Seafood Made Simple: Grilled mackerel with vegetable escabeche

Grilled Mackerel with Vegetable Escabeche prepared by Aishling Moore. Picture Chani Anderson.

This August I was very kindly invited by Kate McCabe and Max Sussman of US based Irish travel company Bog and Thunder to cook in Detroit.

Max opened a bagel shop this year called Bev’s bagels and suggested we might host an outdoor pop up dinner there.

At Bev’s, they only serve wild fish, so this kind of collaboration was right up my street.

Their signature lox bagel, Salmons in the Stream, is filled with wild sockeye salmon with a green goddess cream cheese schmear and briny capers.

Our menu was made up of some bagel shop-suitable Goldie classics with a cured sable fish pastrami, served with Ruben dressing, pickled mustard seeds and sauerkraut.

A panzanella salad with the most beautiful tomatoes grown two blocks away at Fisheye farm, mussel escabeche and day old Bev’s bagels crisped up in the oven before being marinated with the tomatoes and mussel escabeche.

We barbequed some local butterflied trout seasoned with Kinsale sea salt and served it with a dulse seaweed butter sauce, wilted greens and massive mounds of Goldie colcannon.

This weekend’s recipe, a barbequed mackerel served with a vegetable escabeche, is the perfect summer seafood recipe.

You’ll typically find that the seafood itself is ‘en escabeche’. Meaning gently cooked in oil, spices and vinegar. One of my favourite versions of this is the mussel escabeche I cooked at Bev’s.

It’s also a brilliant process to apply vegetables. It’s one of those dishes that’s better the next day, allowing the flavours to mingle a little longer. 

It's great served with this barbequed mackerel, but is also fabulous with baked or pan-fried fish if you’d prefer to avoid lighting the barbecue, and serves as a wonderful sandwich filling.

This vegetable escabeche recipe is very versatile, so use whatever vegetables you have at hand.

Grilled Mackerel with vegetable escabeche

recipe by:Aishling Moore

This vegetable escabeche recipe is very versatile, so use whatever vegetables you have at hand.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 30 mins

Cooking Time

 20 mins

Total Time

 50 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• For the mackerel:

• 4 whole mackerel (gutted and butterflied)

• 2tb rapeseed oil

• Fine salt

• For the vegetable escabeche:

• 100g green beans

• 100ml rapeseed oil

• 1 bay leaf

• 2 cloves garlic, sliced

• 1 carrot, finely sliced in rounds

• 1 red bell pepper, sliced

• 1 small courgette, sliced in rounds

• 2tsp smoked paprika

• 50ml apple cider vinegar

• Sea salt

Method

1. For the mackerel:

2. Light your barbecue at least 30 minutes before you intend to cook. It’s vital when barbequing fish to cook at the highest heat possible to avoid the fish sticking to the bars.

3. Lightly grease the whole mackerel with rapeseed oil and season with fine sea salt.

4. Place the whole fish on the hottest part of the barbecue, be careful when doing so as the oil droplets may catch.

5. Cook the mackerel on one side for 8-10 minutes until charred, depending on the size of the fish.

6. When barbequing fish, it is important to only turn the fish once, minimising the damage you can cause to the exterior and to prevent the fish from sticking. Use a fish slice to free the fish from the bars of the barbecue and turn using a pair of heat-proof kitchen tongs.

7. For the vegetable escabeche:

8. Bring a small pot of water to the boil and season with sea salt. Add the green beans and blanch for 1 minute. Remove and shock in a bowl of ice water. Leave for two minutes, remove from the water and set aside.

9. In a medium-sized heavy-based saucepan, heat the rapeseed oil on medium-low heat, add the bay leaf and garlic and cook softly for four to five minutes.

10. Add the sliced carrot, courgette and bell pepper. Season with sea salt and cook for three minutes. Add the smoked paprika and cook for 30 seconds.

11. Add the apple cider vinegar and cook for 1 minute.

12. Remove from the heat, discard the bay leaf. Add the green beans, toss and allow to sit for 30 minutes before serving.

Panel of tips

• I love barbequing butterflied whole fish; but it can be a little tricker with sticking. The frame of the fish certainly helps with turning and removing. Barbecue the fish whole if you feel more comfortable.
• If you’d like to have a go at cooking a butterflied fish over the barbecue, ask your fishmonger to prepare the fish for you (though you should still watch out for smaller bones).
• If you’d prefer to steer clear of the barbecue you could alternatively cook the fish under a preheated grill at the highest temperature setting.
• The best way to check that the fish is cooked through is by using a thermometer. Always insert into the thickest part of the fish.
• This vegetable escabeche will keep for up to three days in the fridge.