Wherein Mr Ullman forgot to do his usual titchy Wherein Statement
I really love cod and halibut cheeks.
The problem is that they are
expensive -- $20+ a pound isn't unusual or outrageous. When I do cook them it is usually to impress someone. Since they are so expensive I use a tried and true recipe. I don't experiment here.
But I got lucky the other day. A fisherman who uses our software was
significantly grateful to give me a pound of halibut cheeks. I
decided to take a half pound and see what could be done. The other
half pound is being reserved to impress someone.
I bread and fry when I cook cheeks. I use a chickpea flour. So I
decided to use different flours and breading. Since I had them around
I used TVP, oat flour, masa harina (a corn flour used to make
tortillas), and cousous.
Putting aside the choice of flours, this is how I usually cook cheeks.
I put the fish on a cookie sheet and liberally salt both sides. Then
the cheeks are dredged through the flour making sure the cheeks are
will covered.
I cook some pasta-- usually Capellini ,Capelli d'angelo or Pillus.
Heat a cast iron skillet to high. Once the skillet heats up reduce to
medium and add enough oil to cover the bottom of the skillet. Cook
the cheeks for five minutes flipping as necessary.
Take a sweet onion and cut off two fairly thin slices. Take a mild
chard, I use green chard, remove the green leaf from the white stem.
Put the chard and onions into the blender and hit the chop button.
Put the veggies in a bowl with the pasta and toss.
At this point the fish should be cooked. Reduce heat to low. Squeeze
a half a lemon over the cheeks. Add the pasta to the skillet and
squeeze the other half of the lemon on the mix. Cover and let the
mixture warm for a couple of minutes.
So what conclusions did I come to? The oat flour was great, when I
cook the rest of the cheeks for a friend I am going to do a ½ oat
flour, ½ chickpea flour mix for the breading.
The masa harina was surprising tasty but needs a sauce of some sort.
If I were going to use the cheeks as an appetizer with a white sauce
dip I would consider using the masa harina again.
The couscous was fine but not worth repeating and the TVP (Textured
Vegetable Protein – a trademarked product that is clearly in need of a
skilled marketing professional) was pointless since it didn't adhere
to the fish well.
An update:
When I cooked the rest of the halibut cheeks for a friend I managed to screw up the pasta. Rummaging through her pantry I found some basmati rice, an aromatic rice from India. This turned out to be a winner. In fact, I plan to replace the pasta with basmati rice in my tried and true recipe.
Finally, a friend of mine has a blog about weight loss, exercise and related items. She interviewed me which was fun.
Just how big is a halibut cheek, anyway?
ReplyDelete