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[Hasu Cook]4: Morue à la Provençale (Cod)

Blogs > Newbistic
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Newbistic
Profile Blog Joined August 2006
China2912 Posts
May 02 2012 02:27 GMT
#1
Hasu Cook Session IV:
Morue à la Provençale


Introduction

Welcome ladies and gentlemen! Were you surprised by the unintelligible gibberish in the title? It's written in a language called French (the language of silly surrender monkeys from some far off land for you American readers), and it says something like "codfish cooked in the Provence style". In Mark Twain's book "Huckleberry Finn", the character Jim had the sense to ask why these Frenchies can't speak Americanese like the rest of us sensible folk, and well, I don't know. Anyhow, these French people are allegedly world renowned for their cuisine, topping even McDonald's and Taco Bell in the techniques and flavors of their food.

I have once again been called to do some mercenary cooking for my room mate, who managed to bargain for a rather nice looking piece of cod in exchange for some mere pieces of green-colored paper. This Provence way of cooking codfish is what I decided upon, after reading through a couple dozen recipes involving frying, searing, poaching, and baking this fish. The recipe comes directly from Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". It is unadulterated, since I am still new to the French way of cooking. If you plan to follow this recipe, please read through the entire recipe (or at least the recipe as it appears on page 219 of "Mastering the Art of French Cooking") so that you are not caught off-guard by any equipment required.

Ingredients

[image loading]
Yes, all these things just to pamper that small piece of fish on the left. Its 15 minutes of fame before disappearing forever into someone's gut.

Prep and cook time: ~1 hour
Serves Two

1 lbs cod fish fillet, cut into 3-4 pieces
2 tbsp olive oil
1/2 yellow onion
1 lb tomatoes, peeled and seeded*
1 clove garlic
1/4 tsp oregano
1/4 tsp thyme
1/2 cups white wine
2 tbsp parsley, chopped
1 tbsp tomato paste
salt
pepper
1/2 tbsp flour
1/2 tbsp softened butter**

*instructions will be provided on how to go about this below.
**must be at least room temperature! Plan ahead for this if you keep your butter in the refrigerator.

Author's Note: normally I will say something like "feel free to leave out whatever you do not have or are not willing to shell out money for", but if you are really interested in learning French cuisine, you should try to obtain as many of these ingredients as possible to really understand the full gamut of what each ingredient is trying to accomplish in the dish. Also, the cooking process is rather long and complex compared to some of the other dishes I have written about. Please follow the instructions as closely as possible because each step has a very specific reason. Omitting any step can result in a significantly different result.

Cooking

We will start by bringing a pot of water to boil. While the water is heating up, start on your prep work by mashing your clove of garlic, dividing and salt and peppering your cod, washing your tomatoes, and chopping your onions. Salt the cod more lightly than you would pork or beef. It is very easy to over-salt your fish.

[image loading]
Fresh herbs?!? This guy really sold out from his roots as a dirt-cheap cook. You bet your ass I did.

Once the water is boiling, dump (or dip individually with a ladle) your tomatoes into the water and submerge for 10 seconds. Remove them from heat immediately afterwards. This will allow you to easily peel your tomatoes.

[image loading]
Look how red those tomatoes are. You could wave this jpeg in front of a bull and he would charge.

Peel the tomatoes and remove that brown dot where the stem of the vine connects to the tomato. Cut each tomato in half across the width (the latitude). Use a spoon to scrape out the seeds and soft juicy parts of the tomato. Either use these in another dish or discard them. Meanwhile, dice and collect the rest of the tomato. These will be used as the bulk of the sauce for this fish dish.

[image loading]
They're so juicy and plump and smooth. Then you GOUGE OUT THEIR INSIDES AND CHOP THEM ALL INTO TINY BITS.

It's time to move on to the fish! Pour two tablespoons of olive oil into a pan over medium-high heat until the olive oil begins to smoke. Saute your fish pieces for 1-2 minutes per side to lightly brown each side. Remember, the fish should sizzle when you drop it into the oil. If you do not audibly hear the sizzle, take the fish out and wait for the oil to heat up further.

[image loading]
It's poissonous.

Remove fish from the heat and set aside for now. In the same pan, gently cook your onions for about 5 minutes to soften but not brown. You will need to turn the heat down for the onions. Preheat your oven to 325F (160C) After five minutes add the tomatoes, garlic clove, oregano, thyme, and salt and pepper to taste. Simmer for five more minutes.

[image loading]
If it wasn't for human fixation on meat this could easily be a tomato dish with cod playing a supporting role.

Prepare a baking pan. Place your fish on the bottom and pour your tomato sauce on top. Cover the pan (use aluminum foil if you lack a lid). Bake at the bottom third rack for about 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, remove the pan from the oven. Add 1/2 cup of white wine and return the pan to the oven for 10 more minutes. In retrospect, my cook's instinct tells me that this step is critical. The addition of wine half-way through the cooking process lowers the heat of the dish and prevents the fish from overcooking.

[image loading]
I wonder if some 10 year old will ever stumble onto this blog and go "What? They call this fish cod? Those fuckers totally stole that name from Call of Duty."

As your fish is baking, finely chop a tablespoon or two of parsley and mix together your flour and butter into a paste.

[image loading]
According to CSI if you zoom in closely enough onto the reflection in the spoon you could see my face.

After 20 cumulative minutes in the oven take the fish out. Separate the sauce from the fish fillets. Keep the fillets warm somewhere. Dump your sauce back into the pan and boil on high heat until you have less than a cup of it left. Don't worry about the chunky tomatoes, the heat will reduce them into near oblivion by the time your sauce is done. At this point, add a tablespoon of tomato paste and your butter/flour paste and cook for another minute.

[image loading]
What if the reason why god isn't real is because there was a typo a long time ago, and we were supposed to be praying to cod all along?

You are almost done! Take the sauce off heat and dump in your chopped parsley. Mix. Prepare a number of plates. Arrange your cod piece(s) onto the plate and pour sauce onto the cod. Serve warm.

The Result

[image loading]
All that work for such a small portion. Oliver Twist would look at this and ask you for more.

??? / 5 Another mercenary effort so I am not entirely sure exactly how good it tastes. The sauce is pretty good at any rate. It is a bit tart, since I still can't be arsed to grow my own tomatoes and supermarket tomatoes in the United States are typically rather poor in flavor compared to homegrown. If you have access to homegrown, ripe tomatoes, I highly recommend you try this dish with it. You will see a huge difference.

Conclusion

An interesting anecdote is that while I was growing up, raised in a traditional Chinese family, we always looked down on "Western" cuisine as rough and simplistic. My only contact with Western "cuisine" at the time being cafeteria food from school, I was inclined to agree. Steamed peas? Green beans boiled until they were turning yellow? Raw vegetable salads? These foods seemed so basic and flavorless compared to the stir fries of Chinese cooking which involved much washing, slicing, cooking, and saucing. And so I relayed these observations to my parents, who used these findings to reinforce their prejudices against western cuisine. To this day, many first-generation Chinese immigrants hold onto these same prejudices even after having lived in the United States for decades.

But you know, and I know, that these people, as proud as they are of their own cuisine, are missing an entire world of food. To me, right now, French cooking is still a bit of a novelty. It is exotic, complex, and a lot of fun.

The moral of the story is to not be be afraid to try out new foods, even if you do not like it the first time you try it. At the very least you'll leave the meal with an interesting story about that time you tried wild boar's sphincter poached in the tears of seven year old children, or whatever that dish may be!

As always, questions and comments are welcome. If you liked this blog and wish to read more, all past installments of Hasu Cook as well as my other blog series The Ghetto Cook can be found on my main blog,

http://foodinmind.wordpress.com

Until next time, please remember that boar's sphincter is not, to my knowledge, part of any nation's cuisine.

****
Logic is Overrated
JBright
Profile Joined September 2010
Vancouver14381 Posts
May 02 2012 02:38 GMT
#2
This looks amazing. I should try this out sometime. All of your blogs so far have been fantastic.
ModeratorThe good and the wise lead quiet lives. Neo's #1 Frenemy and nightmare.
Angel_
Profile Blog Joined December 2011
United States1617 Posts
May 02 2012 03:11 GMT
#3
I love that your fish comes in a package labelled, "seafood". I don't know why, but it makes me giggle, even though I don't eat fish.
Iranon
Profile Blog Joined March 2010
United States983 Posts
May 02 2012 03:22 GMT
#4
Oh, hello Barefoot Riesling. There's an empty bottle of you in my recycle bin. I love Riesling, and as a graduate student, I also love when my wine is $6 a liter.
endy
Profile Blog Joined May 2009
Switzerland8970 Posts
May 02 2012 03:25 GMT
#5
The recipe is pretty good, however the use of butter mixed with flour is weird. Provençale food normally does not use butter at all, and flour does not add anything to the taste, it's merely used here to thicken the sauce, I would not use it. Simply put some chopped parsley on top of it in the end rather than this butter-flour-parsley mixture. Everything else is the correct way.
I agree that the quality of tomatoes is crucial, this dish will taste much better at the end of summer using ripe tomatoes !

It's also funny that you use the word "morue" as morue usually designates salted and dried cod. I would have called this recipe "Cabillaud à la Provençale"

By the way, I'm French living in China, so I know what you mean in your conclusion haha.

Did you get a new mobile phone ? The quality of the pictures seems to have improved a lot, red stuffs don't look orange-pinkish anymore.
ॐ
Newbistic
Profile Blog Joined August 2006
China2912 Posts
May 02 2012 03:32 GMT
#6
On May 02 2012 12:25 endy wrote:
The recipe is pretty good, however the use of butter mixed with flour is weird. Provençale food normally does not use butter at all, and flour does not add anything to the taste, it's merely used here to thicken the sauce, I would not use it. Simply put some chopped parsley on top of it in the end rather than this butter-flour-parsley mixture. Everything else is the correct way.
I agree that the quality of tomatoes is crucial, this dish will taste much better at the end of summer using ripe tomatoes !

It's also funny that you use the word "morue" as morue usually designates salted and dried cod. I would have called this recipe "Cabillaud à la Provençale"

By the way, I'm French living in China, so I know what you mean in your conclusion haha.

Did you get a new mobile phone ? The quality of the pictures seems to have improved a lot, red stuffs don't look orange-pinkish anymore.


Thanks! Your post are always awesome. Google seemed to have failed me on what is the French word for "cod" :/

It's the same mobile phone lol. It's just usually my hands are very shaky when I take pictures and the lighting is bad.

Apparently the best time for me to cook (and take pictures) is around late afternoon/sunset, when the outside light plus indoor lighting is just right. I try to rest the phone on a solid object instead of holding it in my hands.
Logic is Overrated
EchoZ
Profile Blog Joined October 2010
Japan5041 Posts
May 02 2012 04:37 GMT
#7
Just curious, which part of China are you from. I live in Beijing and don't really know where to look for good ingredients, besides Jenny Lous but they are seriously overpriced.
Dear Sixsmith...
Froadac
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
United States6733 Posts
May 02 2012 04:51 GMT
#8
Hmm. I remember my mom attempting to make this, overcooking the cod, and it being a fiasco. If cod goes on sale I'll try this.

Although cod is so darn mild
Newbistic
Profile Blog Joined August 2006
China2912 Posts
May 02 2012 05:24 GMT
#9
On May 02 2012 13:37 EchoZ wrote:
Just curious, which part of China are you from. I live in Beijing and don't really know where to look for good ingredients, besides Jenny Lous but they are seriously overpriced.


I live in Seattle, Washington, which isn't part of China (yet). Are you Chinese, or just living in China?

I can't believe you live in China and can't find good ingredients! Chinese agriculture is pretty ass-backwards, which means minimal mass harvesting of unripe fruits then spraying on growth hormones on their way to the market. Aside from watermelon, pineapples, and maybe a few other fruits, Chinese produce should all be of significantly higher quality than you can find in American grocery stores (short of Whole Foods ripoff bullshit).

From my experience living in Shanghai, although indoor megamarkets are becoming more common, you should be able to find good quality ingredients at your nearest open-air market, which are only open on certain days of the week I believe. Most fruits and vegetables are seasonal. There are oftentimes multiple farmers selling the same thing (tomatoes or green beans, for instance), so you can pick and choose which seller has the best quality or price.
Logic is Overrated
endy
Profile Blog Joined May 2009
Switzerland8970 Posts
May 02 2012 05:39 GMT
#10
On May 02 2012 13:37 EchoZ wrote:
Just curious, which part of China are you from. I live in Beijing and don't really know where to look for good ingredients, besides Jenny Lous but they are seriously overpriced.


Not sure about Beijing, but in Shanghai I avoid the supermarkets where the quality of the products is awful.
I buy everything in the street, it's better and cheaper.
I go to imported food stores only to buy cream / cheese / capers / anchovies / Habanero sauce / fresh thyme / fresh foie gras / coffee and that's pretty much it.
ॐ
cmen15
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United States1519 Posts
May 02 2012 06:17 GMT
#11
Those are some nice tomatoes lol : )
Greed leads to just about all losses.
Denar
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
France1633 Posts
May 02 2012 07:57 GMT
#12
I am from Provence, and this is a dish I love, those photos are making me so hungry!

People cook with tons of flavors there, because there are many aromatic plants that grow everywhere (it is in the French countryside), so you just need to step out of your house to add amazing flavors to every dish.

And Olive oil, oh god, this is just so good
Disregard
Profile Blog Joined March 2007
China10252 Posts
May 02 2012 08:04 GMT
#13
Why not just substitute with a big can of nice chunk tomatoes?
"If I had to take a drug in order to be free, I'm screwed. Freedom exists in the mind, otherwise it doesn't exist."
JerKy
Profile Blog Joined January 2011
Korea (South)3013 Posts
May 02 2012 09:40 GMT
#14
I always read your blogs late at night... and I make myself so hungry

I wish I were rich and could hire you as my personal chef T_T
You can type "StarCraft" with just your left hand.
mordek
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United States12704 Posts
May 02 2012 14:07 GMT
#15
On May 02 2012 18:40 JerKy wrote:
I always read your blogs late at night... and I make myself so hungry

I wish I were rich and could hire you as my personal chef T_T

I think we all wish we were culinary warlords that could hire her as a mercenary. These blogs are so much fun to read
It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides. Tiberius77 | Mordek #1881 "I took a mint!"
ohsea.toc
Profile Blog Joined December 2011
Australia344 Posts
May 02 2012 14:11 GMT
#16
From the ghetto to French puns, a toothsome journey to be sure.
Clip, clop, Camelot.
solidbebe
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
Netherlands4921 Posts
May 02 2012 17:36 GMT
#17
On May 02 2012 17:04 Disregard wrote:
Why not just substitute with a big can of nice chunk tomatoes?


iieeeeek noo ;(!! Homegrown all the way.
That's the 2nd time in a week I've seen someone sig a quote from this GD and I have never witnessed a sig quote happen in my TL history ever before. -Najda
Shymon
Profile Blog Joined February 2005
United States620 Posts
May 02 2012 17:42 GMT
#18
One point of technique, when concasing a tomato it is generally a good idea to score a small x in the bottom before blanching them. This makes the skin peel away easier and more consistantly with less time spent in the water. It also allows you to peel the skin off evenly in nicely shaped peices, which can then be dehydrated or fried to make garnish.
TheToast
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
United States4808 Posts
May 02 2012 19:58 GMT
#19
Oooo that sauce looks yummy. It's funny, here in the midwest I'm sure there are a lot of older people who's minds would be blown if you told them there were other ways to cook fish besides deep frying

5/5 Nicely done as usual.
I like the way the walls go out. Gives you an open feeling. Firefly's a good design. People don't appreciate the substance of things. Objects in space. People miss out on what's solid.
SgtCoDFish
Profile Blog Joined July 2010
United Kingdom1520 Posts
May 02 2012 23:42 GMT
#20
You want to cut me into pieces and serve me with a sauce? :O

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