Thankful feelings and Fish with a face!

After the Thanksgiving Bobotie was gone and Marc's parents left to make their way back to SC, Marc too went out the door for a long weekend with his friends from college and to play in a reunion concert with Deep River (his old band). I began to decorate the Christmas tree (alone) with only the dogs and some Christmas music to comfort me. All was quiet and I was at once alone with my thoughts. I thought about my family and friends, my life over the past few years, and my life over the past few months. This life thing is pretty interesting. I gave a lot of thought to who I was just over a year ago and I am amazed at the progress I have made in just one year.

Here I am a college student with goals and dreams. Things that I didn't have before. Hell, two years ago had you told me that I was going to be striving to get into graduate school I would have laughed in your face...or simply said " I wish". I am finally able to say and mean it when I say I am thankful for tragedy. Now don't get me wrong I would give anything to have my Grandmother and Father back, but I their deaths have pushed me out of the comfort zone and closer to the woman that both of them wanted me to be. Turns out this whole "dream pursuing thing" is pretty rewarding. I am enjoying the getting there as much as I assume I will enjoy reaching the goal.

I have found new projects and passions, and while they may seem a little Martha Stewart-ish I am glad to have some hobby's to fill my time. I have been jealous of Marc for years because he had music and computers, and I had nothing. Now I have a weekly project that excites me so much I can't wait for Wednesday's to roll around. I have a gardening project that is growing so big in my mind that I am ready for winter (my second favorite season) to be over with so I can begin planting and playing in the yard.

I am also thankful that I got my Christmas present early. I got a good friend. I am thankful that I was introduced to Christine and even more excited that she is someone who is on the same road I am walking down...she is just a few miles ahead. I am delighted to befriend someone that is into the same things I am and is far better at them than me. She is going to get so tired of me picking her brain over gardening stuff and spice stuff. Thankfully, she thinks the International Market is as amazing as I do. It took almost three years to find them but YES there are people like Marc and I in Smyrna! :)

Now for the meal of the week...our taste buds journeyed to the British Virgin Islands were we (minus Marc who ate Chicken nuggets due to his fish allergy) tasted Boiled Fish and Fungi.

Let me preface by saying that this meal (even with all the spices) was very bland. After the rich flavors of Afghanistan and South Africa this simple fish dish didn't live up to the flavorful meals of past weeks. It was good, and from this I did learn that I like snapper (though not as much as Sadie) and I discovered a few new ingredients that I never knew existed in the past.


BOILED FISH AND FUNGI



Ingredients (for the fish)

• 2 whole 1lb.Fish I figured that I would start with the obvious. It took me a ton of research to figure out the actual fish this dish called for. It was tricky because it is assumed that you are in the British Virgin Islands and can go cast your line out in the open ocean. Whatever you catch is the fish you would use. So for those of us who don't fish...or are land locked like myself I found that Red Snapper is the most often used fish followed by grouper. Also you may get lucky like I did and have the people at the market clean it, gut it and descale it for you. Thankfully that is one lesson that I do not have to include here. :)
• 1 sprig of fresh Thyme
• 4 sprigs of fresh Parsley
• 2 scotch bonnets (I have no idea what they are) OR other fresh hot chile. I chose Serrano peppers. Stemmed, seeded and chopped.
• 1/2 ripe plantain peeled and thickly sliced. Plantains look like banana's and are good when the skin is black
• 3 tsp vegetable oil
  
• 2 limes
• 1 yellow onion peeled and thinly sliced
• 1 small green bell pepper stemmed, seeded and chopped
• 1 celery stalk thinly sliced
• 2 cloves of garlic peeled and finely chopped
• 2 tbsp white vinegar
• 1 small malanga. This part of the recipe came to be a tad more difficult than it needed to be. My dear friend Christine accompanied me to the International Market to shop for the ingredients...well due to some confusion and everyone's (and I do mean everyone) inability to read on this day I ended up purchasing a galanga.
  

This is a malanga! This is what you need! And thank you to Marc and Jason that went out to the store to purchase the correct thing to save this meal!

This is a galanga. We have no idea what it is or what to make with it but we have one. Please do not buy a galanga for this recipe and hopefully Christine will figure out what on earth you do with it so that both of our minds can be at ease. Hell for all we know it could be the most delicious thing on earth. Here's hoping!



And don't forget to peel the malanga. A spoon is Christine's weapon of choice for this task.



For The Fungi (Ingredients)

• 1 2/3 cups white cornmeal
• 1/2 cup finely chopped okra
• 2 tsp butter
  

Method

Like I stated before hopefully you can get cleaned, gutted and descaled fish, but if not this would be the time that you take care of that.



Place fish juice out of the bag into the dogs bowls so they can sample the coming dinner attraction.



Get all of your ingredients together and pose with your new friends (i named them Lucy and Ethel) as your friend takes a commemorative picture of your utter idiocy.





I did not time this recipe well because it called for you to do three things at once with out letting you know that.
First get a small sauce pot and put your oil, peppers, onion, celery, garlic, bell peppers, 1/2 of your chiles (the other half cooks with the fish) and your vinegar in it on medium heat to cook until veggies are soft. This will take longer than your fish so make sure you start it first.

Next take 1 cup salted water and bring to a boil (and no it didn't say how salty...put in as much as you like)Add your okra and cook until its soft and looks like slime.

We are multi-tasking here so I hope you are keeping up!

In a large deep skillet put 6 cups of water (the recipe called for 8 but that was WAY too much), 2 sprigs of parsley, half the chiles, and the thyme. Bring to a simmer over medium heat.

Add your fish, the plantains and your malanga. The water should just cover the fish.

Squeeze the juice of one lime into the broth and every few minutes spoon some of the broth over the fish. The fish will cook quickly. Mine was finished in just over 10 minutes.

Now here is where I got all screwed up. The recipe assumes that you already know how to make fungi...this seems pretty presumptuous for a recipe, but I digress.

I made the cornmeal like I make grits. Just enough water (eyeballed) to cook the 1 2/3 cups of cornmeal. Once the cornmeal is almost done add your okra slime and mix together with the 2 tsp of butter.

If all times out appropriately your veggies will be soft, the fungi will be complete and the fish will be ready...all at the same time.

This is what my finished product looked like.

TO EAT...
Well the truly exciting part of this meal happened when we sat down to eat. We talked and discussed ways that this meal could have more flavor, meanwhile we all laughed as Sadie began to look as though she was a drug addict that needed a fix. Who knew that fish was her thing, but she really liked it.

Of course there has to be something said for having a fish carcass on your table...you can play with it once you are done eating.



This is not the best picture of me but this is my icky reaction to pulling the eyeball out for Sadie.



She showed nice manners and ate it right off the fork. Gross I know, but totally funny.




And with that I leave you...hoping that if you decide to make fish you will find a better recipe. But if you do make this dish please do so with the company of fun people so that you too can have a blackmail picture that looks like this.