The Best Fish and Chips

Fish and Chips/ Mexican-style

 I altered "Masa-Battered Fish Tacos" by Chef Isabel Coss of Pascul in Washington D.C. This recipe is featured in "Food & Wine" magazine, July 2024.

I hadn't intended to alter her recipe, but I found I needed to just a little bit to make it the way I would like the flavor to be.

My husband and I tried this for the first time in August 2024 and we absolutely loved it!

Succulent, moist fish with a tender, crispy batter. Every bite filled our mouths with a bright, spicy flavor. Yum!

I will only write down what I did and not the original recipe.

 

Recipe is for 2- 3 people.

8 oz of thawed Mai Mai fish. (Thaw in the refrigerator overnight for the safest way to thaw.)

     -Cut the thawed fish into about 3" x 3/4-1" pieces. Set aside.

 

Make a Lemon-Lola's Aioli

     1/2 cup of Hellman’s Olive oil mayonnaise 

     Zest of 1 whole, ripe lemon

     1 1/2-2 teaspoons of lemon juice. (Only fresh lemon juice)

     2-3 dashes of Lola's Fine Hot Sauce, Green Jalapeno & Serrano.

Mix and place in refrigerator. (p.s. this is such a yummy dip, you may want to double it.)

 

Make Homemade Achiote paste by Cynthia Bergsbaken

Measure all spices into a 2.5 oz electric coffee grinder.

Measure 1 teaspoon of each:

• Smoked Paprika
• Oregano
• Cumin
• Cinnamon
• Garlic (I used freeze-dried. Do not use Garlic salt.)
• Whole Allspice

Measure 1/2 teaspoon of each:

• Whole Cloves
• Black Pepper
• Sea-salt  

Grind all together until smooth.

 

Measure out 2 teaspoons of this mixture and place in a separate small bowl.

Add about 1 teaspoon of Lemon juice.

Mix. Set aside.

Store the remaining spice mixture for another day.

 

Make Fish Masa Tempura (The batter)

 

Place in a mixing bowl:

 

• 1 1/4 cup of water
• 3.5 oz of Harina De Maiz Azul Instant Blue Corn Masa. (I used Masa Brosa brand/Walmart.)
• Your Achiote paste you made with the Lemon juice. This will be 2 teaspoons.
• 1/2- 3/4 teaspoon of sea-salt.

Mix until smooth.

Consistency should be like a thick pancake batter.

Note- When you fry your first batch of fish, if you barely see any batter on the fish, try adding a bit more of the masa to the batter and mix. 

 

I used a heavy Cast iron frying pan with deep sides. I added enough Olive oil to have about 1 inch deep of oil. If you want to, use 2 inches of oil. But I felt using the 1-inch-deep oil was sufficient. (I used Partanna Brand/Fruity and Vibrant Extra Virgin Olive oil.)

 

Warm up the oil to 350 F. ( Do not let oil smoke.)

 

In the meantime, take your cut-up fish and coat them in Cornstarch. Set aside until the oil is almost to 350 f.

 

When your oil is ready, take one fish stick and dip into the batter. Spoon the batter on top of the fish stick if needed. Take that fish stick and gently place in hot oil. Do this for three more fish sticks.

Each time you fry a batch of fish, try frying 4 pieces at a time. Make sure each fish stick is not touching each other. This causes the sticks to be soggy.

 

Brown one side of the fish sticks. Turn over when you are satisfied with the brownness.

I used a a quick thermometer to test for doneness before I took the fish sticks out.

Look for 145 F for a done fish stick.

 

Take the fish sticks out and place on a cookie cooling rack that has been placed on top of a cookie sheet. The cookie sheet will catch any oil draining from the fish sticks. Place the cookie sheet with the fish sticks into a warm oven. I used a 170-f oven to keep the fish warm.

 

Finish off frying the fish sticks.

 

To serve, dip your fish sticks into the Lemon Aioli. Yum!

 

For the chips, I made Baked Tortilla chips.

 

Baked Tortilla chips

 

You will need:

• 1 cookie baking sheet
• Olive oil spray
• Readymade Corn taco tortilla shells. (I suggest purchasing ones that have No artificial trans-fats in them.)
• Sea-salt
• Cutting board
• sharp knife

Set your oven to 400 F.

Next, take out maybe a dozen taco shells. You can stack them if you would like. 

Take your sharp knife and cut shells into 4 pieces. (Cut across shell. Then again cut the opposite side.)

 

Spray a liberal amount of oil onto cookie sheet.

Add the quarter sized tortilla shells, spread out. Do not overlap them.

When your cookie sheet is filled up, spray a liberal amount of Olive oil spray on to of each quarter piece.

Sprinkle sea salt on top.

 

Place in oven for about 10 minutes on the middle rack.

When done, the chips should be a golden brown.

If they have not browned at all, they will be soggy chips. Maybe bake a little longer then.

 

Bon Appetit!

By Cynthia Bergsbaken

  

***All original content is copyrighted by Cynthia Bergsbaken, Perceptive Blogger & Reiki in the Prairie LLC.

Reiki in the Prairie LLC is a legal Entity under law, 2015.

April 11, 2020

Plagiarism is a crime.  Share only by URL without changing the content!  Thank you.