150 replies to this topic

[hansjoakim]

For more recipe ideas, The Norwegian Seafood Export Council actually has a decent collection of salt cod recipes on their web page. Sadly, very few are translated to English, but the Google translator tool does a decent job, I think. Here's a link to the recipe collection (via Google's translation tool).

Remember that all temperatures are measured in Celsius, and don't hesitate to ask if you need assistance with the automatic translation :)

Edited by hansjoakim, 13 January 2011 - 04:03 AM.

[Chris Amirault]

Made salt cod & potato fritters tonight, following a few different recipes roughly.

I cooked the salt cod with some onion and black peppercorns:



The cooked fish:



250g of skinned, boned fish flaked into pretty big chunks, with about 350g boiled and riced potatoes, 1/4 c or so of minced onion, salt, pepper, and smoked paprika, and two beaten eggs:





Fried them in 375F peanut oil:



A few of the final products:



I was going to make some allioli to go with it, but it was clear that no one wanted more than a bit of lemon juice. The photo doesn't capture how earthy and wonderful they were, served with a potato & leek soup and garlic ginger carrots.

We'll be making these again, and more salt cod for sure.

[David A. Goldfarb]

That looks really appealing, Chris. Nice photos, too!

[ChrisTaylor]

Chris: reckon those fritters (which would no longer be fritters, I guess) would pan-fry okay?

[Chris Amirault]

Think so, sure. You might want to coat them in panko or something just before they hit the pan.

You'll want to adjust the fish:potato ratio to your liking. I was following that Norwegian recipe at first but 250:200 seemed insufficiently potato-y.

[LindaK]

Chris, those fritters look fantastic. The addition of smoked paprika is inspired. I will give you full credit when I shamelessly plagarize the idea.

Finally, regarding freezing salt cod: I would not freeze unsoaked salted cod. I've not tried it myself, but I've read that the salt crystals in the fish tend to degrade the meat when frozen. Soaked salted cod freezes very well, however. I very often soak cod for 3 or 4 meals every time, and simply freeze what I don't use within the first day or two. Treat fully soaked cod as you would any other fresh fish.

hansjoakim, thank you for the history and for the web site, I see some good ideas there. As for the counsel against freezing, I hope that turns out not to be true, since I froze 2 lbs on the advice of the shop that sold it to me. I'm actually defrosting 1 lb now, and I'm treating it like other frozen fish by defrosting it slowly in the fridge. I'll report back on what the texture is like. But I love that you can freeze pre-soaked cod--imagine craving salt cod in the morning and cooking it the same night!

[Dianabanana]

Finally, regarding freezing salt cod: I would not freeze unsoaked salted cod. I've not tried it myself, but I've read that the salt crystals in the fish tend to degrade the meat when frozen. Soaked salted cod freezes very well, however. I very often soak cod for 3 or 4 meals every time, and simply freeze what I don't use within the first day or two. Treat fully soaked cod as you would any other fresh fish.

I'm inclined to believe this is true, since the truly dry dried cod I've had was better than the semi-dried frozen, but if so, then why in the world is most salt cod sold frozen in the US? It's infinitely more expensive to maintain it in a freezer. Perhaps the cost savings comes in not having to dry it so thoroughly?

[Chris Amirault]

When vice and I were cruising fish stores on the RI coast we were puzzled by an entire freezer section taken up with wooden boxes of salt cod....

[ChrisTaylor]

My first effort



I cooked the salt cod in some light stock and then shredded it with a couple of forks and mixed it into mashed potatoes (no fat was used when mashing the potatoes, I might add). Some fried-off diced onions and garlic are in there too.

This was my first experience with salt cod and I wasn't sure what to expect. When I smelt the just-cooked cod I was sure I'd hate it--there's something about that 'fishy' smell that I really don't like (see also: the smell of just-boiled/steamed crab). I kept the ratio of cod:potato pretty much on par with a few of the dip recipes I saw, although I didn't dick around with scales or any such thing. Indeed, I was in that sort of mood where a couple of pin bones slipped past me and wound up in the rissoles. Not good. The mixture seemed to hold together okay by itself but just to be sure I added an egg. It was then sticky enough to take on panko crumbs. The 'rissoles' were fried in a mixture of butter and olive oil.

They rissoles are okay. I don't know if I'd run off to buy three pounds of the stuff to muck around with, not at the price I paid anyway. I'm not sure of the quality of the cod--I just bought it at the local Italian deli, haven't seen it at too many places, so I've no idea if it's good stuff or crap stuff in the grand salty coddy scheme of salt cod. If I was to do them again I'd probably buy salt cod from elsewhere, just to see, and I'd look at maybe shallow-frying them in canola oil or something. Rolling them smaller, even, and serving them with a sauce--tartare, perhaps--and they could make for a decent canape. Maybe it's just because this isn't some nostalgic childhood thing for me but I do feel they need some sexing up.

[hansjoakim]

I'm inclined to believe this is true, since the truly dry dried cod I've had was better than the semi-dried frozen, but if so, then why in the world is most salt cod sold frozen in the US? It's infinitely more expensive to maintain it in a freezer. Perhaps the cost savings comes in not having to dry it so thoroughly?

Hi Diana,

That is weird. Dried, salted cod (clipfish) can be stored almost a year at refrigerator temperatures, so I don't see any reason for freezing the unsoaked product. Over here you can find frozen fully soaked clipfish in supermarkets, but these products are very expensive compared to the unsoaked ones. I've never tried the frozen, soaked version, as I find part of the charm is to do this yourself. Additionally, apart from saving money, I also like to be able to control the salt-level in the salt cod myself.

[LindaK]

ChrisTaylor, your fritters look wonderful so I'm sorry you didn't care for them. Salt cod can be an acquired taste, even among those of use who grew up with it. My sisters would never eat it as kids unless they could smother the cod cakes in ketchup (which is oddly good, btw).

If you decide to try again, maybe given them an extra day soak, some cod really needs it. I'd also suggest poaching it in a water/milk mixture--the milk really does mellow the flavor, which is why some people suggest soaking it in milk too. I've never seen a recipe in which it's poached in stock, I'm not sure what that would do to the flavor. As for the finished dish, you might be happier with a simple brandade or one of the gratins (either cream or tomato based sauces) where the cod is only a small part of the finished dish. Maybe someone else has ideas for best "first salt cod experiences" ??

As for the question of freezing it, it's not something I've ever done before. I did it this time because I had 4 lbs of salt cod sitting on my kitchen counter and as we all know, it has a certain odor. I wrapped it well, but even in the fridge it was still noticeable and I was afraid of other foods absorbing it. I tried the freezer to see if it would neutralize the odor, which it did. Ordinarily I only buy it as needed, so this was unusual. I don't know why stores would do it.

[Chris Amirault]

I'd also suggest using a lot more fat as a cooking medium.

One thing I remembered as I prepared the cod was that I really, really hate the smell of the cooked skin. I don't know what happens to it, but, man oh man, that's a familiar stink from way back when, and, iirc, my forebears didn't remove it when they prepared things. Yuck.

[ChrisTaylor]

It wasn't salty at all so I don't think that was the issue. The cod flavour wasn't offensive ... it just didn't excite me at all. It was very bland. In fact, I probably put too much potato, even though I've seen plenty of recipes with a roughly 50:50 ratio of cod:potato. That may have been part of the issue. The cod flavour just didn't stand up to the potato all that well--which is why I kicked around the possibility that maybe the cod was of poor quality.

Does poaching/soaking the fish in milk give it a milky taste at all? Silly question, perhaps, but I don't get along with the taste of milk.

[LindaK]

Poaching salt cod with milk makes the flavor milder and the texture more tender, which is why I usually don't do it. It was a good trick to know, though, when I baked the fillet above--it tasted much more like fresh cod that way.

From your description of your finished dish as bland, it sounds to me as if it needed salt. Really. Once the cod is well soaked and poached, you can't count on it to add salt to the other ingredients, especially anything quick-cooked. And potatoes always seem to need salt. So would not assume that your fish was of poor quality. To the contrary, I find that poor quality salt cod is always overly fishy flavored and salty, no matter how much you soak it.

I've been looking over my surprisingly large roster of salt cod recipes for something untraditional that would meet your criteria for something a little more "sexed up" and think I have hit on one. But since the cod's only been soaking since this morning and I'll be eating out tomorrow night, it will have to wait until Monday.

[ChrisTaylor]

Let me know how it goes.

I was leaning, initially, towards a Spanish recipe with a capsicum and paprika sauce ... but did the fritters instead because I was concerned the sauce would dominate the flavour of the cod.

[LindaK]

Chris, those sound like good flavors for salt cod, I hope one of these days you'll give it a try.

[ChrisTaylor]

I will. I try everything at least three times. In fact, I'll probably swing by the deli later this week and grab another 500 grams or so.

Edited by ChrisTaylor, 15 January 2011 - 04:13 PM.

[djyee100]

Another possibility for salt cod, in a spicy tomato sauce with pasta. I discovered this one while flipping thru Rosetta Costantino's My Calabria cookbook last night. I haven't tried it, of course, but I'm curious about it.

The recipe is on Googlebooks, page 71. Here:

http://books.google.com/books?id=86R77RdzTj8C&pg=PA71&lpg=PA71&dq=costantino+spaghetti+with+salt+cod+spicy+tomato+sauce&source=bl&ots=vW5jHJJsc2&sig=rOslSufhwnhVKPDItxZuYuP3YmU&hl=en&ei=Zy4yTeOGDI64sAPNsoytBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

[LindaK]

Just a quick update with last night's experiment. I am looking forward to reading some of these recent recommendations.

So--ChrisTaylor wanted a sexy salt cod dish, and I’ve found one: “Salt Cod Cakes with Aioli” from Big Small Plates by Cindy Pawlcyn, Pablo Jacinto and Ernesto Jacinto. This recipe takes the classic cod cake and definitely makes it modern.

The cod is poached in water/milk made aromatic with spices, fresh ginger and jalapeno. Once cooked and flaked, it’s bound by a flavorful mashed potato mixture that includes fresh herbs (I used parsley and cilantro), scallions, jalapeno, onion, celery, and aioli. The finished cod cakes are breaded in panko and deep dried, then served on a salad and topped with a bit of aioli and a tomatillo-avocado salsa. I don’t have access to tomatillas this time of year so I improvised with some jazzed up guacamole.





These were fantastic. The flavors were vibrant and balanced, the crispy exterior a perfect foil for the chunky, creamy filling. The aioli and avocado toppings were gilding the lily, really, but a great match. And despite all that was happening, you could still taste the rich flavor of the salt cod. The cakes were good sized, so with the salad would be an excellent starter or light meal.

I’m still looking forward to trying other salt cod classics, but must admit that I’m already searching for an excuse to make these again. A bit time consuming but certainly special enough for company--even a salt cod novice!

[Peter the eater]

My mother was raised in Labrador, and salt cod n' brewis was a fairly regular dish. Salt cod and Purity-brand hard tack are fried together and served with fried salt pork fat back.

When I visit the in-laws at Conception Bay, Newfoundland they make us traditional fishcakes using salt cod.

For hundreds of years people in these parts would lay out the cleaned and salted cod on spruce flakes to dry in the sun and air. Cod is the reason why England made this place their 1st permanent colony in North America.

[Jenni]

You should definitely look to the Caribbean for some interesting salt cod (commonly called salt fish there) recipes. My favourite (though my Trini blood does make me biased) is Buljol. Served with fresh bakes and you have a true Trinidadian breakfast.

[LindaK]

Last night I made salt cod and shrimp fritters to serve with drinks. No photos, sorry, I’d forgotten to recharge the camera battery.

The recipe came from David Leite’s The New Portuguese Table and varies from the standard salt cod fritter recipe in a couple of interesting ways:

Adding chopped shrimp. It adds sweetness to the fritter and the salt cod becomes an earthy backnote. Leite says that this recipe is “ideal for those still acquiring a taste for salt cod” and he’s right.

Separating the egg used for binding, and whipping the egg white before folding it in at the very end. Between the cod and potato, fritters can sometimes be heavy. As you’d expect, this resulted in a fritter that was lighter than usual. I noticed this same technique in some of the salt cod recipes in the Norwegian site that hansjoakin posted earlier, too, so I imagine it would be easy to import this technique into any fritter recipe if this appeals to you. I liked the results a lot and will use it again.

I need to read up on the Caribbean use of salt cod. The Pawlcyn recipe introduced me to the salt cod and chili combination, and it's delicious and addictive.

[LindaK]

Back again, with 3 lbs of salt cod waiting for inspiration. Over the past weeks, I’ve been reading, trying to learn more about the use of salt cod outside of my comfort zone of fritters and brandade.

Information is scattered. One of the few books I’ve found with extensive information and recipes on salt cod is Coleman Andrew’s Catalan Cuisine, recommended above. It has a rice dish that looks fabulous—except that you don’t soak the cod before cooking with it. Hmm. Does anyone have experience with that technique?

I would love other reading suggestions, especially about Caribbean cuisine, which looks fascinating—lots of greens, legumes, and scotch bonnet chilies.

But in the meantime, last night I made a small batch of the salt cod and shrimp fritters, mostly because I’m trying to take advantage of Maine shrimp before the season ends. They are so sweet, they actually dominate the flavor here, but in a good way. This time I took a picture.





I'll be more adventurous with the next post.

[Chris Amirault]

They look great. What's the green?

[OliverB]

How timely again! I just read about salt cod in the intro chapters of My Calabria (a really nice looking book!) and I've been curious about this stuff for a long time.

The book echoes what was said here, don't buy the box or even shrink wrapped, since you often get one nice piece on top, lots of bits and pieces underneath. Go to Italian markets and look there, the piece the OP posted here is gorgeous! I'll have to check around here, have only seen it once (bought it, forgot it in the back of the fridge.....) and I can't remember where, think Asian market.

[LindaK]

Last night’s dinner was remojón, a Spanish salad of oranges and salt cod that I first discovered in Paula Wolfert’s Mediterranean Cooking.





It’s a specialty of the Andalusia and the basic recipe is very simple: orange supremes, salt cod, vinaigrette of sherry vinegar and olive oil, black olives. Most recipes add hard boiled eggs to make a more substantial meal.

The method of cooking the cod is entirely new to me: the unsalted cod is toasted under a hot broiler until lightly browned, then it is soaked. Later, it’s flaked and tossed with the vinaigrette and the oranges, then allowed to marinate—almost like a ceviche.

The combination of sweet-savory-salty flavors is delicious, though I am not sure I got the balance exactly right on this first try (a bit too much vinaigrette). Instead of oranges, I used tangelos, as Paula suggested, which are a little more tart. I will make this again—together, the bright, juicy citrus and rich fish really hit the spot in the middle of winter.

You need some good bread to mop up the lovely juices. I put together an olive fougasse, one of the few breads I know how to make.





Chris, the greens in the fritters above are just parsley and cilantro. They do contribute flavor, not just pretty color.

[Chris Amirault]

Wow -- broiled first? Did you notice any effects from that step?

[LindaK]

Chris, that's a very interesting question, I'm glad you asked.

Paula Wolfert wrote that the toasting step would make it easier to pull the salt cod into strips. And it's true that the quick broil cooked the fish a bit--the outside layer began to flake, so that later, after soaking, it was easy to pinch a section of the cod and peel it off into neat pieces.

However, there was something else going on. I watched it carefully while it was under the broiler (how quickly can salt cod burn? I did not want to find out) and noticed a slightly frothy layer forming a light crust on top--that's what was browning. I investigated--meaning, I plucked off a small piece of the "crust" and took a taste--and ran for the water bottle. Pure salt. The heat was pulling the residual moisture from the fish, which brought salt with it. It was so unexpected that I took a picture. A bad picture, but you can see that the nice smooth surface of the fish looks all lumpy and bumpy:





That's all salt. As soon as I put it into a bowl of water to soak, it completely dissolved and looked like a smooth piece of fish again. The result was that the desalting process was much faster than usual. When I tasted the soaked fish after 24 hrs, it was ready to use. In fact maybe it had soaked too long.

I had wondered at the recipes I'd seen for remojón that called for a soak of only a few hours or overnight. Depending on the saltiness of your fish, that now makes sense. Keep in mind that I had rinsed the exterior salt from the cod (and patted it dry) before putting it under the broiler. That salty crust clearly came from the interior of the fish. Now, you still need the soak to reconstitute the dried cod, since it isn't going to be poached. But this toasting step seems crucial for using salt cod in this "ceviche" style.

[Blether]

... I try everything at least three times...

ChrisTaylor, what Brits call "fish cakes" are a ready-made supermarket standard there, and a popular dish to prepare at home. The normal fish/spud ratio is indeed 50:50. I've talked about them from time to time on eG - once here with a photo.

I think it's important to taste the mixture before breading & frying. They can be very bland - salt, yes of course. Otherwise the usual suspects to give some zing - lemon, parsley. The Brit standard, again, uses white pepper. Of course plenty of other things work if you've a mind to use them - black pepper, garlic, you can think up a list just as well as I can.

Chris A, I too think smoked paprika is a great choice, and I think "earthy and wonderful" is spot-on.

[LindaK]

Garbanzos con bacalao --Chickpea stew with salt cod





Like every other traditional recipe, there are lots of variations out there. I used one that I found on José Andrés’s web site: here

This was not a great success. Too much pimentón, I wonder if the recipe should read teaspoons rather than tablespoons. But I like the concept, and it came together quickly—thanks to having pre-soaked salt cod in the freezer—so I’ll play around with the combination again. If anyone has a good recipe for this, please share.