Atkins fish cakes

[jackal10]

"We haven't had fish cakes in a long time"...

How do you make fish cakes without carbs? No potato, no batter, no crumbs for coating. Can't do chinese style, since that is basically held together with cornstarch.

I made them like quenelle. WHizzed some raw fish, egg white and cream for the base, then added flaked cooked fish, sauteed onion, parsley seasoning. Shallow fried.

Taste was great, and they held together fine, but the texture wasn't quite right - slightly grainy, and without the smootheness and unctioness that the potato gives.

I don't want to use Atkins pseudo bread or flour products. Any suggestions?

[Nick]

Take a break from the Atkins diet and eat some fish cakes. Real ones, potato and all. We've got to break the rules once in awhile.

[mamster]

I can answer this in three words: tod mun pla, Thai fish cakes. Grind whitefish and mix with shallot, chiles, garlic, cilantro, galangal, fish sauce, and perhaps a few long beans or other sort of greenery. Fry. Fall in love all over again.

[Msk]

Jackal,

First, I would direct you here. Its the support newsgroup for low carb, search it and you will find numerous recipes and substitution possibilities. When I was (and still am to a certain extent) doing atkins it was an amazing resource.

Batter is a tough one (Just eggs?), but people often suggested ground pork rinds as a substitute for bread crumbs. There are numerous other low carb suggestions there as well, but I'm in a rush at the moment.

Good luck

Msk

Edited December 9, 2003 by Msk (log)

[edemuth]

Chesapeake House Crab Cakes

and

Maryland-Style Crab Cakes

[Ling]

Make them the regular carb-y way, and take a carb blocker half an hour before eating.

I've never tried a carb blocker though, so I'm not sure if they work. I've read that they work on starch carbs, but not sugar carbs.

Edited December 11, 2003 by Ling (log)

[lorea]

Add ground flax seeds and egg. That should give it a smooth texture, and make you regular too! :P

(Sorry, I just had to put that in....after low-carbing it for 2 months, I got sick of eating flax seeds.)

[Ling]

another option is an egg and a bit of soy flour

[jackal10]

I think I have cracked an acceptable low-carb fish cake.

Recipe is http://recipes.egullet.com/recipes/r836.html

Key is to invert the process for diet foods of replacing fat with starches...

[ExtraMSG]

I just had a Thai cooking class and we made tod mun pla. Yum. And definitely Atkin's friendly. Try these I found googling:

http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Plains/3644/todmun.html

[Jonathan Day]

Jack's initial comment about the texture not being quite right in his first attempt at Atkins fishcakes reminded me of experiments with different ways of making brandade de morue. Some French authors insist that potato appears in classic recipes only as an economy measure. If I recall Raymond Oliver's method, he used no potato but insisted that the skin of the salt cod be incorporated, and that the resulting mixture be very, very thoroughly pureed. I did this with a food processor rather than a mortar and tamis, but let the machine run for a long, long time, until the mixture was very smooth and forced it through a sieve afterward. The result was creamy and unctuous. So for the fishcakes or quenelles, very thorough processing could be important.

If the fishcakes are very lightly breaded, how many crumbs (and hence forbidden carbs) does that contribute? On the "sensible Atkins" regime I am using, which avoids most starchy carbohydrates but does allow the occasional apple or bite of wholemeal bread or potato, I would think that a few grams of breadcrumbs would be OK.

[jackal10]

No need to breadcumb...fry directly

[mpav]

How about cheese as a binder?