Dorada del Mar Menor a la Sal

Despite living on an island, I only made fish in Sicily once.  Early on a Saturday morning I walked up Balestrate's single main road and stopped at the seafood truck parked across from the enoteca offering wine on tap.  I was set on buying a whole fish but knew I only wanted enough for a single portion. (My friend, having lost her taste for the bounty of the sea following countless hours of mussel de-bearding at a local restaurant, had declined my dinner invitation.) I spotted a crate filled with a smallish species and when I asked for just one the vendor didn't even bother weighing my purchase.  After handing over a euro I located the empty water bottle in the bottom of my bag and crossed the street to have it filled with white wine for one euro more.

Made this..

That night, with the double doors opened onto the piazza, Italian music videos playing from the little TV and my apron securely fastened, I was imagining a perfectly executed fillet, accompanied by my bulk wine and enjoyed on the balcony.  I knew that having the right knife is imperative for prepping fish, but while my apartment came fully-furnished, a well-honed, sturdy but flexible blade had not been included alongside the set of dull steak knifes.  The last thing I remember thinking was "ah, it can't make that much of a difference, right?"  and from there things quickly devolved into the culinary equivalent of cutting one's own bangs; a little more here, a little more there, until there's practically nothing left and a shamefaced scramble to remedy the situation ensues.  After disgracing the creature with my hack job, I ended up with about three tablespoons of fish pulp, but thanks to my properly stocked Sicilian pantry I had lots of breadcrumbs and pine nuts on hand to help salvage the remains. By then it was too cold to eat outside but I set the table for my impromptu fried fish cake, decanted fifty cents worth of the wine from its plastic container and finished off my first and last foray into Sicilian pesce.

Upon arriving in Murcia I started to hear about the Mar Menor--a nearby saltwater lagoon separated from the Mediterranean by a narrow sandbar and renowned for its fish and scampi.  The cookbooks and tourism pamphlets talk about it like the Land of Oz, describing the splendor of crystal clear waters where gray mullet, monk fish and sea bass dance and the fishermen bring these "gods of the sea" to market every day.  One of the first recipes that caught my eye was for Dorada, another exalted species from the Mar Menor, and I was determined to try my hand at whole fish again.  I also knew there was a shop nearby that proudly specified the illustrious origin of its catch.

Pepper peelings

One of my favorite things about Spain is that a lot of the butchers and fishmongers here are women, and this pescadería has an all-female crew.  After receiving advice on which Dorada to select when baking them in a salt crust, as well as a surprise free lemon in my bag, I set off with very little time to spare before lunch.  After rushing home I realized all of the recipes I had were very clear about the baking time (20 minutes on the dot), but none of my books actually stated the temperature at which to bake them.  Luckily Google España provided the answer and willing the oven to pre-heat at double speed I laid the fish on their bed of salt. I poured the rest of the bag on top, nuked some potatoes for a hurried version of smashed spuds and grabbed the container of roasted red peppers I had been marinating in garlic from the fridge.

The front door opened with four minutes still on the clock and knowing that Yolanda had hardly any time to eat that day, assured her she'd have a fork in hand soon.  My oven timer finally went off and I was brushing the salt away with much anticipation when I heard "que barbaridad!"- one of my roommate's signature exclamatory remarks.  In the context I wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing but when I looked back she was just peering over my shoulder intently to observe, never having seen such a cooking method before in her life. (When I first met her and asked if she had any favorite family recipes she replied that her mom's specialty was buying pre-made meals.)  Trying to hide my concern that the fish would be completely over or under cooked (my recipes detailed cracking open the crust before serving and my grains of salt hadn't even formed a thin shell) I put out our plates and went to work finishing the potatoes.  Yolanda, with hands in her lap, was still staring blankly at her fish.  She looked up at me like a kid working on a particularly difficult story problem involving locomotive speeds and asked "so..how do I start?"  Holding my breath a little I pulled back the skin and was relieved to find that  the Mar Menor had indeed delivered up "simplicidad y exquisitez, imposible", just like the reverent cookbook authors had promised.

With that

As we ate I told Yolanda that a classic Murcian rice dish prepared with fish broth was on the docket for the following week and that our Dorada bones would make a perfect foundation.  After listening to more of my seafood-based aspirations she gestured to the skeleton on her plate and with a sense of accomplishment said "y...al final!" showing me that despite her earlier hesitations about the large size of her portion she had picked it clean.  I beamed, happy that she had enjoyed her lunch and that I was one step closer to boiling up my first fish stock.  As she cleared the table I flipped open one of my cookbooks and thought wistfully about fish carcasses and bay leaves.  A minute later the sound of the trash can popping open snapped me out of my daydream and I turned around just in time to see Yolanda absent-mindedly scraping the last of her Dorada bones into the bin.  We both started laughing as she let out an impressively creative string of Spanish expletives, knowing how attached I can get to my endeavors in making local recipes from scratch.  I taught her the phrase "no big deal" and began musing over the thought of a personal tutorial from the fishmonger, sorting through scraps with her and learning the best ones to use for my next dish from the Murcianos' salty little sea.

Dorada a la sal

Ingredients
1 Dorada (gilt-head bream) per person, about 14 oz each
Coarse sea salt

-Preheat oven to 335 degrees Fahrenheit
-Pour salt on baking sheet and pat down to form an even layer
-Lay the fish on top of the salt bed and use the rest to cover the fish completely
-Bake for 20 minutes, brush the salt off of the fish and serve
-Do not reuse salt

Roasted red peppers
Every recipe I've seen for roasted red peppers calls for placing them on a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil, but on a day when I had to use our one baking sheet for something else I found a couple of old ceramic dishes in a drawer and used those instead.  Now I only use this method because it captures all the great juices from the peppers instead of losing them tragically to the foil.

Ingredients
2 red bell peppers
2 small cloves of garlic, sliced into very thin discs
Extra virgin olive oil
Salt

-Preheat oven to 410 degrees Fahrenheit
-Place the peppers in an enamel baking dish that holds them snugly
-Roast the peppers for 45 minutes to an hour, using tongs or two forks to make quarter turns as each side gets nice and blackened
-Put the peppers in a bowl and cover with a plate until cool
-Skin and seed the peppers
-Tear the peppers into strips with your hands and place them in a container
-Pour the accumulated roasting juices into the container
-Sprinkle with salt, add the garlic and pour in a little olive oil
-Stir all the ingredients together and keep in the fridge-the peppers are tasty right away and even better after left to marinate