A Long and Messy Business. Rowley Leigh

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      juice. Cut the cheese as best you can and distribute over

      the salad in the bowl.

      Whisk the salt, pepper and vinegar together in a bowl

      until the salt is dissolved, then whisk in the olive oil. Drain

      the pears of their lemon juice and distribute on top of the

      salad. Pour over the dressing and toss the salad at the

      table. Taste the leaves: they may need more seasoning or

      a bit more oil for lubrication.

      Serves four to six.

      1 large head of Castelfranco

      radicchio

      3 large ripe pears

      juice of 1 lemon

      150g (5½oz) Roquefort cheese

      ½ teaspoon sea salt

      ½ teaspoon coarsely ground

      black pepper

      1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

      4 tablespoons best-quality

      olive oil

      WINE: A little caution is required. Like most fruit, pears

      can strip out the fruitiness of a wine, making reds seem

      astringent. Blue cheese is hardly better news, and will kill

      delicate, mineral styles of white if they lack acidity. Staying

      within the terroir, I suggest a richer style of Friuli white,

      either a Friulano or a good ‘gris’ style of Pinot Grigio.

      60

      A Nice Skill

      Griddled Mackerel with Rhubarb

      Filleting a mackerel is a nice skill: ‘nice’ in the sense of

      requiring precision, deftness and care, but also implying

      a certain pleasure in the task. A sharp knife is required,

      and two quick cuts behind the gills start the procedure.

      With the fish on a board, you then need to make two long,

      parallel cuts either side of the backbone, only as far as the

      central vertebrae, on both sides. You then manoeuvre your

      knife around each side of the backbone in turn, proceeding

      to cut all the way through past the stomach cavity, thus

      separating each fillet entirely from the bone. Thereafter

      the knife should be slid under the ribcage, which must be

      cut away before facing the greatest challenge, the removal

      of the line of tiny pin bones that protrude at right angles

      from the backbone down into the middle of the fillet.

      As with other round fish such as salmon, sea bass or

      red mullet, the traditional method is to pull out these pin

      bones with tweezers, making sure you pull away at an

      angle so as not to tear the fillet. With mackerel, the flesh

      is quite soft and it is likely to pull away in great clods

      along with the bones. The modern method is to cut a fine,

      V-shaped channel down either side of the pin bones that

      meets just below the skin and to simply lift the line of

      bones out in one neat stroke. With this achieved, you then

      have before you a mackerel fillet. A very good fishmonger

      will be able to perform this task for you, but do not expect

      the nice but nervous attendant at your local supermarket

      to be able to do anything of the sort.

      In the past, it was more usual to cook mackerel on the

      bone, but filleting this fish transforms it. If you choose, you

      do not have to cook the fillet at all – cut in thin strips at

      an angle down towards the skin, it is excellent served raw

      with wasabi and soy sauce – but the cooking process is

      also simple. Fried with the skin-side down in a pan, it

      becomes very crisp, and with the flesh only just cooked

      the result is much more succulent than if the fish is on the

      bone. It is a paradox that oily fish, such as tuna, salmon

      and mackerel, become horribly dry when overcooked.

      What with its sustainability, abundance in our local

      waters and the health-giving properties of its high quotient

      of omega-3 fatty acids, mackerel is the near-perfect food.

      The only drawback is that it must be eaten when very

      fresh: look for bright, prominent eyes, a moist shiny skin

      and a glistening demeanour, then fillet at will.

      61

      February

      GRIDDLED MACKEREL FILLETS WITH RHUBARB

      The astringent note from rhubarb makes a brilliant adjunct

      to any oily fish, fulfilling the same role as lemon or that of

      gooseberries in a few months’ time.

      Serves two.

      2 large mackerel, weighing

      about 300g (10½oz) each

      1 tablespoon golden caster

      sugar

      3 star anise

      6 cloves

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