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Hake steaks in garlic sauce with clams
Serves 4 Starters and mains
Ingredients
- 4 hake steaks about 2cm thick
- 2tbsp dry white wine
- 400g clams washed and any opened that don’t close when tapped discarded
- 8 cloves garlic, 5 very thinly sliced and 3 crushed to a paste with a few sea salt crystals
- 100ml olive oil
- 2tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 2tbsp flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
Method
Hake steak exudes a creamy liquid when heated gently and agitated, which makes a lovely sauce but care must be taken to ensure it doesn’t burn.
Put the hake on a tray and sprinkle lightly with a little sea salt crystals and leave for 5 minutes.
Put the wine in a saucepan large enough to take all the clams. Add the clams, cover and cook on a medium high heat for a few minutes until they have all opened. Any that don’t open throw away. Strain through a colander set over a bowl to catch the juices, cover the clams and leave them to drain over the bowl.
Put the thinly sliced garlic in a heavy frying pan large enough to take the hake in a single layer. Add the olive oil only and heat very gently so the garlic slowly turns golden while flavouring the oil. Remove the garlic to a plate and set aside.
Pour the oil from the frying pan into a measuring jug. Measure 3tbsp of the oil and put back into the pan. Pat the fish with kitchen paper to remove excess moisture and put into the warm oil. Cook over a very low heat moving the pan in a circular motion continually so the fish moves gently, not just the pan. You need to keep taking the pan off the heat so the fish just oozes its juice into the oil, making an emulsion just like a mayonnaise. Turn the fish after about 4 minutes. Add the rest of the warm oil from the jug a little at a time (add the extra virgin olive oil for the last minute of cooking for flavour) while the fish cooks to form a thickening sauce. Continue to cook the fish for another 4 minutes or until almost cooked.
When all the oil has been added, carefully remove the fish onto a plate and cover with foil to keep it warm. Put the emulsion back on the heat and add the crushed garlic and a little of the clam juices at a time (pour gently leaving any grit behind) to make a creamy sauce. Put the fish back in the sauce along with the parsley and continue to cook for about 4 minutes. Add the clams to heat through just before serving and sprinkle with the fried garlic.
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