Fish Cakes

https://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/fish-recipes/fish-cakes/

Easiest Fish Curry Ever!

Easiest fish curry ever! And so tasty, with the sharp flavors of tamarind and curry leaves. Got it from here. Don't go by the picture, it's a lot tastier than it looks :)

 Ingredients 

• 5-6 pieces of fish (like seer, pomfret etc that can be cut into slices. Prawn may also be a good idea.)
• 1 tbl spn coriander seeds
• 1 tea spn cumin seeds
• 2 tea spns chilli powder
• A pinch turmeric
• 1 tea spn ginger (a thick piece)
• 1 tea spn garlic (a few pods, I used more garlic than ginger)
• 1/4 tea spn tamarind extract
• Oil
• 10-12 curry leaves
• Salt

Method:

1. Roast cumin seeds and coriander seeds. Cool, and grind. I am assuming that if you don't have the time, you could just use some good quality coriander and jeera powder!
2. Make a paste of ginger, garlic, tamarind, turmeric, the coriander-jeera you just ground, chilli powder, salt, with very little water.
3. Heat a little oil and fry the paste till the raw smell goes off. Now add 1/4 cup water, and add fish pieces. Add the curry leaves cut into two. Cover and cook till done. Taste gravy in between to see if you want to make it tangier with more tamarind. You can either make it slightly-gravy-ish, or cook until dry.

  

I made the mistake of not pre-grinding the coriander-jeera first - it doesn't grind well when you add it to the wet ingredients - that's why the masala looks a bit chunky!

Kerala Fish Curry, Oil-free

(Click photo to enlarge)

So I should've taken the photo before most of the fish got polished off, but well, I forgot, greed :)

You can use this exact same recipe for prawn curry too.

This is a routine, ordinary fish recipe from Kerala, with only fresh ingredients, no ground masalas, and absolutely no oil. The only real effort is the making of the coconut milk - but the reaction to the curry is usually so good, in the end you feel it was all worth it :)  You can also buy coconut milk in packets these days. Remember that it is concentrated, you need to dilute a bit when adding.

I use an earthen-ware pot to cook this. You can use any thick vessel too, but see if you can buy a pot - am sure it adds something to the taste.

Ingredients

• Fish (any one, though the most popular are seer, pomfret, karimeen(pearl spot), sardine, mackerel. I used karimeen this time, 4 of them.) Preferably something with one center bone.
• Ginger, one big piece, lightly crushed
• Green chilly - 1
• Red chilly powder - 1 teaspoon
• Turmeric - half a teaspoon
• Curry leaves - 2 whole sprigs, you can leave the sprig as it is, without pulling out the leaves.
• Shallots (sambar onion) - a handful, sliced in half
• Kodampuli - 3 pieces, soaked in water beforehand (http://www.kodampuli.com). This is what adds that typical addictive sourness/tanginess. You should get it in any Mallu grocery shop, or ask any Mallu friend to get it for you from Kerala. You can keep it for years, in a bottle, won't go bad - it's dried and preserved. If you can't get this, use tamarind, lots of it. Or green mango slices!
• Coconut milk. 1 packet. Or make it fresh this way: For 4 fish, I used half a coconut, you can add a whole coconut if you want a thicker gravy - scrape it, grind in the mixie, add warm water and extract as much milk as you can. Grind twice, strain the milk so no coconut scrapings remain in the milk.
• Rock salt, a teaspoon (if not, ordinary salt)
• Cornflour. If you want to thicken the gravy in the end, mix a bit of cornflour in water and add and boil for a couple of minutes.

Preparation

Just put all the stuff together in the pot, with half the packet of coconut milk, add the fish, add water to immerse it all, and cook, with lid half-open. That's it! Taste in between, add more chilly/ginger if you want it spicier. Coconut milk reduces the chilly flavour. In the end add the remaining thick coconut milk to thicken the gravy.

Fish cooks real fast, so keep an eye. Some big fish may break when you try to turn them around, like it happened to one fish in the photo :) - but hey, it still tastes delicious, you will search out the pieces and eat every last bit! It is best to not turn them around.

Some people do add a drop of coconut oil in the end, to give that extra flavour. If you want the gravy thicker, add some cornflour as described above.

Fish Fry Masala

This masala paste is simple, and results in great fish fry! Tried and tested.

Garlic
Curry leaves
Red chilly powder
Coriander powder, a little
Turmeric
Salt
Lemon juice

Grind all these to make the paste. I used to use tamarind earlier, but lime gives a better taste. Proportions? Garlic and Curry leaves the max, and the others a lesser quantity.
Apply on fish and keep for a few hours for the best results.

Goan Red Masala - for Shrimp and Fish and Chicken

From Christabel/Sundari:

This masala can be made in bulk and stored away. It's a typical Goan red masala. Apply it as a marinade to fish or shrimp as needed and fry. Can also be used with chicken but then you need to add some garam masala as well.

Red chilli powder - 8 tsp if using Catch brand or 10 tsp if using Kashmiri
Jeera powder - 1 tsp
Pepper powder - 3/4 tsp
Haldi - 1 tsp
Salt 1 tsp
Ginger Garlic paste - 1 tsp
Mix the above with malt vinegar (as much as is required to make a thick paste that can be rubbed over the fish or shrimp). Marinate the seafood for minimum 30 mins and fry.

Fish Cutlets

From Christabel/Sundari:
Makes about 12 cutlets.

Fish - 400 grams. Boil this in 1/2 tsp salt + 3 tsp vinegar + 1/4 cup water for about 7 mins (till it cooks and becomes whitish). Mash this and keep aside.

Heat oil and fry the following till soft (don't cook too much)
1/4 cup finely chopped onion + 1 heaped tsp of finely chopped green chilli + 1 heaped tsp of finely chopped ginger + 2 heaped tsp of finely chopped garlic. Add in mashed fish and some freshly chopped coriander. Beat an egg and add to this along with one slice of bread broken up. Mix all this together. Make into balls. Roll each ball in breadcrmbs and flatten. Fry in oil.

Variations:
1. You can use half quantity boiled potato and only half the amount of fish to make it more balanced and get your dose of veggies and carbs
2. You can also experiment with brinjal instead of potato. Its innovative but not always appealing to all palates!!