|
|
Notes
on Fish |
Rule
of thumb
on cooking fish: 10 - 12 minutes per inch of thickness. Just a rule
of thumb. It always depends on the method and temperature. It should
lose the “transparency” in the thickest part.
Grilling or broiling:
Thick even cuts work best. Meaty fish like, salmon, tuna, mahi mahi
work well and are big enough to cut as steaks. Use butter or oil
to coat the meat as it is cooking. Exception to the timing would
be tuna, as it really loses its character if cooked all the way.
So if you want it rare, use a really hot fire very briefly.
Frying:
Trout and catfish fried with salt and pepper and dredged in flour
can be pan fried in oil. If cooked whole, it takes longer so don’t
use butter. It burns at relatively low temperatures. Good with Tartar
Sauce.
Sole, halibut and flounder fillets are delicate and need to cook
fast or they will fall apart– 5 to 8 minutes, again depending
on the thickness. I use high heat and clarified butter. (See “Miscellaneous”)
Use salt, pepper and flour. It is nice to add lemon juice, butter
and chopped parsley to the pan after the fish are removed, to make
a Meuniére sauce. Almandine is with sliced almonds toasted
in the butter, skip the parsley in this case.
Baked:
Almost any fish is fine baked in foil with seasoning and thin sliced
veggies. Bake at 375º. 12 to 15 minutes again –just guessing.
Poached:
Use cheesecloth to lower a large whole fish into a pan with 1 -
2 inches of water or court bouillon. I’ve only done this with
salmon and I never remember to measure the pan first, or the fish
monger never has a small enough salmon. So I always have to cut
off the head, tail or both. The idea is to serve a whole, hot or
chilled unblemished salmon for a party dish.
I always poke it too much to see if it is done. Anyway, the court
bouillon is an aromatic broth, made with water to which you add
a fair amount of white wine, some herbs, parsley, bay leaf, peppercorns,
chopped carrot, onion and celery.
Serve salmon with hollandaise
if hot, cold dill
sauce if cold.
Safety issues: Use fish right away or freeze it. It is OK to sniff
before buying. This is normal customer behavior. It should have
virtually no odor, or maybe smell of the ocean. Not “fishy”.
Eyes on whole fish should be clear.
Always rinse and dry fish and leave it at room temperature for a
few minutes and sniff for freshness. Sometimes there is a small
amount of surface bacteria, so rinsing and drying will remove this.
If in doubt, return it. They will take it back even if you’re
wrong, unless you’ve had it lying around for a week.
Wash up carefully, just as with chicken.
Shellfish:
Clams should be tighly closed. If they are slighly open, banging
them together will induce them to close. If they don't, discard.
This is also how to detect "mudders". (empty clam shells
which have filled with mud) they make a differnt sound when clicked
together. Same rules apply for oysters and mussels. Mussels need
to have "beards" removed before steaming. When cooking
shellfish, brief is best. They get tough when overcooked. Watch
for shells to open in the pot and then take off heat.
-Kate
|
|
|