THE BOOYAH COOK: BAKED FISH

Yerrrr... so now we have this thing on Friday night's at my house called 'Family Dinner' only it isn't really a family dinner because we aren't family, but we do it cause we are homeless or orphans or new to London and we eat food together in the really Australian / European way which a few decades ago, the British also did. But now they don't so much cause the most organised meal of the week happens to be a Sunday roast which doesn't count.

Anyway I really wanted to make mussels at the last Family Dinner, only when I went to the shop, there were none there. Mussels are super easy, so we will come back to this another time. BUT I went into a tailspin at the supermarket cause I hadn't planned and alternative, I was fucking dead tired and wanted to die. Hmmm... With some quick thinking I came up with the ultimate solution: BAKED CHERMOULA FISH!!!



Chermoula is a middle Eastern thing and can be used for Lamb as well. You can marinade a piece of fish with it and fry it too.

INGREDIENTS**
1 bunch of coriander chopped finely as you can be bothered
1 bunch of flat leaf parsley chopped finely as you can be bothered
6 cloves of garlic [or less]
1 tablespoon cumin
1 teaspoon coriander
1 tablespoon paprika
1 big pinch cayenne
Juice of 2 lemons or 150 mls vinegar
300mls olive oil

Beat all the ingredients together. Marinate the fish for an hour. Cook the fish. [Details to follow]

** With the ingredients list, you can freestyle to whatever is in the cupboard. I had no cumin so I skipped it and no cayenne but I had some green thai chilli.

I reckon you could keep the parsley, but use basil, garlic, lemon, red pepper, pine nuts or slivered almonds for pseudo Italian style. Or pan-asian and have coriander, parsley, lemon grass, chilli, lime etc. You get my drift.

SO IN THE CASE OF THESE BAKED FISH!
I used rainbow trout cause they were only £2.03 each and were already gutted. For each fish, I got a sheet of aluminium foil, drizzled some oil with my hands over it. Then I lay the fish on the foil, spooned some of the marinade inside the fish, and a bit on the top. Then I wrapped the fish up kind of loose in the foil, but tight enough so juices wouldn't go everywhere. I did it two more times and put all three on a biscuit tray side by side. I left them for about 40 minutes to let the flavours 'vibe' and then baked them in the oven at Gas Mark 6 [is that like 190 degrees centigrade or 200?] for 25 minutes. Then I put them on a big plate all together and impressed the Family Dinner guests with the big fish platter and I felt like a total expert. We ate them with rice and salad.

BOOYAH!!!

The next day, after another Xi Gong class which I have to say I am really into, V and I went to the Highgate Cemetery for a walk - WASN'T THE WEATHER AWESOME TODAY.



Here is a nice picture we took. I have been trying to coax the Cardinal into something like this, but it never happened. Not sure what I have been doing wrong... I'll keep trying.

Oh and if I might say, the other time in my life which I am enjoying IMMENSELY is Lady's Night where like a fake family we sit down and have a nice dinner together which somehow always ends up with Pippa pulling this face:



Not sure why.



And if only Pippa's knees weren't so pressed together!

Anyway I want to be in bed asleep now dreaming of other lovely things. I think next family dinner the french man is going to cook toad in the hole as a cultural experience for V.

xx Lektrogirl

P.S. UBM coming soon!

DINNER IN CAMDEN

And just for the glory of the universe, here is the picture Cardinal took on holiday of the monkey who by all pink appearances appeared to be very fond of her. I re-visit this picture on her Flickr quite frequently as his hair-do REALLY cracks me up. It is a totally bogan do and I remember boys at the neighbouring school - New Town High School in their PB's and acid wash jeans with hair like this [except a mullet at the back] getting off the hostel bus on a Sunday night on Tower Road.

Last night was dinner in Camden with Mrs Kipling, Jazz, Caz, RJ and Cardinal where we discussed such matters as 'There you go!', 'Suprise!' etc, Fletcher Jones skirts, the tortures of boarding school in the UK pre 1984 [I think], errr actually I can't really remember - besides it was all highly confidential and my life would not be worth living if I were to repeat it all. In a nutshell: XXCENSOREDXX. Madame Pippa couldn't make it with some flimsy excuse about having to take care of her children [if she heard Mrs Kipling's stories leaving her children at home unsupervised with pots of boiling oil on the stove, no clothes, a wet concrete floor and no fresh supply of oxygen would sound and even more appealing way to take care of her kids than the butch dykes in aviator sunglasses at Mrs Kipling's school...]

Anyway - I may be giving too much away already.

xx Lektrogirl