haddock in a tomato sauce with herbs

ingredients - info haddock celery onions carrots young leek tomatoes garlic olive oil fish stock passata all-purpose flour

tomato concentrate bay leaf thyme rosemary oregano sage lemon basil parsley dried seaweed lemon paprika powder butter pepper and salt

Haddock was not very popular in Belgium until recently. In England, on the other hand, this fish is widely eaten, salted, smoked and, above all, processed into the national dish par excellence: the fish & chips. The fish meat is slightly softer than cod. That means: be careful when baking or preparing in general. There is a supply of haddock all year round, but the best period is from July to the end of the year. In this recipe, the fish is served in a tomato sauce with different kinds of fresh herbs.

First make the sauce. Cut the carrots, onions and celery into fine brunoise. Cut the young leeks into rings. Crush a few cloves of garlic. Sauté all the vegetables in a few tablespoons of olive oil. Make a bouquet garni from bay leaf, thyme, rosemary, oregano and sage. Put it with the vegetables. Pour in fish stock, a glass of white wine and a bottle of passata. Mix with a few tablespoons of tomato concentrate and the juice of half a lemon. Season with pepper, salt and paprika. If you have it, you can also add some dried seaweed. The other preparations. Chop a few sun-dried tomatoes. Remove the skin from a tomato, empty it and cut the flesh into strips. Extract the zest from a lemon. Remove the leaves from a few crowns of lemon basil. Wash a handful of parsley. The haddock. Choose the whole fish with skin on both sides, but without the head and the intestines removed. Cut the fins and rinse off the blood. Cut off the tail and divide the rest into three pieces. Sprinkle with plain flour. Heat oil with a knob of butter and fry the fish pieces on high heat, about 3 to 4 minutes on each side. The finishing touch. Bring the sauce back to temperature, just below boiling point. Stir in the sun-dried tomatoes and the basil leaves. Place the fried fish in the sauce. Finish with the strips of fresh tomato, parsley and lemon zest.