On a recent trip to the Yucatan peninsula, I happened upon a superb rendition of a semi-poached fish dish. It’s about as simple as it gets: poaching the fish in its native seawater, but the results are a gorgeously plump, succulent and meltaway fish. Alessandro, Genoan chef and co-owner of Posada Margherita explained the cooking method:
“You cook the fresh snapper in olive oil with whole cloves of garlic, and when the olive oil gets very hot – but not hot enough to burn the garlic -- you put in one glass (wine glass?) of seawater, the juice of one lemon, then toss in fresh chopped tomatoes and and cover until the fish is cooked through.”
I considered filling a plastic water bottle with the Carribean’s finest to recreate the magic, but decided against it (after recalling a sour memory this summer of taking a pre-emptive swig from a bottle full of Rocky Mountain lake water before the purification tablets had run their course, ewww.) Instead, I recreated “seawater” by diluting my Fauchon “Sel de Mer” in boiling water: 3 Tbsp. per 1 cup of water. Another option is plain Sel Gris, which has a high content of sea minerals.
However, you can’t discount using a snapper that’s been freshly snatched from its seawater to achieve the original dish’s level of outrageous deliciousness.
RECIPE
Fish Cooked in Sea Water (As recounted by Alessandro and interpreted by me)
1/3 c. Olive oil
1 lb Fresh Snapper fillet
8 Whole garlic cloves
1 Wine glass of "seawater" (see below)
2-3 Fresh plum tomatoes, seeded & chopped
Juice of 1 lemon
Boil water and dissolve 1 Tbsp. of Sel de Mer or Sel Gris in 1 cup of hot water. Set aside. Heat the olive oil in a skillet. Clean the snapper and pat dry. Season lightly with pepper. Add garlic cloves to the oil in pan & swirl around to seaons olive oil cook for 1 minute on medium to high heat. Add the snapper, cook 3-4 minutes while the oil continues to get very hot, but the garlic cloves do not burn. Add the 1 cup of faux seawater, juice of lemon, chopped tomatoes. Reduce heat to medium and cover. Cook unti snapper is opaque throughout.
