My Sunday Fish stew and grilled pole beans

So I went grocery shopping with my friend and  I found some fish. I don’t know which of you like fish, but I do. Although, I don’t eat more than 12oz per week; which are the doctor’s general recommendations.

I love a good fish stew for a lot of reasons. Although I roast my fish before use now, I remember my mother and aunt frying some fish and using the oil used in frying the fish for a tomato based stew…Oh Father GOD! These days due to #Fitfam and healthy eating specifications, I do not fry most things. This fish stew brings nostalgic feelings of my childhood. Feelings of every Sunday rice and stew. We used to go to the fish or meat market almost every Sunday for stew ingredients and for some strange reason our Sunday stew took for ever to cook. Now, it takes me about 25-30minutes and 10 minutes of prep time…For my seasoning, I never cook this stew with too many seasonings. The simple, the better. You may eat this fish stew with anything from bread, to yam and rice; even potatoes.

If as a Nigerian kid you never had fried fish stew; then errmmm I need to make you one :)) …without further ado, I introduce you to my “Sunday” fish stew…

 

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My simple Fish stew and grilled pole beans
 
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
 
Author:
Recipe type: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Cuisine: Nigerian
Serves: 4-5
Ingredients
for fish
  • 1 inch of fresh ginger
  • 1 clove of garlic
  • 1small onion
  • salt to taste
  • ½tbsp of olive oil(any oil works)
for pole beans
  • salt
  • thyme
for stew
  • 2 med-large pieces of mackerel. Washed and cleaned
  • 2 pieces of cleaned butter fish
  • 2 large pieces of ata-rodo(use more if you like more heat)
  • 4 pieces of fresh plum tomatoes
  • I and a half pieces of red bell pepper
  • 1 large onion cut in half
  • 1small shallot(optional)
  • 1 14oz can of diced tomatoes
  • salt to taste
  • knorr
  • thyme
  • meat stock
  • ¾ cups of oil
Instructions
Beginning with the fish
  1. put all the ingredients for the fish into a food processor and crush
  2. pour all the crushed seasonings and ingredients into the fish and work through the fish using your hands(put some gloves on to prevent getting the hot pepper into your finger nails and into your eyes). Cover the fish a bowl and let it sit in the refrigerator and marinate for an hour -24hours. Wash and season the pole beans with salt and thyme after snapping the ends. Place the fish on a grill or oven to slowly roast on 350-375 degrees while you make your stew. (when the fish is almost done, add the seasoned pole beans to the grill or oven and grill with the fish until just slightly cooked; then you may cook your stew
for stew
  1. chop all the tomatoes, half of the onion and peppers into large chunks(leave out one chili pepper/ ata-rodo). Open the can of plum tomatoes and pour both the chopped vegetables and canned tomatoes into a food processor and smoothly blend using as minimal water as possible(I used none)
  2. In a stew pot, heat up the oil and thinly slice in the other half of the onion along with the shallots. Sauté until translucent and slightly brown, then pour in your tomato and pepper blend. Drop in your whole chili/ata-rodo pepper and fry the stew on medium heat, leaving the pot slightly covered. Let the tomato fry until the oil floats to the top; then season with salt, thyme and some meat stock(do not put too much meat stock in order to prevent a watery stew). Stir and let the stew cook once more until the oil floats to the top. Check for seasonings, add some Knorr if needed. Add your Mackerel and reduce the heat to low. Slightly cover once again and let the stew cook for another 3-6 minutes or until the stew has seeped into the fish and you see the oil has risen to the top...set aside and serve.

 

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