Prawn Rougaille

Mauritius is a nation of beautiful tropical islands off the eastern coast of Africa, and it’s no surprise that seafood is dominant in its food culture. As I’ve said before, a nation’s cuisine is a reflection of that nation, particularly its history and culture. In the early days of sea-bound trade, Mauritius became a location along the spice trade between Europe, India and south-East Asia. It was first settled by the Dutch, but was abandoned and came into the hands of the French, both major influences in Mauritian cuisine. After the defeat of Napoleon, the British became the next imperialist power to rule over Mauritius and its people until its independence in 1968. So, like many countries and strategic locations, such as South Africa, India, Sicily and Singapore, a variety of cultures have had their impact upon Mauritius and its own cultural development.

This recipe, Prawn Rougaille, is a reflection of those influences and how they have shaped the cuisine of Mauritius. Within this dish are elements from French, Arabian, Indian and Asian flavours. The dish is very spicy, and it gains its heat from the emergence of chilli in Asian cuisine, brought back by the ships along the spice trading route. The use of coriander in the dish, also a key ingredient in south-east Asian cooking, provides a great balance to the heat from the chillies in the dish, and allows the tender prawns to provide a source of heat, but not overbearing. India, one of the major stops along the spice trade, also exhibits elements of its cuisine in the dish and Mauritian cuisine in general, as the rougaille is served with basmati rice to absorb the sauce and condiment the spicy prawns. Cumin, one of the most widely used spices in Middle Eastern cuisine, is used to provide an earthy depth of flavour to the dish. Finally, French influences abound in the dish, most obviously exhibited by the name of the recipe. Typical ingredients in French cooking such as garlic, parsley, thyme, extra virgin olive oil and white wine are key elements in the rougaille, and provide the real flavours to the dish.

As can be seen, this recipe, a reflection of Mauritius, is a melting pot of cultures coming together to form a unique and delicious form of cuisine. This dish is also an example of why I love cooking and why I’m looking forward to cooking and tasting food from every country and culture in the world. Second only to travelling there, it is perhaps the best way to experience and understand a culture, as food plays a central role throughout every culture in the world, and our passions, beliefs and influences create our cuisine. As for the recipe itself, the one thing I didn’t follow was the instruction to keep the heads of the prawns on. I’m sorry, but that just didn’t sit well with me, as I’m used to discarding the disgusting heads when I peel and de-vein prawns. I must admit that one thing that did surprise me about this dish is how spice it is. I’m not sure why it was so spicy, as I have a high tolerance for spice and, to be perfectly honest, 2 chillies is not a huge amount compared to other dishes that I’ve cooked and found much less spicy. Perhaps I actually added more but can’t remember it, but, although I loved the dish, I actually had to eat it in small spurts because the heat from the chilli was almost overbearing. For those that don’t like spicy foods, you could still use the red chillies but remove the seeds from them, as the seeds provide the real heat. Other than that, the elements of the dish came together beautifully. The French elements came together with the cumin and the rice wonderfully, and show that fusion of different cuisines can achieve delicious results.

Recipe (serves 4):

1kg king prawns, peeled (heads & tails left on)

½kg tomatoes, peeled & chopped

2 red or green chillies, finely chopped

1 tbs garlic, finely diced

½ bunch parsley, finely chopped

2 sprigs of thyme

1 tbs ground cumin

1 tsp white pepper

2 tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 Spanish onion, diced

½ cup white wine

1 tsp salt

1 tsp paprika

½ bunch coriander, chopped

In a frying pan, heat the oil over a medium heat and add the onions and half of the garlic, cooking until golden. Pour in half the wine to soften the onions.

Add the tomatoes and cook for a few minutes over a high heat until the liquid has reduced.

Stir in the salt, pepper, paprika, cumin and a drizzle of olive oil. Add the thyme, parsley and chillies and reduce to a simmer.

In a separate frying pan, fry the remaining garlic in some olive oil. Add the prawns, season with pepper and cook for 2 mins. Pour in the remaining wine to deglaze the pan.

Transfer the prawns to the Rougaille and stir through the coriander. Serve with basmati rice.

Cuisine: Mauritian

Source: www.sbs.com.au  

Rating: Four stars

Equatorial Guinean Grilled Fish with Three Sauces

When I started this cooking adventure, I wanted to cook food from some of my favourite cuisines, especially Asian and Italian, but as the adventure has progressed I’ve become even more curious about international cuisine and what it says about different cultures all throughout this world. So, through this blog, I plan to cook recipes from every country in the world, while continuing to return often to my favourite cuisines. After all, I really don’t think I can go three meals in a row without one of them being Asian! I now have a list of recipes to cook from every country in the world, and when possible, I’m going to cook what is considered to be the national dish of each country. For instance, I have recipes for Bulgogi from Korea, Bobotie from South Africa, Kormeh Sabzi from Iran and Bacon and Egg Pie from New Zealand. It’s an exciting thought of everything that I have ahead of me, and I really think it lives up to the title of this blog – Dishing Up The World.

This recipe, Equatorial Guinean Grilled Fish with Three sauces, is one of the traditional and staple recipes of that country. As I’ve researched recipes from all around the world, I’ve come to notice many patterns and tastes in various regions. In this case, the importance of peanut butter in Central African cooking has stood out to me. I’d already cooked a dish from Benin that also uses large quantities of peanut butter (Lamb and Peanut Stew), and this dish is yet another example of how common peanut butter, or what Africans often call groundnut, is in their cooking. I’m assuming it’s because it’s quite easy to obtain, it’s native and it’s cheap, as we all know that African cuisine is quite earthy and “of the land”. One of the things that I loved about this dish is that, on one hand it has that very simple, earthy element to it, and yet the three sauces provide such an interesting dimension to the fish and provide so many flavours of Africa.

The fish itself in this recipe is the easy part. The marinade doesn’t take long to prepare. The important thing is to try to achieve the colour that is produced by Palm Oil. I say this because many people refuse to use palm oil for conscientious reasons (deforestation of palm trees) or health reasons (it’s very high in cholesterol, accounting for the wonderful taste of Thai street food!), and it’s extremely difficult to find. I looked in my local Asian and Indian food stores, and they didn’t have any. The reason why you need to think about how to substitute palm oil effectively rather than with just a random oil is that it has a very unique, rich red colour, and this provides a wonderful red/orange sheen to the food. There are two options for substituting palm oil. You could make a simple swap with coconut oil, which I found in my local Indian spice shop, which is rather close to palm oil in terms of flavour, but not colour. Or, and this is the option that I chose, you can use the equivalent amount of peanut oil but stir in some turmeric and paprika to the oil in order to achieve the colour. As you can see from the photo, this did provide the fish with a crisp, orange skin that looked, in my opinion at least, rather appetising.

The fish aside, the real ‘cooking’ involved with this dish is preparing the three sauces, all of which provide a distinct and appetising accompaniment for the fish. Something that has come to annoy me is the lack of availability of scotch bonnet chillies in Australia. This recipe calls for lots of scotch bonnet chillies and habanero chillies, which are much spicier than regular red or green chillies or even bird’s eye chillies. Scotch bonnet chillies seem to be easily available in Europe and North America, but not in Australia. To substitute scotch bonnets, you should use double the amount of green chillies with the seeds in. I still think this doesn’t provide the heat factor that scotch bonnets and habaneros would, as this recipe was surprisingly not spicy, although very delicious. Prior to making the recipe, I anticipated that I would enjoy the peanut sauce the most, followed by the avocado sauce and the spinach sauce coming in last. As it turned out, the spinach sauce was my favourite by quite a clear margin, I think because of the beautiful smoky flavour provided by the smoked salmon. The peanut sauce was also nice, and was much thicker and drier than I thought it would be. While the avocado sauce provided a relatively flavoursome alternative to the other sauces, I did find it rather bland compared to the other two. So it was wonderful to enjoy the tastes of Equatorial Guinea and many elements of their daily cuisine, and recipes such as this that provide a genuine insight into traditional food and preparation are extremely enjoyable to make.

Recipe (serves 4):

4 firm fish steaks, about 200g each (eg kingfish, swordfish, mackerel, barramundi or tuna)

2 garlic cloves, crushed & finely diced

1 scotch bonnet, minced or pounded to a paste (or 2 green chillies)

125ml lime juice

3 tbs coconut oil or palm oil

Salt & pepper to taste

Guinean Peanut Sauce (see below)

Guinean Spinach Sauce (see below)

Guinean Avocado Sauce (see below)

Guinean Peanut Sauce

500ml chicken stock

½ onion, diced

Pinch of oregano

2 garlic cloves, finely diced

1 tsp lemon juice

1 tbs tomato paste

Pinch of cayenne pepper

200ml peanut butter

½ habanero chilli, pounded to a paste (or 1 green chilli)

2 bay leaves

Salt & pepper to taste

3 tbs oil

Guinean Spinach Sauce

300g spinach, de-stemmed and finely chopped

100g smoked fish, flaked

½ large onion, chopped

30ml peanut butter

350ml warm water

180ml palm oil (or peanut oil with some turmeric and paprika for colour)

1 scotch bonnet chilli, left whole but scored (or 2 green chillies)

Guinean Avocado Sauce

200ml beef stock

200ml water

½ chilli, pounded to a paste

½ tomato, chopped

1 tbs lemon juice

1 large avocado, thinly sliced

2 tbs peanut butter

Rinse the fish then drain and pat dry with paper towels. Season the fish liberally with salt & pepper then place in a glass or ceramic baling dish. Add the garlic and chillies, then pour the lime juice over the top. Turn a few times to ensure they’re evenly coated, cover with foil, then place in the fridge to marinate for 1½ hours.

Meanwhile, prepare the sauces. To prepare the peanut sauce, fry the onion and garlic in the oil until soft. Pound the tomato and chilli together into a paste and add to the pan. Fry for a few minutes then add all the remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer and cook, uncovered, for 30 mins or until desired consistency is reached.

To prepare the spinach sauce, fry the onion in a little of the palm oil until softened. Mix the peanut butter with the water and add to the pot along with the other ingredients. Bring to a boil and simmer for 20 mins or until well thickened. Add the palm oil, remove the chillies and cook for a further 10 mins.

To prepare the avocado sauce, bring the stock to a boil and add all the ingredients except the peanut butter. Reduce to a simmer and cook for 20 mins. Extract 6 tbs of the broth, mix with the peanut butter and return to the pot. Cook for a further 10 mins, and serve warm.

When ready to cook the fish, heat a grill or barbecue. Drain the fish, pat dry and then brush with the palm oil and season with salt & pepper. Cook for about 4 mins per side, arrange on a plate and serve with the sauces.

Cuisine: Equatorial Guinean

Source: www.healthy-life.narod.ru

Rating: Four stars

Chicken, Olive and Preserved Lemon Tagine

I had intended to publish this post a couple of days ago, but the last few days have been a bit rough, especially because one of our cats, Maya, who I’m looking after while my parents are away, has come down with pancreatitis and it took a while for us to finally come to that conclusion. Anyway, I’m glad to finally get back to what I like doing – cooking and writing. Around three weeks prior to cooking this recipe, I had prepared some preserved lemons (I will post the instructions for doing this) and was awaiting the outcome. To be perfectly honest, I’m not sure if I had ever actually had preserved lemons before, at least not intentionally, and I was intrigued about their texture and the impact they would have upon a dish.

So I searched for a recipe which not only included preserved lemons, but actually celebrated them and made them a predominant part of the recipe. Many recipes use only small amounts of preserved lemon rind in their recipes, or even use them as garnish on dishes such as Moussaka. This dish, which I found in Jamie Oliver’s Jamie Does..., one of the series of cookbooks that came with the Daily Telegraph recently, seemed the perfect recipe to cook, as not only did I want a dish that used preserved lemons as a primary ingredient, but I was also quite eager to cook a Moroccan dish. The recipe includes up to 3 whole preserved lemons, but I only used 2 because I didn’t want to go overboard on my first time with this ingredient. It was quite interesting dicing up the lemons in preparation for cooking – the flesh of the lemon was almost jelly-like and seemed translucent, and the rind was so wonderfully soft and tender.

Unfortunately I don’t have a tagine, but you can actually substitute a tagine with a heavy-based pot which is what I did and which proved to be adequate for the purposes of cooking this dish, although it would be interesting to cook the same dish using a tagine to see the difference, whether subtle or distinct. As for little tweaks on my own part, I didn’t actually use saffron, but rather a saffron substitute that provides the same effect, at least in terms of colour, and you can see from the photo that the substitute also provides that beautiful, rich yellow that comes from saffron. As I was slicing up the fennel, I was wondering whether it would impact upon my enjoyment of the dish. It’s the first time that I’ve used fennel in my own cooking, and I noticed the distinct aniseed scent which I’m absolutely no fan of. As it turned out, the chicken was beautiful and tender, but I must admit that I just wasn't a fan of the flavours coming out of the recipe. I think the combination of the preserved lemon, the fennel and the olives (which I usually like) provided for too tart a taste for my palate, whereas Asian cuisine, my favourite type of food, generally is sweeter. I’m sure people who prefer less sweetness in their food would love this recipe. Nevertheless, I’m going to cook plenty more Moroccan and North African recipes, and this was just part of my exploration of ingredients and cuisines that I’ve never cooked.

Recipe (serves 4):

1 whole chicken, divided into 4 pieces

Olive oil

1-2 large bulbs of fennel

2 onions, peeled and roughly chopped

Small bunch of fresh coriander

2 garlic cloves, peeled and sliced

2-3 preserved lemons, deseeded & chopped

80g black and green olives, stoned

A good pinch of saffron

500ml hot chicken stock

Couscous

Spice rub

1 heaped tsp coriander seeds, bashed up

1 tsp ground cumin

1 heaped tsp ground ginger

2 tbs olive oil

Sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

Mix all the spice rub ingredients together in a small bowl. Put the chicken pieces in a large bowl, massage them with the spice rub then cover with cling film and put into the fridge to marinate for a couple of hours or, even better, overnight.

Heat a generous lug of olive oil in a tagine or casserole-type pan and fry the chicken pieces over a medium heat, skin side down first, for about 5-10 mins or until golden brown.

While the chicken fries, chop each fennel bulb into 8 wedges and add these to the pan along with the onions, coriander stalks and garlic. Stir well and fry for a couple more minutes, then mix in the preserved lemons, olives and saffron. Pour in the hot stock, give everything a good stir, then cover with a lid or foil and simmer on a low heat for 1½ hours, or until the meat starts to fall away from the bone. Halfway through, have a check and give it a good stir. Add a splash of water if it looks dry.

After 1½ hours, stir gently. If it’s still a bit liquidy, leave it to thicken with the lid off for a bit more. Sprinkle with coriander leaves, and serve with a large bowl of steaming couscous.

Category: Moroccan

Source: “Jamie Does...” by Jamie Oliver

Rating: Two stars