One thing leads to a monkfish…

I always knew it would happen, that there would be recipes in the book that are just a little too English and today I faced it for the first time.

What is monkfish when it’s at home?

Grilled Monkfish with Black Olive Sauce & Lemon Mash

I hit the net – not the fishing kind but the world wide web kind – and asked the question: can you get monkfish in Australia? Answer: no. Well, I pretty much knew that, but good to get confirmation right... So I asked the next question: what do you substitute for monkfish in Australia? And there, on an old Q&A session with the one and only seafood king Rick Stein, was my answer: leatherjacket, John Dory or swordfish. Thanks Rick!

End of the day, jumped off the bus and into my local fish monger, where I put the question to him as well, just to be sure. Well, I’m not sure Rick would appreciate the exact response I got, but let’s just say I didn’t walk out with any of his recommended substitutes, but with a fillet of hapuku.

What the hell is hapuku when it’s at home?

I hear you. Good question. And in summary it’s an ocean delicacy found all around the Australian coastline. Works for me.

Back in the kitchen and preparation under way, I realise I may perhaps be following the recipe too literally – something to do with monkfish being watery and using salt to dry it out, but as I didn’t actually have monkfish, probably best not to dry out the hapuku. Oops! Quick, scrape off the salt!

Grilled fish, olive salsa (olive, chilli, parsley, garlic, celery etc) and lemon mash (potato, milk, olive oil, lemon juice – and by the way, using olive oil instead of butter in the mash was genius. Nice one Jamie). Great dinner. And luckily solo – the garlic in the salsa, phew…

Xx

PS – I have to comment on it being 09.09.09. And it's not just that. It's the 252nd day of the year and the total sum of those three numbers is 9. Plus it's a Wednesday in September, both of which are 9 letter words. Spooky. Cool. Nerdy. You name it, this is it.