Fish and Chips on a Tuesday night in the middle of our Kitchen in Somerville
Anyone think Tuesday’s are worse than Monday’s? It’s not the first day of the week – it’s not the last – it’s not half-way through or the day before friday – it just is. But I gotta say, this Tuesday night’s dinner made up for the nothing that is Tuesday.
When we went to New Zealand for our honeymoon, we ate a LOT of fish and chips – mostly from these tiny hole in the wall places where there was no room to sit – you basically went in, picked your fish, waited for it and then left. They wrapped it in the white paper like the ‘real’ fish places do and it was the most delicious fish and well seasoned chips we had both ever had.
Fish and Chips in the middle of a vineyard in Marlborough, New Zealand
And tonight, shockingly enough, it was like taking a time machine back to kiwi land with this amazing beer battered fish recipe from The Culinary Chronicles posted by Cooking for Carnivores. This batter was absolutely amazing – light and crisp, fried perfectly, like something out of Bon Appetit! And the best part – it was SO easy – I can’t even tell you. The hardest part was getting the skin off the haddock (mainly because we have sucky knives :() We paired it with some green beans and Alexia Sea Salt fries and man, let me tell you, we were in heaven – on a Tuesday night – now how often does that happen?If you love a delicious piece of fried fish that doesn’t taste greasy and heavy, you have GOT to try this – we were so impressed with it!
Beer Battered Haddock
INGREDIENTS
2 pieces of fresh haddock (preferably w/ skin off, unless you’re up for a challenge :))
3/4 cups of flour
1/4 cup of cornstarch
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/4 tsp paprika
1 tsp of kosher salt
1 tsp of baking powder
1/3 cup of lager beer (we used an IPA)
Salt and Pepper to taste
vegetable oil
1) Place enough vegetable oil in cast iron skillet til 1/2 inch high. Heat on medium
2) Combine all the dry ingredients except the salt and baking powder in a large mixing bowl. Pour 1/3 of this dry mixture in a separate mixing bowl and set aside.
3) Add the baking powder and beer to the 1/3 of the dry mixture the other bowl and combine to form the ‘wet’ batter.
And of course test the beer first – just incase 🙂
4) Pat fish dry and season with salt and pepper. Remove skin if necessary.
I would not recommend de-skinning with a bread knife!
5) Coat fish in dry mix (large bowl) first, then in wet batter (small bowl), then again in dry mix.
6) Place fish in hot oil and cook for 2-3 minutes until crust is golden – then turn over and cook 2-3 minutes on other side.
7) Remove and drain on a plate lined with paper towels.
Long John Silver’s got nothin’ on this fish
And there you have it folks – quite possibly one of the most delicious things that has ever come from this kitchen! We spent the rest of the night trying to figure out how many other things we could dip in this heavenly batter – onion rings, scallops, shrimp, clams, paper clips, kitchen spoons – pretty sure it would make just about anything taste amazing.
Hopefully this will bring you back to a fun fish and chip memory of your own!