Cooking minced fish is an occupation that, to put it mildly, is not enjoyable, but it is not a reason to refuse a huge range of dishes, the main component of which is minced fish.
A few simple tricks - and the fish in the family menu will appear more often. In a variety of forms!
Dishes from minced fish - the basic technological principles
You can make a lot of interesting and tasty dishes from minced fish. You can purchase frozen minced fish in the trading network, but when starting to prepare the cutlet mass from it, one should take into account that frozen foods sometimes contain more liquid than is allowed.
If you are going to cook fish cakes from ready-made frozen meat, then slightly change the technology for preparing the cutlet mass to get a more viscous consistency of stuffing. To bind fish mass from fresh, chilled fish, white bread is added, soaked in water or milk. Replace the bread flour, decoy, without adding liquid to the cutlet mass of frozen minced meat. This technique will achieve the desired consistency.
If we chose fresh fish for mince, then we’ll have to face a problem that is unpleasant for all housewives: fish, especially river, raw does not smell appetizing, and this smell for a long time eats into the surface of the cutting board, table, dishes, not to mention the scales, which during the cleaning flies in all directions.
Put fresh, live fish in an acetic solution (10%) to put the vinegar inside. The unpleasant smell will disappear, after which you can proceed to the cleaning and cutting of carcasses.
To save yourself from the extra hassle of cleaning the kitchen after cleaning the scales, take a transparent film, wrap the tank in which the fish lies. In the film, make two holes for the hands. The film will not allow the scales to scatter throughout the kitchen, put your hands into the holes and proceed to cleaning. Cutting boards and work surfaces should be greased with so that the fishy smell is not absorbed when cutting fish, and after work wash them with ordinary detergents. A greasy film on the surface of the board will repel water with a fishy smell. If this is not enough, then wipe the kitchen utensils in contact with raw fish, lemon rind or parsley juice after washing.
The best raw material for cutlet mass is spinal fish, in which the skeleton does not contain a large number of bones: catfish, pike perch, pike, hake or pollock, ice fish, pangasius, all fish of the salmon family.
For the preparation of minced meat only skinless portion of skin is used. Fish fillets are minced and passed, as a rule, through a meat grinder twice: minced meat is made for the first time, and it is passed through a meat grinder, with a smaller net, the second time, after adding bread or rolls of wheat flour, spices, onions.
To increase the viscosity, add an egg to the minced meat. To make semi-finished products from low-fat varieties of fish more juicy, add butter. After grinding, the stuffing is fought off to create a fibrous structure, which will help keep the shape of the products during frying.
For the flavor and special taste of minced fish dishes, onion, garlic (some national cuisines), fresh, very finely chopped greens are added.
Breading not only decorates the dish with a crispy and ruddy, appetizing crust, but also helps to preserve the juice inside the patties, zraz, chops, rolls.
For frying and baking fish semi-finished products, you can use a variety of shells: from flour, white crackers, a mixture of nut chips with flour or crackers, coconut chips. So that the breading does not crumble, the semi-finished products are pre-coated with an egg-milk mixture, a mixture of flour and water. Breading can be single (for simple dishes) and double. Fish is a perishable product, and harmful bacteria in it multiply so quickly that in the process of passing the mass through a meat grinder at room temperature, fish fillets in combination with other components (milk, vegetables) instantly lose their freshness. Therefore, cook fish cutlet mass only from products previously cooled to 2-5 ° C. At this temperature, the growth of bacteria stops. After cooking, immediately proceed to hot processing.
If it is necessary to preserve semi-finished products in raw form, immediately after cooking, they should be subjected to deep dry freezing.
The decoration of any minced fish dish is sauce and garnish. The classic version of the side dish for any fish dishes is potatoes, boiled rice, eggs, mushrooms, stewed vegetables, and if sauces prepared according to different recipes are served to ordinary fish cakes, the cutlets each time will look like a new dish.
1. Minced fish dishes - potato forshmak with herring
Ingredients:
750 g potatoes
Herring 530 g
Onion 150 g
Parsley (greens) 120 g
Vegetable oil110 ml
Mayonnaise 60g
Eggs 2 pcs.
Preparation:
Boil peeled potatoes until ready, drain the water, dry the potatoes, rub through a sieve, then cool. Herring fillet and prepared onions re-pass through a meat grinder. Combine mashed potatoes with the prepared mass, add finely chopped parsley, refined oil, mix thoroughly. Give the prepared mass to a loaf, grease with mayonnaise, set for baking for five minutes. When serving, sprinkle with chopped hard boiled eggs, garnish with fresh greens.
2. Minced fish dishes - fish galantine
Products:
Cod fillet 1.2 kg
Bread 300 g
Cream, drinking 150 ml
Onion, 200 g
Oil 60 g
Eggs 1 pc.
Garlic Tomatoes 350 g
Horseradish Sauce 150 g
Cooking Technology:
Remove the skin from the prepared fish fillet, skip the meat through a meat grinder, add wheat bread soaked in milk, combine with finely chopped passaged onions, enter the softened butter, add the beaten egg, salt, pepper, mix everything thoroughly. On the food film sent on the working surface, put fish skin, with the inner side up, lay the mince on it, wrap in the form of a roll, cook in salted water, and cool under a press.
Serve with slices of fresh tomatoes and horseradish sauce, decorate with parsley.
3. Minced fish dishes - pollock chops with sauce
Ingredients:
Milk 180 ml
White bread 400 g
Pollock fillet (without skin) 1.6 kg
Butter (for baking)
Breadcrumbs
Salt
Vegetable fat for frying
White pepper
Dill
Lemon Peel
Onions 250 g
Cooking Technology:
Cut fish fillets into pieces, grind with a meat grinder, along with white wheat bread soaked in milk. Once again, skip through a meat grinder, adding onions. For flavor add lemon zest, chopped dill. On request, garlic can be added to the minced fish. Add salt, white ground pepper to the mincemeat, mix thoroughly and repel. Form chops, breading them immediately, in breadcrumbs. Fry on both sides in a pan, over high heat. Bring to readiness in the oven by lining the baking sheet with foil and brushing it with plenty of butter.
Serving, pour sauce. To chopsticks fit tomato or sour cream sauce with onions.
Garnish - boiled potatoes or mashed potatoes, vegetables.
4. Minced fish dishes - meatballs with freshly frozen mackerel rice in tomato sauce
Ingredients:
Minced meat 1.0 kg
Boiled rice 200 g
Onions 150g
Salt
Flour 60 g
Pepper
Coriander
For the sauce:
Salad pepper 150g (net) Carrots 250 g
Leek 200 g
Parsley
Cilantro
Tomato sauce 300 g
Pepper Mix
Celery (root) 50 g
Preparation:
Combine minced meat with chopped onion, boiled rice, season with salt, ground coriander, pepper. Add flour, mix well and repel. Form balls (60-70 g). Blanch in a little water.
Dice carrots and peppers, stew in water, in which meatballs are cooked until half cooked. Heat the oil in a skillet, add chopped onion, combine with blanched vegetables and tomato sweet-sour sauce. Simmer for 10-10 minutes, then add spices, chopped greens and chopped celery. Adjust the taste. Put the meatballs in a saucepan, cover with sauce and simmer for another 5 minutes on low heat.
5. Minced fish dishes - meatballs in sour cream sauce with dill
Ingredients:
Fish mince 1.2 kg
Onions 100g
Egg 1pc.
Wheat roll 250 g
Milk 150 ml
Lemon Peel
Chopped parsley
Pepper, white
Butter 80g
Salt
Sauce:
Sour cream (20%) 300 g
Fish broth 100 ml
Dill
Green onions
Garlic
Spice
Cooking:
Crush the loaf, soak with milk. Combine with finely chopped onion, parsley, fresh lemon zest and minced fish. Mix everything, add the egg and butter, season with salt and pepper. Beat off and soak in a closed container in the refrigerator.
Roll balls of 25-30 g and blanch in boiling water. Transfer the meatballs to the dish.
Combine warm broth with sour cream, stew for five minutes, add a couple of cloves of minced garlic, chopped dill, and ground spices. Serve the sauce to the meatballs.
6. Minced fish dishes - red fish roll with champignons and eggs
Ingredients:
Cutlet mass, fish (recipe number 1) 800 g
Fried champignons with onions 400 g
Boiled eggs 5 pcs.
Rusk bread 200 g
Raw egg 1 pc. Flour 30 g
Oil 50 g
Preparation:
Spread paper for baking on the working surface, lubricate it with oil. Put ready minced fish on a rectangular sheet in a layer of 1.0-1.5 cm. Put a layer of fried champignons with onions and chopped eggs on top. Form a roll, putting the seam down. Wrap in oiled paper and bake in the oven at 180 ° C for 10-15 minutes. Remove the baking sheet, remove the paper and grease the roll with a beaten egg. Sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Brow for 5-7 minutes.
Serve with sour cream sauce (recipe number 5).
Dishes from minced fish - useful tips
- When frying fish, add a piece of butter to the pan, turning the fish to the other side: the fish plate will have a more delicate and pleasant taste. If you are cooking fish patties or another dish of minced fish, then put the butter in the mince. This is especially good if the stuffing is made from low-fat varieties of fish (perch, pollock, hake).
- Spicy greens, garlic, lemon will help remove the specific fish smell.
- Add some sugar to any stuffing: it adds juiciness to semi-finished products, improves their taste.
- Fish products are fried over high heat from two sides, after which, if necessary, brought to readiness, covered with a lid.
- To keep crisp in fish cutlets, after frying, place them for 5 minutes in a strongly heated oven.
