Basque-style Hake with Garlic and Sauce Romesco

A recipe from...

The Ocean Cookbook 2024

Recipe by Mitch Tonks, United Kingdom

When you choose fish with the MSC blue label, you can be absolutely sure you are making a sustainable choice to have fish in the future, and we all want that – right?

Prep time

20 mins

Cooking Time

20 mins

Serves

Ingredients

½ dried nora/choricero chilli
4 MSC certified hake fillets, about 180–200g each, with skin on
100ml olive oil
4 garlic cloves, finely sliced
20ml good quality agrodolce vinegar (e.g. white balsamic vinegar)
1 teaspoon chopped parsley
salt

For the sauce Romesco

4 dried nora/choricero chillies
100g whole blanched almonds
6 garlic cloves, peeled
12 roasted pequillo peppers
1 teaspoon sweet paprika
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
¼ teaspoon hot smoked paprika
25ml sherry vinegar
100ml olive oil
salt

Ingredients

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°C/Gas Mark 6. Soak the dried chillies for both the fish and the sauce in separate bowls for 10 minutes, then drain and deseed.
Place the almonds and the 4 soaked chillies in a processor and pulse until roughly chopped. Add the garlic, roasted peppers and spices and pulse again. Add the vinegar, most of the olive oil (reserve 1 tablespoonful for later) and a pinch of salt, then pulse again to produce a thick sauce that is neither too chunky nor too smooth.
Fry the hake fillets skin-side down in a large, ovenproof frying pan in the reserved olive oil until lightly golden. Turn, then transfer the pan to the oven and roast the fish for about 5 minutes, or until just cooked through.
Finely slice the soaked dried chilli. Heat the garlic in a little olive oil, add the sliced dried chilli and a pinch of salt. Cook gently for 2 minutes, stirring occasionally to distribute the garlic and chilli.
As soon as the edges of the garlic begin to turn golden, take off the heat and allow to cool slightly. Add a splash of
the agrodolce vinegar and the chopped parsley.
Remove the hake from the oven, put a fillet on each serving plate and peel away the skin. Spoon a little sauce over each piece of fish and serve with a spoonful of Romesco sauce.