Cape-Style Spicy Beer-Battered Fish Bites

I've recently reworked this recipe for a guest blogpost I wrote for The World of Beer blog. This is one of my all-time favourite recipes, and I do hope you give it a try.

I often use beer to make batter for fritters and other deep-fried delectables because it produces such a beautifully light and brittle result. The actual science behind the beer-effect has always been a mystery to me, but recently I came across an article in Scientific American that neatly explains just why beer makes such excellent batters. In Beer Batter is Better, W. Wayt Gibbs and Nathan Myhrvold write: “Beer makes such a great base for batter because it simultaneously adds three ingredients—carbon dioxide, foaming agents and alcohol—each of which brings to bear different aspects of physics and chemistry to make the crust light and crisp.”

One of the most important points they make in the article is that because alcohol evaporates so fast, a batter made with beer needs less cooking time and dries out more quickly than one made with water or milk.

When it comes to frying delicate fish in batter, this speedy cooking time plus the insulating effects of the foamy batter both play a crucial role in preventing the fish from drying out in the fierce heat of the oil. It took me many attempts to come up with the right formula for a super-crisp fish batter, and eventually I abandoned wheat flour and cornflour altogether. In this recipe, I’ve used a mixture of chickpea flour and rice flour to give the spiced batter a fine texture and a lovely, lacy crispness. As the nuggets hit the hot oil, the batter puffs up into a crunchy golden cage, while the encased cubes of fresh linefish are quickly cooked by the action of steam.

I have called these nuggets 'Cape-style' because the fish comes from my local harbour in Hout Bay, and because the batter contains some of the key spices and flavourings of Cape Malay cuisine.

Served with a cool avocado and coriander dip, or a zingy yoghurt raita, or a fresh mint chutney, this is a delicious snack for a festive occasion, and I promise your guests will fall on the nuggets like starving puppies. Do use very fresh, firm-fleshed fish, from which you have removed all the bones, and not frozen fish, which will turn to mush.

I find it easiest to deep-fry food in a small, deep saucepan over a gas flame. You can use a pan over an electric plate, or a domestic deep-fat fryer, but a naked flame is better because it allows you to regulate the heat with ease. For perfect results, I can recommend using a thermometer to keep the oil at a constant temperature of between 160°C and 170°C. If you don't have such a gadget, use Jamie Oliver’s method: put a little piece of raw potato in the oil while it’s still cold. When the potato floats to the surface and is a rich golden brown, the oil is hot enough.

Rice flour and chickpea (channa or gram) flour are both available from health shops, Indian spice shops and some supermarkets.

Cape-Style Spicy Beer-Battered Fish Bites

For the fish:
1 kg fresh, firm-fleshed white fish fillets, deboned and skinned
3 cloves garlic, peeled and finely minced
a thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, finely grated
2 tsp (10 ml) lemon juice
salt and milled black pepper
a little rice flour
oil for deep-frying

For the batter:
¾  cup (180 ml) rice flour
¾  cup (180 ml) chickpea [channa] flour
2 tsp (10 ml) cumin
2 tsp (10 ml) powdered coriander
1 tsp (5 ml) turmeric
1 tsp (5 ml) red chilli powder (or more, to taste)
1 ½  tsp (7.5 ml) salt
milled black pepper
1 x 330 ml can of ice-cold lager

To serve:
lemon wedges
flaky sea salt
a dip of your choice

First make the batter. Sift the rice flour and chickpea flour into a mixing bowl and add the spices, salt and pepper. Gently pour the beer over the dry ingredients and whisk lightly until you have a smooth, slightly puffy batter about the thickness of cream.  Don’t over-mix the batter. Place in the fridge for 10 minutes.

Cut the fish into 2-cm square cubes. Put the cubes in a bowl and add the garlic, ginger and lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper and toss well to combine. Set aside for five minutes.

Warm a platter in the oven. Heat the oil in a small, deep saucepan, until it reaches 160°C. Put a little rice flour on a plate. Roll each fish cube in rice flour, dust well to remove the excess and, using a fork or a pair of tongs, dip the fish into the batter so that it is well coated. Gently lower the nuggets into the oil (five at a time is about right) and cook for a minute and a half to two minutes, or until puffy, crisp and golden. Fish the nuggets out of the oil in the order in which you put them in, using a slotted spoon, and drain well on kitchen paper. Place them in the warm oven while you fry the rest.

Serve piping hot with lemon wedges and a dip.

Serves 6-8 as a snack. 

This article originally appeared at www.scrumptious.co.za on 5 January 2010, and then in The World of Beer's blog on 20 June 2012.

Print Friendly

Triple-Lemony Linefish Baked in a Paper Parcel

If you're nervous about baking a whole fish to perfection, try oven-steaming it in a paper parcel. If you judge the cooking time correctly, you will end up with tender, succulent flesh, delicately scented with your selected stuffing ingredients. In this dish, I've used my five best-beloved ingredients, the heavenly quintet of garlic, lemon, olive oil, salt and butter.

I've stopped buying kabeljou, my favourite fish, since an anonymous commenter on

this blog snippily informed me that although it's rated 'orange' on the SASSI (Southern African Sustainable Seafood Initiative) database - which means that consumers should use it with caution -  it's not actually a sustainable species. Fair enough. But what was I supposed to do with the three lovely fresh kabeljou presented to me by the builder, let's call him Bob, who's doing alterations on my house?  (Bob, who is reaching retirement age, has a holiday cottage in Struis Bay, and loves nothing more than to head out of town on a Thursday afternoon to spend the whole weekend fishing off the beach.)  Eat them, of course!

Two have gone into the deep freeze, and I intend to bake them this weekend, when Bob has finished building my new braai [barbeque] and pizza oven. I asked him to do this on impulse, seeing as there were left-over piles of bricks and sand lying around, and a bricklayer on hand.

Sure, said the ever-obliging Bob, and when we'd agreed on a price, I showed him what I wanted: a little brick braai with a small adjacent oven.  What is rising out of my lawn looks more like the Taj Mahal than the modest structure I envisaged, but I don't have the heart to tell him to scale it down. My husband, who is bewildered by my longing for a pizza oven, has suggested we paint it in a camouflage pattern and turn it into a dog kennel.

Anyway, back to the fish: you can stuff whole fish with anything you like, but what I wanted was a powerful lemony flavour, so I used lemon leaves, kafir lime leaves, fresh lemon slices and Vietnamese coriander, which has its own particular lemoniness. During baking, the volatile oils from these lemony things infuse and perfume the flesh of the fish.  Some people believe in slashing the flesh of fresh fish, but  I don't think this is ever necessary, unless you're cooking a large, oily-fleshed fish directly over hot coals, in which case the slashes help the smoky flavour penetrate the fish, and allow it to cook evenly.

The cooking time will depend on the size of your fish.  To test whether the fish is done, stick a sharp knife right through the paper into the thickest part of the fish. If the flesh flakes easily, the fish is done. Remember, though, that the fish will continue to cook for two or three minutes after you take it out of the oven, so it's best to underdo it - you can always pop it back in the oven for another few minutes.

Triple-Lemony Linefish Baked in a Paper Parcel
1 medium whole fish (about 2 kg), cleaned

flaky sea salt

milled black pepper

5 fresh lemon leaves or kafir lime leaves

3 slices of lemon

3 sprigs Vietnamese coriander (or lemon thyme) 

2 cloves garlic, sliced length ways

3 T (45 ml) olive oil
1 tsp (5 ml) finely grated lemon zest
2 T butter

Preheat the oven to 180°C.  Place the fish on a large piece of parchment paper or greaseproof paper. Season the inside of the fish with a little salt and pepper. Crumple the lemon leaves to release their oil and stuff them into the cavity along with the lemon slices, Vietnamese coriander and garlic. Pour the olive oil over the top of the fish, scatter over the lemon zest and season with more salt and pepper. Cut up the butter and place on top of the fish. Pick up the long sides of the paper, bring them together, and fold over and over to make a neat pleat.  Fold in the shorter edges of the paper and tie securely with a piece of kitchen string.  Put the parcel on a baking sheet and bake at 180°C for about 25-30 minutes, or until done (see notes above). Using two spatulas, lift the fish onto a warmed platter. Pick up the paper and pour the juices over the fish. Serve with mayonnaise and boiled baby potatoes.

Serves 4. 

Print Friendly

Hout Bay Linefish Simmered in a Spiced Coconut Gravy

Tamarind water adds a lovely tartness to this creamy, delicately spiced curry. This is a subtle dish which I think is just right without any extra heat, but if you like a bit of a kick, you can spike it with a few chopped fresh green chillis.

I was reluctant to put the word 'curry' in the title of this dish, because an artfully spiced curry is, to my mind, a work of sheer culinary magic, and best left to experts.

 Now that I've provided this disclaimer, I can tell you that I loved this dish - which I came up with after consulting numerous books by my favourite experts, namely Madhur Jaffrey, Atul Kochhar and others - so much that I couldn't stop eating it.

I had made enough for six, but - predictably - my fish-loathing family turned their noses up, without even tasting it.  So I ate it for lunch and supper for two days running, and had the dregs on toast this morning for breakfast. (I know, I know. But these flakes of fresh fish bathed in spicy, aromatic, creamy gravy were just what my brainbuds desperately craved, and who am I to refuse them?).

This dish is better the day after it was made, but do reheat it very gently to avoid over-cooking the fish.

You can use any robust, firm-fleshed, fresh fillets of fish in this dish; I used kabeljou from my local Hout Bay Harbour.  This is my all-time favourite fish, but I try not to buy it too often, as it is ranked orange (meaning 'use with caution') on the South African Seafood Sustainable Initiative (SASSI).

[Postscript, 7 May 2012:  I no longer cook with orange-listed seafood.]

As always, very fresh spices make all the difference to a dish like this.  Please use plenty of oil in which to brown the onions: you will not achieve the right depth of flavour if you use just a lick.  You can always drain off the oil once they're cooked.

Compressed tamarind pulp is available at Asian spice shops. If you can't find it, add 4 teaspoons of prepared, bottled tamarind sauce or the same quantity of freshly squeezed lemon juice, plus 200 ml water, to the dish.

Hout Bay Linefish Simmered in a Spiced Coconut Gravy

1.2 kg fresh, firm-fleshed white fish fillets, skinned and boned
4 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
a thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, grated
1½  tsp (7.5 ml) red chilli powder
1½  tsp (7.5 ml) turmeric
1 tsp (5 ml) salt
30 g pressed tamarind, soaked for 20 minutes in 250 ml warm water
100 ml vegetable oil (sunflower or canola)

1½  tsp (7.5 ml) mustard seeds, brown or blonde

1½  tsp (7.5 ml) whole fenugreek seeds

2 whole cloves

3 whole white cardamom pods

1 quill of cinnamon, about  7 cm long, or a thumb-sized piece of cassia bark

2 large onions (about 400g), peeled and very finely chopped (or grated, or whizzed to a slush in a food processor)

340 ml coconut milk

2 t (10 ml) powdered cumin

freshly milled black pepper

To serve: 

a handful of chopped fresh coriander [cilantro]

Remove all bones from the fish and cut into large (about 5cm x 5cm) chunks.  Place in a bowl and add half the prepared garlic and ginger (reserve the rest) , and all the chilli powder, turmeric and salt.  Toss so that every cube of fish is well coated with the seasonings, cover, and place in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Put the cube of tamarind pulp in a bowl and add 200 ml warm water. Set aside to soften for 20 minutes.

Heat the oil in a large saucepan, and when it is very hot, but not smoking, add the mustard seeds, fenugreek seeds, cloves, cardamom and cinnamon quill. Sizzle the spices in the hot oil until the mustard seeds begin to pop and crackle. Add the onions and the reserved ginger and garlic, turn down the flame and fry over a brisk heat for 10 minutes, or until the onions are a rich golden brown.  (At this point, you can, if you want to, tip the mixture into a sieve and drain off any excess oil.)

Using your fingers, mash and crush the now-softened tamarind pulp into its soaking water.  Strain the water into a little clean bowl, pressing down hard on the pulp to extract all the juices. Discard the pulp and add the tamarind water to the fried onions, along with the coconut cream, cumin and milled black pepper.  Stir well and simmer for 15 minutes.  Remove the marinated fish from the fridge and tip it into the sauce. Toss gently to combine.  Turn up the heat and simmer, over a low flame, until the fish chunks are just cooked through (about 7 minutes). Do not stir or mash, as this will disturb the fish chunks: rather give the pan a gentle shake.

Serve hot, with a shower of chopped fresh coriander, and Basmati rice.

Serves 4 Print Friendly

Cape-style Crispy Spiced Battered Fish Bites

Rice flour, chickpea flour and beer give this spiced batter a lovely crispiness: as the nuggets hit the hot oil, the batter puffs up into a crunchy golden cage, while the encased cubes of fresh linefish are quickly cooked by the action of steam. It took me four attempts to find the right formula for the batter, and, in true Goldilocks fashion, the last option - namely, to abandon wheat flour and cornflour altogether - was the best.

Crisp battered fish is, to my mind, the food of the gods, but I very rarely make it at home because deep-fried food isn't exactly wholesome family fare, is it? A McRatburger-and-fries now and then is all my teens can expect in the deep-fried department. (Hah! There is no McDonalds in our new home town!)

I have called this 'Cape-style' because the fish comes from my local harbour, and because the batter contains some of the key spices and flavourings of Cape Malay cuisine.

Served with a cool avocado and coriander dip (but use yoghurt in place of the crème fraîche), this is a delectable snack for a festive occasion, and I promise your guests will fall on them like starving puppies. Do use very fresh, firm-fleshed fish, from which you have removed all the bones, and not frozen fish, which will turn to mush.

I find it easiest to deep-fry food (not that I'm the expert, but for what it's worth) in a small, deep saucepan over a gas flame. You can use a pan over an electric plate, or a domestic deep-fat fryer, but a naked flame is better because it allow you to regulate the heat with ease. For perfect results, I can recommend using a thermometer - I use a jam-making/candy thermometer - to keep the oil at a constant temperature of between 160°C and 170°C. If you don't have such a gadget, have a look at these tips for checking whether the oil is hot enough.

You can use ordinary cake flour, with a little cornflour added, for this recipe, but you will get a much crispier result using rice flour (available from health shops) and chickpea [gram/channa] flour (from Indian spice shops).

Cape-style Crispy Spiced Battered Fish Bites

For the fish:
1 kg fresh, firm-fleshed white fish fillets, deboned and skinned
3 cloves garlic, peeled and finely minced
a thumb-sized piece of fresh ginger, finely grated
2 tsp (10 ml) lemon juice
salt and milled black pepper
a little rice flour
oil for deep-frying

For the batter:
¾  cup (180 ml) rice flour
¾  cup (180 ml) chickpea [channa] flour
2 tsp (10 ml) cumin
2 tsp (10 ml) powdered coriander
1 tsp (5 ml) turmeric
1 tsp (5 ml) red chilli powder (or more, to taste)
1 ½  tsp (7.5 ml) salt
milled black pepper
1 x 330 ml can of ice-cold lager

To serve: 
lemon wedges
flaky sea salt
a dip of your choice (I can recommend my coriander and avocado dip)

First make the batter. Sift the rice flour and chickpea flour into a mixing bowl and add the spices, salt and pepper. Gently pour the beer over the dry ingredients and whisk lightly until you have a smooth, slightly puffy batter about the thickness of cream.  Don’t over-mix the batter. Place in the fridge for 10 minutes.

Cut the fish into 2-cm square cubes. Put the cubes in a bowl and add the garlic, ginger and lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper and toss well to combine. Set aside for five minutes.

Warm a platter in the oven. Heat the oil in a small, deep saucepan, until it reaches 160°C. Put a little rice flour on a plate. Roll each fish cube in rice flour, dust well to remove the excess and, using a fork or a pair of tongs, dip the fish into the batter so that it is well coated. Gently lower the nuggets into the oil (five at a time is about right) and cook for a minute and a half to two minutes, or until puffy, crisp and golden. Fish the nuggets out of the oil in the order in which you put them in, using a slotted spoon, and drain well on kitchen paper. Place them in the warm oven while you fry the rest.

Serve piping hot with lemon wedges and a dip.

Serves 6-8 as a snack. 

Print Friendly

Dorado Steaks with a Zingy Sauce of Capers, Herbs, Olives & Anchovies

Woolies branches here in Johannesburg are selling gorgeous fresh dorado steaks: if you love a dense, muscular, oily fish, you'll go mad for these. It's difficult to get good fresh fish here in Johannesburg, land-locked as we are, because all the best fish tends to jet directly into restaurant kitchens, and the pitiful specimens left over end up in fish shops, looking and tasting elderly by the time they hit my frying pan.

This zingy sauce is version of salsa verde. It's lovely whizzed up to a silken green cream in a liquidiser, and equally good served chunky. The choice is yours.

Woolies Dorado Steaks with a Zingy Sauce of Capers, Herbs, Olives and Anchovies

4 x 150 g fresh dorado steaks
salt and freshly milled black pepper
4 tsp (20 ml) butter
2 Tbsp (30 ml) olive oil

For the sauce:
1 Tbsp (15 ml) capers
2-3 anchovy fillets, to taste
3 Tbsp (45 ml) chopped fresh parsley
3 Tbsp (45 ml) chopped fresh mint (or coriander, or rocket, or a combination)
2 cloves fresh garlic, peeled and sliced
3 Tbsp (45 ml) green olives, pitted
3 Tbsp (45 ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice
3 Tbsp (45 ml) olive oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper

First make the sauce. If you'd like a silken sauce, put all the ingredients into a liquidizer, or the jug attachment of a stick blender, and whizz to a paste. Add a little olive oil or water if the blades are reluctant to turn. If you'd like a chunkier sauce, finely chop all the ingredients and mix together. Put the sauce in the fridge while you cook the fish.

Pat the steaks quite dry with a paper towel and season on all sides with salt and pepper. Heat the oil and butter in a frying pan until very hot. Place the fish in the hot fat, skin-side down, and fry for 3-4 minutes, or until the skin starts to crisp. Now turn the steaks and fry and until golden brown on all sides, basting frequently with hot fat to prevent the fish from drying out.

 Poke the tip of a sharp knife into the fish to check for doneness: it should be a lovely, white, moist and flaky. If the centre of the steaks is still pink and transparent, cook over a gentle heat for a few more minutes. Peel off the strip of leathery skin before serving.

Arrange the fish on a plate and top with blobs - or lashings, if you've chopped everything - of cool green sauce.

Serve with boiled baby potatoes and dark salad leaves.

Serves 4. Print Friendly

How I got my kids to eat fresh fish

It is an abiding mystery to me that small children adore fish fingers, yet loathe the taste and very idea of fresh ocean fish. To me, a fish finger tastes like pencil shavings ground up with chalk, yet even the pickiest toddlers I've known have not been able to resist the finger of a fish, especially if it's fried to a lovely crisp in a panful of oil, and served up with a puddle of scarlet tomato sauce. I've spent years - actually, more than a decade - fruitlessly trying to convince my kids that a thick, toothsome steak of flapping-fresh fish is just the most delicious thing imaginable. Finally, tonight, I prevailed, and here's how.

First, the reason why kids hate fish:

1. It's frozen, and its texture has become slightly mushy. Even the best frozen fish you can buy, whether crumbed, battered or coated in crushed Smarties, still has a pappy* texture. Kids under the age of 12 appreciate a bit of springy bounce in the foods they eat: why do you think they love chicken nuggets so much?

2. If it's not frozen, it's bony. Not nice chewy rib or chicken bones, but spiky, gelatinous, throat-lodging bones.

3. If it's not frozen or bony, it's smelly. And smelly fish does not tread lightly on the nostrils of the under-10s. I personally love the rich fishy flavour of anchovies, Thai fish sauce and Peck's Anchovette, but to juvenile noses the aroma of fish is on a par with cooked cabbage, stale farts and sun-baked doggie-doo.

Yesterday I went into a local fish shop and was pleased to see that the selection of fish was actually rather fresh (although it's one of Jo'burg's most popular fish delis, the stench that sometimes billows out from this shop needs to be smelled to be believed. My daughter actually holds her nose when she comes into the shop with me).

An assistant was frying up some sample nuggets of fresh fish in a garlicky, lemony dark sauce, which my daughter, astonishingly, agreed to taste. 'Lovely!' she cooed. 'Just like chicken!' She had another piece, and then another, and I dragged her away before she polished off the lot.

I was so impressed that I bought a couple of thick steaks (they called it 'red snapper', but it looked like Red Roman to me; whatever it was, it was a meaty, snow-white and robust fish, with no bones and good thick white flakes ) and tried to replicate the sauce. All three kids devoured the fish - and asked for more. Hall-e-luh-ja.

Fish Chunks for Kids

1 kg thick, fresh, meaty fish steaks
1 teaspoon (5 ml) white flour
1 tablespoon (15 ml) olive or sunflower oil
1 tablespoon (15 ml) butter

For the sauce:
1-2 fat cloves garlic
a good pinch of salt
2 teaspoons (10 ml) balsamic vinegar
2 teaspoons (10 ml) good soy sauce (eg, Kikkoman)
juice of 1 fat lemon
1/2 teaspoon (2.5 ml) Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon (2.5 ml) honey

Trim the fish steaks of any dark-red, thin or bony bits, and give these to the cat. Cut the remaining flesh into chunks of about 2cm x 2 cm. Put the flour into a plastic bag, add the fish chunks and shake well so that the fish pieces are lightly dusted with flour. Heat the oil and the butter in a frying pan until very hot, but not quite smoking. Add the floured fish chunks and fry, tossing frequently, for 7-10 minutes, or until golden brown and just cooked through.

While the fish is frying, make the sauce. Using a mortar and pestle, crush the garlic cloves with the salt to a fine paste. (Or squash the garlic cloves into a bowl, using a garlic crusher). Now stir in the remaining sauce ingredients and stir well. When the fish is cooked through, turn down the heat and pour over the sauce. Stir or toss well, turn down the heat and allow to bubble for another minute, or until the fish chunks are coated with a lovely sticky glaze.

Serve with lots of lemon wedges and no tomato sauce.

Recipe rating
My rating: 6/10
My Significant Other's rating: Not at home tonight.
Teenagers' rating: 7/10 'Not bad. Not bad at all. Can you make it again?'
Small-daughter rating: 8/10 ('This tastes like chicken. It's a sea-dwelling chicken with fins and a beak like a dolphin')

* 'Pappy' A term used by my family to describe fish with a mushy texture. The opposite of 'pappy' is 'tacky'. When a fish is 'tacky', it's springy, and makes your teeth stick together for a fleeting instant during the chewing process.

Print Friendly