Steamed whole fish in olive oil
September 6, 2004
Filed under Purely experimental
Simple and easy. Geez, it was good! From the aroma that first permeated the kitchen and then the dining room… but the best things were the short cooking time (40 minutes including preparation), the readily available ingredients (these are staples in most pantries), the fancy-free procedure and my family’s appreciation.
My kids and I were watching a Disney TV movie last night called “Eddie’s One Million Dollar Cookout” about a boy torn between his love for cooking and his father’s expectations that he become an exceptional baseball player. He was good at both. But he explained his love for cooking this way, “I like creating something out of nothing.” How true. Like art, cooking is about self-expression. Food is the medium. That little piece of dialogue was playing inside my head all day and I was inspired to create something new for dinner tonight.
This dish was inspired by a sauce for white chicken. In Chinese cooking, white chicken means steamed chicken. My father used to serve white chicken with a special sauce–a mixture of peanut oil, finely chopped ginger and salt. I didn’t have peanut oil. But there was a bottle of olive oil on my kitchen shelf. Olive oil is traditionally used with garlic. The question inside my head was would it be good with ginger as well? No harm in trying. I went a step further. I will not only use ginger, I will use garlic and add plenty of chopped parsley as well. What you see in the photo is the cooked dish that resulted from my little experiment.
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In focus
Hi Connie,
Your steamed fish looks great! This dish is a regular in seafood restos here in China, but iba siyempre yung mommy ang mag-serve. Expecially with the help of pinoycook (as usual)! I have a question though…. ‘just went to the supermarket to buy my olive oil….. and I saw different kinds - extra virgin olive oil, pure olive oil, cooking olive oil, virgin olive oil, olive oil….. so may choices!! How do they differ?
If you mention “olive oil” in your recipe, which one of these are you referring to?
Olive, I use extra virgin olive oil when no cooking is required (like for salads, pesto, etc). For cooking, I use virgin olive oil.
thanks connie!
Connie, I’ve been looking for a simple fish recepi - ngayon natagpuan ko na. i’ll try it this weekend - just looking at it, nag lalaway na ako.
thx…