Aishling Moore: How to make monkfish with haricot bean, pea, and guanciale stew
Goldie: Food Marking: XX Jillian Bolger: 04/06/26: Monkfish with beans, recipe by Aishling Moore: Picture Chani Anderson
I feel very lucky indeed that I can saunter down Oliver Plunkett St, take a sharp right at Prince’s St, and pop into the English Market whenever I so choose.
We are spoilt in Cork City with such a wonderful resource. When I was picking up some locally reared lamb in O’Mahony’s butchers for Easter dinner, I spied a few packs of O’Mahony’s own guanciale.
Guanciale is an Italian cured meat made from pork cheek and is most commonly used in a classic carbonara. When thinly sliced into matchsticks and slowly cooked to render the cured fat, guanciale produces the lardon of all lardons.
At O’Mahony’s, they are using free-range pork from Peter Twomey’s Glenbrook Farm to make their guanciale. It is not only the best guanciale I have ever tasted, but I find it so very encouraging to see this level of collaboration and provenance happening in the food industry.
I have used some of that very guanciale in this weekend’s recipe: Pan-roasted monkfish with a haricot bean and pea stew. A little guanciale goes a very long way in seasoning a couple of tins of haricot beans. The pork fat emulsifies beautifully with the starchy liquor from the tinned beans.
The juice of a lemon and some fresh herbs brightens everything up and offers some relief, cutting through the fat. I have used flat leaf parsley and mint but chervil, dill, and chives would all make great additions.
Golden brown and carved monkfish tails sit atop of this bean dish elegantly, but this would be delicious too served with a pan roasted fillet of hake, ling, or pollock.
Carbon steel frying pans are my preference for cooking fish. They are excellent conductors of heat and require very little upkeep.
Preheating your frying pan is the most crucial step in pan-frying a piece of fish. The goal is to achieve an even temperature across the full surface area of the pan. Cold pockets will cause your fish to stick.
Make sure you’re using a pan that’s large enough for the number of portions you’re cooking. Avoid overcrowding the pan; each addition to a cooking surface reduces the temperature of the pan. Work in batches if needs be.
The bean stew can be made in advance and warmed whilst cooking the monkfish.
Swap the asparagus for green beans, broad beans or tenderstem broccoli.
