Pickled fish is an iconic traditional South African dish. I first ate pickled fish at the ripe old age of about seven. It was the starter for Christmas lunch: the first I really remember. I was instantly smitten. Auntie Doris made it every year and for all the years we “had Christmas” at number 10, I looked forward to it – more than the Christmas cake or the Christmas pudding. In the intervening years, I don’t remember eating it very often.

Regional traditions

I grew up in the Eastern Cape, and not in a coastal town. I think I’ve mentioned that although both my mother and I enjoyed eating fish, my father didn’t. Fish was not a regular menu item. I have no recollection of eating pickled fish other than at Christmas. It was only when I moved to the Western Cape that I was assailed with stories of the Easter pickled fish tradition.

Making pickled fish

I have no recollection of what spurred me on to making pickled fish. I do know that the first attempt was probably nearly 20 years ago. I don’t remember the occasion. I do remember two things:

Consulting the lovely lady in “our” spice shop who not only gave me a recipe, but a few tips.
Hearing celebrity chef, Jenny Morris talking on the radio about making pickled fish. Not long after, her regular newsetter – and recipe – arrived in my inbox.

I carefully copied, pasted and saved the email recipe. After printing it out, I filed it with the other. They still “live” together.

“My” recipe is “born”

I now make pickled fish twice a year. Before we moved to McGregor, it had become our standard Christmas starter and a tradition that continues. Because of this, in addition to the traditional Easter “season”, I also sell it at the market.

An lockdown-related aside

I know I’ve told this story elsewhere, but it bears telling again:

When we went into a hard lockdown, two years ago in March, Easter fell earlier than this year. Feeling the fear and now “un-normal” things were, l naively decided to try to retain some semblance of normality, if not cheer. So, I posted on our community notice board, something to the effect and that I was taking orders for pickled fish. As I had done, twice a year for the last several.

I say, naively, because ~~our~~ my understanding of the lockdown had not included word for word interrogation of the regulations. I discovered, thanks to vitriolic keyboard “police”, that even my suggestion could not be countenanced.

So, began for me, a very difficult patch. That was just one incident. Perhaps I will write about the others. Suffice it to say that I retreated, folded my wings and embraced the black that came with being locked down.

I recognise that, only now, am I beginning to re-emerge and really heal. Partly, too, because at least three of those self-appointed keepers of the village wellbeing have ~~been spat out~~ have left.

Back into the pickle

Over the years, and because I’m not a fan of deep fried foods, I decided that I would take Ms Simply Spice’s advice and bake my fish. Not fry it – either with or without batter – which is the most common way of doing it. That, and my use of fresh ginger and the ratios of curry powder are the result of trial and error. My go-to curry powder is a blend called mother-in-law. Yes, it has a bite as the name suggests. And it has good flavour. One of the women who cared for my ailing father, and of Cape Malay descent recommended it. I’ve not looked back.

Flavour roots

As I’ve learned more about the smorgasbord of traditional cuisines with which South Africa is blessed, and as I’ve learned about cooking and preserving in general, I realise that pickled fish is deeply rooted in the miscellany of cultures that make us who we are: Malay and often Muslim, Dutch, Catholic and Protestant. The consumption of pickled fish on Good Friday has Catholic roots; the spices and sweet curry flavouring: Malay and Muslim. I love it.

Advance planning and long life

Last but not least: don’t decide to make pickled fish tonight for tomorrow. It needs to pickle. It needs at least three days. That means its a great dish for preparing ahead and copes well with being left over.

Market sales

I don’t know how long ago I started making pickled fish to sell at the market. Considering I’ve had a stall at the market for nearly ten years, it must be at least six or seven. This year, at least six weeks ahead of Easter, I had somebody asking if I’d be making pickled fish this year. Well, umm…is the duck’s…?

On the back of that, I canvassed my usual customers and had I made my regular batch, I’d have sold everything before it got to the market. This year’s batch is the largest I’ve made in years.

Pickled Fish

A traditional South African recipe

2 kg Firm fish (Yellow tail, kabeljou, snoek, hake, angel fish)
Oil (For baking/frying)
3 cups vinegar (red wine vinegar adds an extra depth of flavour)
1 cup water
25 ml turmeric
15 ml curry powder
25 ml black pepper corns
25 ml crushed, fresh ginger
4 large onions, finely sliced
6 lemon leaves
2 bay leaves
1 cup sultanas
40ml cake flour

Cut the fish into portions, season and dust with flour and a little of the curry powder.
Bake in a moderate oven for about 20 minutes or until cooked; turn half way through.
In a large, stainless steel, ceramic or enamel pot combine the vinegar, water, sugar, turmeric, curry powder, salt and pepper corns. Bring to a boil.
Add the onions, lemon and bay leaves. Simmer for about 10 minutes. Be careful not to overcook the onions – keep them crunchy.
Place the flour into a small bowl or jug and gradually add a little of the sauce to make a smooth paste. Add this to the sauce and stir over a high heat until it thickens.
Add the sultanas.
Starting with the onions layer them with the fish in a glass dish (do not use plastic or metal). Pour over the sauce. Cover and allow to cool before putting it into the fridge.
Allow to stand for at least three days before eating. Keeps for up to three months.
Serve at room temperature with brown bread and butter.

Appetizer, Main Course

South African

If you find that awkward to print, you’ll find a downloadable copy of the recipe here. If you download it, buy me a coffee. Or better yet, a glass of wine….?

To all are celebrating religious and cultural festivals over the next few days, I send blessings.

Until next time, be well
Fiona
The Sandbag House
McGregor, South Africa

Post script

I am participating in @traciyork‘s twice-yearly Hive Blog Posting Month.

If this post might seem familiar, it’s because I’m doing two things:

re-vamping old recipes. As I do this, I am adding them in a file format that you can download and print. If you download recipes, buy me a coffee. Or better yet, a glass of wine….?
and “re-capturing” nearly two years’ worth of posts.

I blog to the Hive blockchain using a number of decentralised applications.

From WordPress, I use the Exxp WordPress plugin. If this rocks your socks, click here or on on the image below to sign up.

Join Hive using this link and then join us in the Silver Bloggers’ community by clicking on the logo.

lastly, graphics are created using partly my own photographs and Canva.

We have had occasion, this month, to host two very different dinner parties. One was a birthday for a friend of ours and her teenage daughter, and the other for new-ish friends into whose home we have been warmly welcomed. The birthday celebration was mid-week and relatively impromptu, while the other was a little longer in the planning and coincided with the Easter long weekend. I thought I’d share with you how these two, rather different dinners were put together – from the planning to the table setting.

First off, most of our entertaining is with food that doesn’t take us away from our guests. What is the fun in having people to share a meal with you if you’re banished to the kitchen because the what you’re cooking demands all your attention?

Simple does, however, require some planning and advance preparation. One of the easiest meals to produce with the minimum of fuss is a roast: a lot can be done beforehand and, depending on what you’re roasting, it’s looking after itself when (and for a while after) your guests arrive. We always do our roasts on the Weber which has two benefits – you can roast your vegetables under the meat which also has the most wonderful smoky flavour.

Tom and I are a great team in which there is good division of labour: he looks after the fire, and the nyama (the Nguni word for meat) and the vegetables that are cooked in the juices that run out of the meat as it cooks. The menu is also usually a joint effort and its planning takes into consideration our guests and the time we have at our disposal. Entertaining during the week and with little notice can be a challenge. It’s not a 10-minute trip to the local supermarket or butcher to get something that’s not in the pantry cupboard, nor is there a premium food store from which one can select items to make up a gourmet meal in the blink of an eye. Then, I admit that I an my own worst enemy: I work until late-ish, so time is at a premium and then, to make matters worse, I’m not good at taking short cuts. So, acknowledging that I make the rod for my own back, I cope by doing careful planning which starts a couple of days (or more) before the event, itself.

The birthday dinner

As her birthday was on a week night with school and work the following day, this was a simple, two course meal with a Brut Methode Cap Classique from Lords, a local winery, as an aperitif. We did a topside of beef on the Weber with fresh, creamed spinach from the garden. Of course, there was gravy made by deglazing the pan in which the roasted potatoes and butternut and had been cooked. Potentially the most complicated part of the meal (partly because I’m not a great fan of desserts) was the berry crisp: a relatively healthy dessert made with frozen mixed berries and topped with a butter and oat crisp, and which was baked for an hour or so in the oven. The great thing about this dessert that it must rest for an hour or so, which makes it good to do in advance (I did it as soon as I came out of the office, and it went into the oven while everything else was being prepared). Serve it with cream or Greek yoghurt.

So, in addition to South Africa’s answer to a good Champagne, this simple meal was special because I set a table that was different, and which included items that are special to us, and have their own stories to tell.

Long Weekend Get-together

Since moving to the village, we have been fortunate to meet new and interesting people. Not all live permanently in the village, so getting together can be tricky, and we were delighted to discover that over the Easter weekend, our respective calendars were included the same free evening. Wanting to reciprocate their hospitality, we decided to stick to our tried and trusted recipe and have a roast – leg of pork – on the Weber, with the usual suspects happily cooked underneath it. This time we had wine braised leeks (leeks are to be the subject of another post…) and the traditional apple sauce and gravy with the roast.Because it was a holiday weekend, we decided that we needed three courses, and in South Africa, it is traditional to eat pickled fish over Easter. The thing about pickled fish is that you cannot make it today, to eat tomorrow – it must pickle – so I made it the weekend before. People think it’s difficult to make, partly because it’s often deep fried before being placed into the pickling sauce. I don’t do this: I don’t like deep fried anything, so the fish is baked (a tip from a Cape Town local) and then the warm sauce is poured over it. Allow this to cool and then store in the fridge. Because of the vinegar and sugar content, pickled fish can be kept comfortably (in glass rather than metal or plastic) for as long as three months. If you have the fridge space and you like pickled fish, make a big batch!

The dessert was also something typically South African: pureed brandied peaches whipped into Greek yoghurt and topped with cream. Both the dessert and the starter were plated, which, along with a pretty table, added to the sense of occasion.

So, two quite different dinners that were variations on single menu:

To begin – MCC or pickled fish
The main bit – Roast beef or pork with seasonal vegetables and the traditional accompaniments
To end – Mixed berry crisp or Brandied peach whip

And the best part: because quite a bit was done before people arrived, we spent virtually all our time actually with our guests!

Tag: tradition

Pickled Fish: a South African Tradition