Kedgeree

And here we have another recipe I fell for when I arrived here. Actually what it made me fall in love was the smoked haddock.

In Catalunya we don't use to smoke fish a lot, of course you can find smoked salmon in the grocery shops, but haddock... I don't even know how to translate it in Catalan. What we've got is salted cod and you know what? I think it might work! So if anybody there is brave enough to try, please let me know how it has turned out.

It is believed that the dish was brought to the United Kingdom by returning British colonials who had enjoyed it in India and introduced it to the UK as a Breakfast dish in Victorian times, part of the then fashionable Anglo-Indian cuisine.

As you can imagine that's too fishy/spicy for my taste as breakfast, but I love it for supper! There are a lot of variations, but here you have the one I made earlier this evening.

Ingredients (adapted from The Good Cook:

• 40g butter
• 2 tsp garam masala 
• 250g basmati rice
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 lemon, zest only
• 2 mild green chillies, seeded, chopped
• 1 small piece fresh root ginger, finely grated
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 375ml chicken stock
• 400g un-dyed smoked haddock 
• 2 free-range eggs, hard-boiled, peeled, grated
• 2 spring onion sliced
  
  
  
  
  1. Preheat the oven to 180C
     
  2. Melt the butter in a large, heavy-based lidded casserole. Add the garam masala and allow to sizzle gently for a moment. Tip in the rice and stir around until the grains are well coated with this spicy butter.
     
  3. Add the bay leaf, lemon zest, green chilli, ginger and a touch of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Pour over the stock, bring up to a simmer, then lay the fish on top, gently submerging it under the surface. Put on the lid and cook in the oven for 15-20 minutes.
     
  4. Remove from the oven, then leave to stand for 5-7 minutes without removing the lid; this is important - it allows the rice to finish cooking.
     
  5. Take off the lid, remove the skin from the fish and immediately add the chopped egg and onions using two forks, gently mix the rice, while also breaking the fish into flakes and mixing everything else in as you go. Remove the bay leaf and cover with a tea towel, clamp on the lid, and leave for a further five minutes to remove any excess steam. Mix again lightly.
     
  6. Serve and squeeze over a little lemon juice.