Fish Tempts

Fish has infused and inspired many cuisines across civilizations. Its exquisiteness has encouraged many exciting distinct and enriched recipes. Cook it anyway, the aroma of the fish hangs somewhere in the mouth leaving an extreme pleasure of a satisfied meal. The magic in cooking fish lies in understanding its texture, shape, fat content, scales or even bones. Fish can be simply fried, cooked in spicy tomato gravy, mustard with green chillies, poppy seeds, bamboo shoots, marine herbs, and seasonal vegetables, steamed inside plantain leaves, cooked with curd, any sour sauce or even tangy sweet sauce.

The simplest spice that one can think for fish is salt. But to make it peppy, aromatic spices like coriander, fennel, pepper, fenugreek, mustard seeds, tamarind, curry leaves, coconut milk, curd, cinnamon, garlic, onions, gingers, cardamom, cloves, lemon etc. are used. A very common type of spice usually used in eastern part of India is panch puron, a blended flavor of five spices: green fennel seed, black mustard, nigella seeds, golden fenugreek and buff-coloured cumin seeds. The real essence of a fish curry lies in its technique of cooking. The whole fish piece in a curry needs to be obsessively wholesome. Even if mixed with vegetables, the fine fish curries are those that have a nourishing and distinct appearance. Like a beautiful landscape a fish curry with vibrant spices is just faultlessly ideal for a lazy Sunday.

This publication, Fried Eye’s featured guest, Rakhi Phukan Saikia, writes us a mouth teasing Ilish fish curry cooked in spicy spinach.

Ingredients

1.Mustard oil, turmeric and salt
2.Ilish fish
3.Curd ( as per the amount of pieces taken )
4.Ginger, onion and green chili for masala paste.
5.Spinach as per the pieces of fishes
6.8-10 pieces of onion leaves, coriander leaves for aroma to make gravy

Method

1.Marinate the Ilish fish with curd and keep it for 3 hours
2.The marinated fish is to be fried slightly in oil
3.In a pan take 3-4 tablespoons of mustard oil
4.Put the paste of ginger, onion and green chili to it and fry it till it turns golden brown. To it put the paste of spinach, onion leaves and fresh coriander leaves (must be a smooth paste) and stir it in low flame.
5.Add salt and turmeric as needed. When the mixture leaves aroma put some warm water to it and allow it to boil.
6.Put the pieces of slightly fried fish into it. Cover it and cook it in low flame. Then garnish it accordingly. Cooking time is approximately 25 minutes.

Enjoy!