Things wot I Made Then Ate: catfish

Showing posts with label catfish. Show all posts

Catfish, fried broccoli, avocado salsa cruda

Generously seasoned with salt/pepper, Dixon red chile powder. Fried in butter steamed in white wine.

Broccoli fried in butter, steamed in white wine.

Catfish and grits

Cornmeal mush, if you like. Polenta, if you must. And my milled corn is better than your milled corn because I milled mine myself! That's right, it's popcorn. So it has not been treated with lye, and it's retained its pericarp, its endosperm, its germ, all of its starch, oil, protein and fiber.

It smelled magical too when I milled it and that tells me something ... 'bout something.

I'm going to throw out this bottle of truffle oil. It's gross. That was the worst thing about this. It nearly ruined the whole thing. I kept picking up an unpleasant stale taste/aroma. But then I'm going to go right out there and get another bottle to make up for the loss -- to recompense the sacrifice to great taste, which come to think of it is no sacrifice at all then innit.

Other than that, this could not have been easier. Bacon cooked first and removed to a plate. The catfish fried in the same pan. The catfish was frozen. Chopped, seasoned, and fried while still frozen. Fried in the fat left over from bacon, enhanced with olive oil and butter, garlic and seasonings.

The cornmeal, for a small amount, in another pot:

1 cup water
1 cup milk
1/2 cup corn meal
S/P
1 oz grated Parmigiano or some other cheese added to finish off the heat.

Obviously, double all that for more. Could be enough for 4 people, or two if you're pigs like me. Or six if it's intended for a side dish.

Bring the liquid to a boil and whisk while slowly pouring in the cornmeal so that it does not clump. It tends to thicken dramatically as soon as it boils.

I added Thai curry to both the cornmeal and the catfish before cooking. That was an impulse.

Catfish,hushpuppies

These catfish pieces were in the freezer for-eh-ver. They had ice crystals stuck all over 'em. They looked bad, real bad, real real bad, I'm tellin'n ya, they were so bad even my cat looked at me with a clear expression of disgust. I don't even own a cat, it showed up just to show disgust.

So I can't believe how good they turned out. This gives me hope for the future of ice-frosty fish.

* A/P flour into a bowl

* equal amount of corn meal into the same bowl

* S/P/cayenne into the bowl

* 1 egg into another bowl

* equal amount of milk with the egg.

* mix

* dredge

* drench

* re-dredge

Hot oil 350℉ / 175℃ until a light golden brown. More of a dark golden rod brown. No wait, a sienna brown. No, wait, wait, wait, a saddle brown, that's it, a saddle brown. Definitely a saddle brown. Maybe a cocoa brown. Okay, forget about the color, just cook 'em 'til they're done.

Steamed seafood breakfast with vegetables

Since you have already proven you can fry bacon to perfect crispiness along with two eggs without breaking them over easy so that the whites are cooked perfectly, neither runny nor rubbery, while keeping the yolk penetrable by a toast corner, and do that while coordinating in other devices toast with butter and jam along with a pot of coffee and all that goes with coffee if it isn't plain black, like sugar and cream and vanilla or almond, cinnamon, what have you, and include with all that a huge pile of hash browned potatoes that dwarfs the plate or a bowl of grits or a side of polenta, mush, whatever, then you've already demonstrated technique superior to the technique needed here to steam up some seafood bits for a few minutes along with some vegetables and to use the steaming liquid to create a memorable sauce.

What? You don't do those things? Well, never mind then. Carry on.

It amounts to a slight difference in technique not mastery, an easing of technique, in fact, and an adjustment on attitude toward breakfast. And by breakfast, I mean that first meal whenever it occurs, in this case noon. Ha ha ha ha ha. Hey, it's Saturday.

Oh damnit. I forgot the saffron and the diced tomato I intended. Oh well, some other time.

I live in the center of the country with nary a seashore within 1,000 miles so all my seafood is frozen, or at least very cold. I used what I had which turns out to be my favorite things -- because what? -- would I buy things I don't like?

My steaming liquid included remnant white wine, onion, garlic, butter, and the shells and tails of the shrimp. There's a lot of flavor locked up in those carapace covers and it's a shame when it's wasted.

A mayonnaise was made just for this. That was the fun part. Three egg yolks into a jar along with the juice of one lime and a tablespoon of Dijon. Just for fun, I included a tablespoon of horseradish that I processed myself from a root a long time ago along with powdered ginger and powdered garlic, then used the immersion blender to incorporate 3/4 cup vegetable oil, slowly at first then more quickly as it went along. Salt and pepper.

For some strange reason unknown to modern science olive oil turns bitter when it's whipped. It can be worked in later, but it must be accompanied by a milder oil to prevent that from happening, or even butter could be used, clarified or not, but then you've set off into a whole 'nuther realm of other sauces beyond mayonnaise with their own official names. But it shows you pretty much anything goes.

Like a stir fry, except this is steamed, one small red diced potato first into the steaming pot, then carrot cut into discs, then finally the seafood. I had:

* salmon
* catfish chunks
* shrimp
* scallops
* oysters that were not frozen, the kind that come in a jar. A tub really, with a metal pull top. They're sort of gross, actually, without their shells.

All of that released more liquid than I was expecting which foamed up through the steamer and caused the items to boil as much as to steam. [Note to self: don't let that happen again.]

After all that stuff steamed, approximately 5 minutes:

Six tablespoons of the flavored mayonnaise was put into separate bowl. 3/4 cup of the steaming liquid was strained and whisked into the mayonnaise and then returned to the pot and whisked over moderate heat checking the temperature carefully not to exceed 180℉ / 82℃ and careful the whisk reached into the edges of the pot and careful to prevent the egg from setting. It thickened visibly while whisking. I kept lifting the pot off the heat to avoid scorching and boiling and checked the temperature throughout with an instant-read thermometer, a good one too, not one of those crap pocket thermometers. (at one time I had 5 pocket thermometers that all gave different readings.) All that took about 2.5 -- 3 minutes.

These pictures were taken in the moments between that up there ↑ going on.

Tempura catfish and butternut squash

The deep-fried flavors of tempura are enhanced with dipping sauce. Prepare that first and get it out of the way before proceeding.

The typical sauce, like this one, is made from a standard dashi base. 50% of the liquid is this most common of all fish soup bases made from kombu, a large flat dried kelp, that can make it's own standalone seafood broth, sort of like kelp tea, in combination with bonito flakes, which are a dried type of skipjack tuna that has been sliced super thinly, shaved actually, with a razor sharp mandolin tool, into nearly transparent flakes that virtually melt within the kombu broth. Handfuls of these airy dried fish flakes are dumped into the kombu tea-broth, soaked for about 10 minutes then strained out. Sometimes, the exhausted flakes are left in. They don't hurt anything. However, you don't have to mess with kombu or with bonito for your kombu bonito dashi. Bonito dashi is marketed in various ways, as you can imagine, much like Lipton's soup in individual packages. This dashi here was made the copout way using one of those packages. I had 1/2 package sitting in there with the regular kombu and bonito flakes and thought, "Eh, why not?" It turned out stronger than what I was aiming for so I diluted the finished soup.

For the tempura sauce, add 25% soy sauce and 25% mirin, which is a sweet rice wine. Test it. If you don't care for the flavor, adjust with more mirin or consider adding a little sugar, say, 1/8 teaspoon, or maybe honey. I suppose you could also substitute fish sauce for the dashi, which is basically an anchovy concoction. There you go, anchovies and water, if nothing else.

But you don't have to settle for just one dipping sauce. Here's where you can really impress a date. Make two or three different sauces with various flavor profiles. Just throw them together in small amounts and set aside in an arrangement of bowls. Powdered mustard in one, fish sauce in another, wasabi in another, water down a Hoisin sauce then adjust the flavor, with grated ginger, Sriracha, garlic, those sorts of things. Pretend you know what you're doing. Allow your date to taste and to suggest adjustments, drag her into it, allow them to feel useful and creative while learning something.

Kombu = kelp
Bonito = katsuobushi = skipjack tuna
dashi = soup
Sriracha = popular Asian red chile sauce

The purpose of this tempura was to feature butternut squash. It's very good in tempura form, as is sweet potato, but they must be cooked first otherwise they will not have enough time in the oil to finish. A few minutes in the microwave with a little water was sufficient to soften them for tempura. I also steamed the green beans while I was at it. The rest of the ingredients were just things I had on hand, onion, mushrooms, catfish works particularly well, and shrimp.

The batter can be prepared any number of ways, but it must be cold. Today I decided to use beer because I was in the mood to finish the bottle. This ale worked especially well. If I hadn't used beer, then lighten the batter by including a trace amount of baking powder along with whatever combination of flours you use. I like to use a combination of milled flours; rice flour, corn starch, regular wheat flour, all three at once. Any one can be used alone, results vary. The tempura ingredients are coated first with dry flour before being dipped into the batter made with the same flour mixture. This helps the batter adhere. So, you can mix together the dry ingredients in one bowl, then divide that between two bowls and add a whipped egg and additional cold liquid to one of the bowls to form a thin batter. Thin batter is better. Glumpy thick batter is uncool for tempura. I like to flick off most of the batter before dipping it into the hot oil.

* egg whipped

* beer, soda/tonic water, cold tap water

* rice flour
* corn starch
* wheat flour
* salt
* baking powder in tiny amount if not using beer or soda/tonic water
* any dry flavoring that strikes your fancy, or not.

If you ever watch a Japanese cook prepare tempura, you'll notice they don't actually deep fry them, rather, they shallow fry tempura in a wide low cast-iron pan. After adding the battered ingredients the cook stands there and drips more batter directly into the oil onto the edges of the frying ingredients which are floating creating artistically bizarre elaborated leg-like designs of extra fried batter onto the original coated piece that looks like splatters. I do not do that. Tempura is messy enough without all that extra glopping batter added to the disaster already occurring in the kitchen. I'm too much a klutz as it is, and this makes an even greater mess of the oil, and so the oil must be continuously skimmed and raked between batches. But I tell you what, do this with a friend for fun in the kitchen and you'll change their lives permanently with a whole new understanding of how these apparently magical culinary exploits are pulled off, and it will affect their understanding of all fried foods thereafter.

Oil at 350℉. I use a instant-read thermometer to keep it dead on, but that's probably not necessary. You can test with drops of batter. I also turn the handle of the pot inward because I'm just too clumsy to have handles sticking out from pots with hot oil. I also never fill the pot more than 1/2 full of oil. See? This is one idiot that manages to learn from mistakes.

Conclusion: Butternut squash is superb as a tempura ingredient. I should have used more.

Catfish in miso

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I really wanted pad Thai because I just now saw a Bobby Flay pad Thai throw-down and that put me in the mood but I don't have any rice noodles and I don't have any more tamarind paste, nor any shrimp so there goes that. But I can approximate the idea using ingredients that I do have, so there I go.

I do have miso in quantity and tofu, two extraordinary Asian contributions to world cuisine. I also have mirin (sweet rice wine) and fish sauce (fermented anchovy in water) so I'm set. I also happen to have napa cabbage which can substitute good vegetable carbs for bad noodles carbs, and chunky peanut butter that can substitute for peanuts in pad Thai.

I added onion, garlic, and broccoli.

These ingredients were built up in a pot starting with frozen catfish. I got that going then added all the rest of the ingredients with broccoli next. If you were to watch me do this, you'd think I'm insane, but there is method to the madness. It's like a liquid stir-fry. You begin with the ingredients that take the longest, catfish in this case because it's frozen. Ordinarily it would be last because fish is most tender. The frozen fish will be cooked at the same time the dense broccoli will be cooked so I do not add all the water at once. I fry these ingredients in scant oil to get them started, then add a small amount of water to stop the frying and start the steaming which hastens the process. Everything else goes into the pot in rapid succession. It doesn't look like soup until the miso is added and the color changes. The peanut butter, an odd ingredient, adds another dimension usually missing in miso soup but it is nearly identical to the way miso mixes. The soup is delicious, but it lacked peppery heat and acidity, so I added Sriracha, which has both, at the table.

Fish tacos

Handmade corn tortillas. That went surprisingly fast.

Frozen catfish bits diced and added to sautéed mixture frozen.

Mixture:

* diced onion

* two smashed and minced garlic cloves

* olive oil

* seasoned with:

a) ground coriander

b) ground cumin

c) habanero flakes

d) diced jalapeño

e) S/P

f) oregano

Catfish with broccoli and pecans

Catfish drenched and dredged, with steamed broccoli and pecans. Topped with a simple roux velouté sauce made with frozen chicken broth cubes and the drench milk used for the fish, along with more of the same seasoning added to the dredge. Wouldn't do to waste now, would it? Plus some kind of little piece of cheese, I have no idea what it was, the label is gone, whatever it was, it's good. The seasoning was some kind of brown powder in a circular tin from Spice Boys marked simply HOT. It's not.

Catfish hushpupies

Made with real cats! Catfish, that is.

When we first moved to the South (she shall r-i-i-i-i-i-s-e again) my dad hooked up with the Shreveport Masons. Maybe it was Bossier City masons. The only Masonic lodge I've ever seen made of wood. Go figure. They hosted a catfish and hushpuppy dinner. It was fun. My introduction to both catfish and to hushpuppies, and it was love at first sight. Incidentally, to get there we had to pass vast fields of cotton, and that was fascinating too. It was like popcorn on scraggly sticks.

No recipe here, I just threw my favorite things into a bowl. I used 1/4 of a large onion because that's all I had left. Three scrawny limp stalks of celery, the end of a large package of three or four whole things of celery bushes or whatever they're called. One orange bell pepper. That was the most of the vegetables. I added adobe chile powder, and the last of a package of Vindaloo curry. I have a whole 'nuther jar but that was the last of the little bag. S/P and one egg. I used masa herena which made it smell all Mexicany and fantastic, not a normal ingredient, corn meal, and flour for adhesion, plus a little baking powder to lighten the mixture. Should have used more of that. They could have been more moist too. I still have some of this mixture left so I might fix it. That's all.

Hot vegetable oil for no more than a few minutes.

Sriracha sauce is the red stuff in the little bowl, and weeeee doggie, it that stuff hot. I should have mixed it with catsup but I was too lazy.

Catfish filet with green salad

Dressing:

* olive oil
* rice vinegar
* raspberry preserves
* Dijon style mustard
* prepared horseradish
* salt/pepper

Salad:

* romaine
* tomato
* home-made ricotta cheese
* capers

Catfish coating

* flour
* anjo chili powder
* garlic powder
* salt/pepper

Coating to batter

* milk
* whey

Dressing for catfish

* home-made ginger/garlic mayonnaise

The catfish is cut into bite-size bits following the lines of the filet, dredged in the dry flour mixture to help the batter adhere, then milk + whey is added to the flour mixture to suitable thinness and the powdered catfish bits are drenched in the batter. The batter can be lightened with a touch of baking powder but I didn't feel like it tonight.

Catfish filet with fruit salad

Catfish filet patted dry, dredged in whole wheat flour, drenched in whey, dredged in Panko (Japanese breadcrumbs). Hastened with a steam of water and lime which was reserve liquid from pulling ceviche out from a jar. It was a chubby little filet and I didn't have all day to stand around waiting for eight minutes while the bulging center cooked.