about 375F.
Grilling
10. Place the fish on the rack and grill for about 5 minutes each side.
Because we used a slightly bigger fish, ours took about 8 minutes per side. Juices will flow from the wrapped fish; when they start to dry and the grape leaf starts to dry, it is probably done.
Fish on grill, almost done
Inside of wrapped fish

Results

Fish served with bread and salad
Served the Turkish way, the fish should be presented with lemon wedges, radishes, and an arugula or green salad. We served the fish with a fresh salad tossed in a light oil-based vinaigrette dressing, and some delicious bread, also from the Persian grocery store. It made a great light meal that felt fresh and healthy. As we ate, we wondered what else we could possibly wrap in grape leaf that could be as yummy as this dish. We think that other more dense white fish like halibut or cod (without the bones) might go well with grapeleaf. What do you wrap in grape leaf?

 

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Seafood / Vietnamese — View Comments
6
Mar 11

Canh Chua Ca – Vietnamese Sour Fish Soup with Tamarind, Pineapple and Okra

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Rating: 3.3/5 (12 votes cast)


Canh Chua


This is my favourite comfort soup to make. It’s a healthy combination of so many vegetables (pineapple, tomatoes, okra, taro stem (bac ha) and bean sprouts. The classic fish in Vietnam to use is Cat Fish but I prefer to go with fresh fish that I find – this time I used a whole salmon coho. The best part of the fish for the soup is the head (and tail) so if you want to live on the cheap, pick up some fish head (sometimes obtained for free or dirt cheap). This is my family’s recipe for Salmon Fish Soup. Andrea Nguyen‘s Into the Vietnamese Kitchen is also a good reference for this recipe and more.

You can find this dish in more traditional Vietnamese restaurants (no guarantees that the fast food Pho places will have it). In Vancouver, I loved it at Phnom Penh. In the Bay Area, there were so many: Vung Tau, Khanh’s Restaurant, Anh Hong to name a few. In Toronto, well the best place to have Canh Chua would probably be at my parents home.

Summary


Preparation Time: 20 min Chopping and Tamarind prep
Cook Time: 20 min
Total Time: 40 min
Servings: 6 portions I made double the portion (12 people) in a big pot since we had a whole fish but will just refer to half here.
Meal type: Soup
Cost: $15

Ingredients

  • 1 lb salmon steaks (or catfish and any fish head/tails)
    ingredients
  • 4 oz tamarind pulp – this was my first time making tamarind concentrate from pulp+water but it is time consuming! Put about 4 tablespoons concentrate tamarind liquid
  • 6 cups water
  • 1 cup chunks of pineapple – frozen or fresh
  • 1/2 lb okra – de-stem and cut in halves
    ingredients
  • 3 stalks bac ha (taro stem)
    ingredients
  • 2 tomatoes cut into wedges
  • 1 cup bean sprouts
  • 2 sprigs culantro and Vietnamese rice paddy herb
    culantro
  • 2 sprigs cilantro
  • 1 medium cooking sliced onion
  • 1 1/2 teaspoon sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 3 tablespoon fish sauce – adjust with taste

Instructions


1. To make the tamarind concentrate from tamarind pulp, take a look at this recipe. You can make this in bulk and freeze in ice cube tray or just buy tamarind concentrate which is what I usually do.

2. To separate the pulp and seeds as the paste reduce, we used a french press since we didn’t have a course mesh sieve. We ended up having to put some of that pulp back to get more than a few drops of concentrate tamarind.
tamarind

3. In a pot, heat canola oil in medium heat and add onions until soft. There was a shortage in pots in the kitchen so we used a pan to cook the onion before pouring it into the pot.
tamarind

4. Add tamarind concentrate, sugar, fish sauce, salt and water and bring to a boil.
5. Lower heat to low and add fish heads, fish steaks and pineapple and simmer for 5-10 minutes.
soup
soup

6. The remaining vegetables only need about 2-3 minutes to cook so add this when ready to serve. Add the okra , tomatoes, bac ha.
soup
7. Add bean sprouts.
soup

8. Add chopped up sprigs of culantro, cilantro and rice paddy herbs.
soup
9. Take out the fish steaks onto a place and serve fish soup in a family style bowl.
soup

Results

Usually a Vietnamese dinner consists of jasmine rice and a few dishes, always finishing with a substantial soup. I’m a fan of just having this soup and rice as a complete meal since it’s so filling, delicious and healthy! Here’s how it could be served.
Fish Soup

 

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Rating: 3.3/5 (12 votes cast)

Cookbook / Indian / Seafood / Vikram Vij — View Comments
17
Feb 11

Black Cod with Vij’s Ginger Tomato Yogurt Broth

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Rating: 5.0/5 (1 vote cast)

black cod curry
For the inaugural first official YouCook night of 2011, I decided to make something from one of my favourite recipe books of all time (and one of the best restaurants I’ve ever been to): Vij’s. I had a craving for seafood and remembered the last time I was at Vij’s I had a halibut and spot prawn curry dish that was deliciously fresh and unforgettable. So flipping through the book I found a grilled sablefish in tomato-yogurt broth recipe.
black cod curry
On my trip to the grocery store, I saw a beautiful piece of Black Cod that was simply calling for me to buy it, and so I did. I didn’t exactly follow any steps in the recipe to prepare the fish but did stick to the broth as mentioned in the book. Instead of the tomato broth, I used Ming’s home-made tomato sauce. As for the grilled sablefish called for in the recipe, I marinated with a similar mix of spices but pan fried the black cod instead. To be honest, I made a whole bunch of mistakes not following the recipe, not marinating it for the 3-4 hours it called for (just 1-2 hours in my case) but it was seriously one of the most memorable meals I’ve had in a long time. The ginger, tomato, yogurt broth really complimented the fish like nothing I’ve ever tasted before. Really, everytime I eat at Vij’s or now cook from the cookbook, I fall in love with Vikram and Meeru all over again – they are really culinary geniuses when coming up with these recipes.

Summary

Preparation Time: 10 min for the fish before leaving it to marinate.
Servings: 3-4
Meal type: Main
Cost: ~$40.

Recipe Rating: ★★★★★ 

Ingredients for the fish

black cod curry

  • 2 lbs of black cod cut into 2 inch x 3 inch pieces ($30) – original recipe calls for 1lb 5 oz sablefish. Cutting them into chunks really helped reduce the cooking time and let the fish cook evenly.
    black cod curry
  • 1/2 cup canola oil
  • 1/4 teaspoon of ground cayenne pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon of salt – I find usually reduce a lot of Vij’s recipe for salt, so its up to your tastes
  • 1/2 teaspoon of paprika
  • 1/2 teaspoon of garam masala – I used just a bulk brand of this. Actually, the recipe didn’t call for this in the fish but I screwed up while reading the curry instructions and added the garam masala anyways.

Instructions for fish

I’m going to stick to what I did with the black cod, if you’re curious about how to prepare sablefish, you should buy the elegant and inspired Vij’s book.
1. Mix oil, cayenne, salt and patrika in a mixing bowl.
black cod curry
2. Add the fish and mix well, making sure the black cod is well covered in the marinade.
black cod curry
Actually, I ended up cutting the fish into pieces after marinating because it took me a while to accept that I was going to cut up that perfect looking piece of black cod.
black cod curry
3. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap an refrigerate for 3-4 hours. I did it for an hour and feel that like was sufficient to bring out the flavours.
4. I went on to making the tomato-yogurt broth while waiting.
5. Lightly coat the black cod in flour.
(Keeping in mind that this is still winter with no access to a BBQ, pan frying was the next best thing. )
black cod curry
6. I put a pan and oil on medium heat. When it’s hot, add the pieces of fish.
black cod curry
I split it up into 3 rounds of fish so that I could pay attention to their cooking time. It doesn’t take too long to cook, you can tell when the fish is done when you press into it with a fork and it flakes off easily.
black cod curry
The texture changes from slimy/squishy into flakey. You also don’t want to over cook it.
black cod curry
7. As soon as it’s ready, cover with sauce and serve with basmati rice. I didn’t get a chance to get naan but that would taste delicious too.
black cod curry

Ingredients for the curry

  • 1 cup plain yogurt, stirred (4% milkfat is recommended, I could only find 3%) ($3)
  • 1 1/2 tablespoon of garam masala
  • 1/2 tablespoon of salt – again I can’t let myself put that much salt
  • 2 teaspoon of paprika
  • 1/2 teaspoon of ground cayenne pepper
  • 1/4 cup canola oil
  • 2 1/2 tablespoon of chopped garlic – this was one whole garlic
  • 3 tablespoon of finely chopped ginger
  • 2 1/2 cups of tomato broth – we used 3/4 jar of home bottled tomato sauce

Instructions for the curry

1. Mix yogurt, garam masala, salt, paprika and cayenne in a bowl.
black cod curry
2. Chop garlic and ginger.
black cod curry
Oh and here’s a trick I learned from Youtube of how to peel the ginger skin – just use a metal spoon and scrape off the ginger skin, it comes off easily.
black cod curry
3. In a pot, heat oil on medium heat and saute garlic until golden brown.
black cod curry
4. Add ginger and saute for 1 more minute.
5. Add tomato broth and then yogurt mixture. Here’s where I think I screwed up because some of the yogurt curdled.
black cod curry
If you have any tips on how not to let this happen let me know. Mix well is my only advice.
6. Stir well and reduce the heat to low. Simmer for 10 minutes.
black cod curry
7. Serve this with the fish!

Results

black cod curry
What really makes this dish was the fresh black cod in addition to the simple combo of spices. I’m very glad about the decision to pan fry the fish as it added another element (crispiness) that you wouldn’t get when grilling. The ginger, tomato, yogurt really worked well with the fish and it was definitely a hit – we all fought over the last pieces! Add some wine, basmati rice and really it was an enjoyable meal that I’d make again.

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Rating: 5.0/5 (1 vote cast)

Brazilian / Main / Restaurant / Seafood — View Comments
20
Dec 09

Caju Moqueca Stew – Actual Restaurant Recipe

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Rating: 5.0/5 (1 vote cast)


A few weeks ago, I ate at Caju, a Brazilian restaurant on Queen St W. I tried to make it on my own since I didn’t have the recipe yet (see post Moqueca Fish Stew with Rice), but Chef Mario Cassini emailed me the recipe about a week or two later, so I decided to make it again to see how this compares with the one I made before. So this post is the ACTUAL bona-fide Caju restaurant recipe, from Chef Mario Cassini himself. The description that accompanies the recipe is: “A traditional fish stew from Bahia, the northeast region of Brazil. The dish was originally made by the Native Indians and has African influence.” Chef Mario Cassini has taken the traditional Bahia recipe and added his unique modern spin to it for the non-Brazilian community. I had the chance to interview him and get some tips from him. You can read that interview here in a separate post (A Talk with Caju’s Chef and Owner Mario Cassini). The key things I took from that talk for this recipe is to be careful to not overcook the fish and use fresh cilantro. Thanks Chef Mario Cassini for taking the time to talk to me and for providing your recipe for our readers!

Summary

Preparation Time: 30 min
Cook Time: 15 min
Servings: 4
Meal type: Dinner
Grocery Cost: $ 7.20 ($1.80 per person)

Recipe Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Ingredients

  • 1 lb white fish cut in 2 inch pieces ~ $4.24
    I used a package of frozen perch fillets.
  • ½ cup coconut milk ~ $0.25
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons lime juice
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • ½ diced onion ~ $0.13
  • 1 of each – chopped green and red bell peppers ~$1.40
    I used a yellow bell pepper instead of green since that’s what I had in my fridge
  • 1 tsp minced garlic
  • 1 tablespoon chopped ginger ~ $0.14
  • Chopped cilantro ~ $0.17
    I couldn’t find fresh cilantro so I substituted parsley instead.
  • 1 tablespoon tomato paste ~ $0.17
  • 1 cup diced tomatoes with broth ~ $0.50
  • 1 teaspoon hot pepper sauce ~ $0.20
    I used 2 hot chili peppers finely chopped instead.
  • ½ cup fish stock
    I used chicken stock instead.

Instructions

1. Add lime juice, pinch of salt and a sprinkle of cilantro to the fish and let it marinate while preparing the sauce.
Step 1
2. Heat the olive oil in a pot and add the diced onion, bell peppers, garlic and ginger. Sauté the ingredients until they become soft.
Step 2
3. Stir in tomato paste, diced tomatoes with broth and fish stock and simmer for about 1 minute on medium heat.
Step 3
4. Stir in the coconut milk, hot pepper sauce, cilantro, salt to taste and the pieces of marinated fish fillet and simmer for approximately 8-10 minutes.
Step 4
5. Serve with white rice.

Quick Notes

I made a few substitutions in terms of ingredients as you see in the ingredient list above, mainly because I couldn’t find the specified ingredients in my local grocery store.

Variations

This stew is simply a base. Chef Mario Cassini encourages you to take this recipe and do variations on it. Besides fish, you can put any other type of seafood in it, such as shrimp, calamari and mussels. If using fish, he recommends using fish that is a few inches thick and sticks together (not too flaky). Good types of white fish he recommends include: halibut (which is what Caju uses), monkfish and grouper.

Results

Caju's Moqueca
I was very pleased with the results! I thought this turned out very close to what I remembered having at Caju, and I could really taste the ginger in this recipe, without the distraction from the sesame oil I mistakenly used in my previous attempt. I ate it this time with jasmine rice instead of basmati rice and I think it tastes just as good with jasmine rice. I think my Moqueca turned out a bit thick and I would’ve have preferred more sauce. The restaurant version also seemed more watery, so I may add more coconut milk next time. The last thing I noticed is that the Moqueca I made was spicier than the restaurant version – probably due to my using fresh hot peppers rather than hot sauce, but I liked it. Again, a very simple stew that’s tasty and economical! This has earned a spot into my regular dinner rotation!

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Rating: 5.0/5 (1 vote cast)

Main / Restaurant — View Comments
2
Dec 09

Moqueca Fish Stew with Rice

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Rating: 0.0/5 (0 votes cast)

Cajus Moqueca dish

On Friday, I went with my boyfriend to try out Caju, a Brazilian restaurant located on Queen St W in Toronto (http://www.caju.ca/). We haven’t really had Brazilian food except all you can eat Brazilian steakhouse (Churrascaria).  Our one Brazilian friend had also recommended it, so we were excited to try it. I had the Moqueca with fish, and it was good! Here’s the description from the restaurant website: “a traditional Bahia stew of fish and shrimp in a tomato and coconut milk broth, spiced with Malagueta peppers and ginger”. Mmm! I couldn’t wait to cook it!

I told our waitress at Caju that I really enjoyed the dish and I wanted to know how to cook it myself. She went and asked the cook for me to write it down for me. She came back a few minutes later, and told me that the cook was too busy at the moment, but if I emailed him, he would send it to me. Boo! I emailed early Saturday morning, but I never got a response, so I had to search for it myself.

I searched online for a bit, and found that Moqueca Fish stew is a pretty standard, traditional Bahia stew, so there were plenty of listings for it. I picked a basic, traditional recipe. However, the recipe I picked didn’t have ginger, nor very exact measurements, so I had to do some substitutions and make some executive decisions. See my modified recipe below, based on the following one: http://brazilian-food.suite101.com/article.cfm/moqueca_fish_stew

Summary

Preparation time (duration): 25 minutes
Cooking time (duration): 20 minutes
Number of servings: 4
Meal type: Dinner
Grocery cost: $12. 99 total ($ 3.25 per person)

Food Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Ingredients

Ingredients

  • 1 kg of fish (I used haddock)  ~ $6.99
  • 8 tiger shrimps, peeled and devined ~ $1.00
  • Juice of 1 lemon ~ $0.50
  • Salt
  • 4 Pimenta Malegueta (hot red chilis) finely chopped
  • 1 spring onion, finely chopped ~ $0.10
  • 1 bunch of Cilantro, finely chopped – $0.10
  • 6 Italian canned plum tomatoes, finely chopped ~ $1.99
  • 1 red onion, finely chopped ~ $ 0.12 ($1.52 / kg)
  • 1 red pepper, finely chopped ~ $0.50
  • 1 tablespoon ginger, finely chopped
  • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 can (400 mL) of coconut milk ~$1.19
  • Dende oil (palm oil)
  • Basmati rice ~ $0.50

Instructions

1.Make the basmati rice in a rice cooker.
2.Finely chop the cilantro, parsley, spring onions, tomatoes and chillis. Set aside.
Chopped herbs
3.Chop garlic, add salt, and continue chopping, until a paste forms (use a mortar and pestle if that’s easier). Add ginger and herbs to this.
4.Prepare fillets on a separate plastic chopping board to avoid cross-contamination.
5.Heat a large pot, over a low/medium flame.
6.Add mixed herbs, chillis, garlic and tomatoes.
Mixing the herbs in the pan
7.As soon as you start to smell the perfume from the herbs filling the kitchen, add a splash of olive oil.
8.Clean fish, descale and rinse thoroughly. Pat dry with a paper towel. Squeeze fresh lemon juice over the fish, season with salt, and carefully place over the herbs.
9.Add coconut milk, and dende oil.
10.Pop on the lid, and leave until cooked.
Stewing the fish after adding the coconut milk
11.When the flesh starts to leave the bone you know it’s ready. About 15-20 minutes.
12.Serve with basmati rice.

Quick Notes

I used sesame oil instead of dende oil – not a good idea! If you need to substitute, try a milder-tasting oil, such as peanut oil. To compensate for the sesame oil taste, I added an extra tomato and 2 chili peppers to the broth half way.

Variations

This stew can be used with other types of white fish (i.e. mahi mahi, grouper, etc) and shrimp.

Result

My version of Cajus Moqueca Fish Stew

The result was a mild, slightly spicy stew. My friends that ate with me said it reminded them of a Thai curry. The dominant taste was coconut milk. Overall, I thought this was a simple stew where I could make with most of the ingredients on hand already. The only thing we needed to shop for was haddock and cilantro. We looked for dende oil, but we couldn’t find it in our local market, with is the reason for the sesame oil substitution. I think I would make this again! Especially when looking at the grocery cost of about $3.25 a person, with most of the ingredients ones we already had on hand, this is a tasty and cheap meal!

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