Wicked Good

I'm participating, along with Terry at Moss and Clover, in a cooking club.  We're over at I Heart Cooking Clubs and getting naked with Jamie Oliver for the next six months.  Should be fun.  The idea is to create some inspiration for the Manor kitchen and broaden the old repertoire.  I've been familiar with Jamie since early Food Network days.  His teeny apartment with it's teenier kitchen where he created simple, delicious, brilliant food appealed to me immediately. I loved his philosophy of simple and fun food and, well, I've always been a sucker for an accent.  Plus, he's pretty dang cute.
Though I've oogled Jamie, I don't think I've ever cooked one of his recipes. This week's theme is Happy Days with Jamie. To initiate myself I decided on a simple recipe of fish and chips. Simple makes me happy. His recipe called for haddock or cod, but I had a piece of halibut that I needed to use, so we went with it.  Using what I have makes me happy.  Simple and happy....

The participants:

Ignore the canister of coffee, that's not part of the show.  The paper towels do have a supporting role, however.

You'll take that cup of flour, dump it into a bowl and add a cup of that beer, a little salt and stir that up.  I won't judge you if you use Pabst instead of Heineken, but really you'll have 6 ounces or so to finish off, so why not enjoy it?  Those eggs?, you ask...you'll only need the whites.  To do this:

See those lovely soft peaks?  That's what ya need.  Not meringue.

Fold those sweet little soft peaks into the flour and beer mixture with your pirate spatula.  Be gentle here.  You just want to incorporate the egg whites with the flour/beer mixture. 

Now you're ready to take your fish swimming in a lovely, frothy beer bath before they jump into a hot tub of 350 degree oil....

See how poofy the batter gets in the hot tub?  Gorgeous.

While the fish is draining on the aforementioned paper towels cook the potatoes, plate, and humbly accept the compliments coming your way.  That should make you very happy.

 Brilliant!  Crispy coating and tender fish, crispy chips.  Brilliant, I tell you.

Fish and Chips 

Jamie Oliver

4 servings

For the chips:

3 3/4 pints vegetable oil

2 lbs. floury potatoes, like russets, peeled and cut into large chips (I didn't peel ours)

For the batter:

1 c flour

1 c beer

2 egg whites, whipped to soft peaks

salt

4 (9 oz) fillets haddock or cod, skin on and pin boned

Directions:

Pour all the vegetable oil into a deep pan or deep fat fryer, and heat to 300 degrees F.  Blanch the cut potatoes in the oil until soft, but not colored, about 4 minutes.  Remove and drain.

Mix together the flour and the beer, then fold in the egg whites.  Turn up the heat on the oil to 350 degrees F. Dip the fish in the batter and fry for a few mintues with the chips until golden brown.

Drain on kitchen paper and serve with bread and butter, wallys (battered, deep fried pickles served with ranch dressing), and pickled eggs. (We declined the wallys and pickled eggs and had coleslaw instead). 

Try it, simple and yummy!