Julia's Guest Blog; Happy Birthday Jo!
So whilst Jo is off sunning herself in Italy (not at all jealous!) she has asked me to pen a post for Jo Eats.
Having recently bought my first flat I finally took delivery of my sofa and so could at last invite the girls round for lunch and not leave them sitting cross legged on the floor. As luck would have it, it was also Jo’s birthday so I set myself to creating a Mediterranean feast – her fave food.
Having moved to a new part of London I also took it as an opportunity to do some exploring, so on Saturday morning I took myself off to Peckham Rye to get some seafood and other bits for the next day. I love a good fish market so had a wonderful couple of hours wandering about in the sunshine. The dish I had in mind called for halibut but sadly I struggled to find any so I went for sea bass as an alternative.
The menu for the day was grilled spinach and ricotta stuffed aubergine rolls, Mediterranean seafood stew with prawns, clams and sea bass and chocolate mousse to finish. Even if I do say so myself the stew was delicious!
The ever reliable BBC Good Food provided me with the recipe which was super easy to do – very much a one pot jobby. The tomato and chilli based sauce was cooked first with an interesting twist of the juice and zest of an orange which really added a nice zesty element. Once the sauce was reduced and bubbling away the sea bass went in and then 5 minutes later in went the shellfish and then it was just left to cook until the clams opened up and the prawns were cooked through. So simple, but really packed a punch flavour wise!
Ingredients (serves 4)
1 onion, sliced
1 garlic cloves, sliced
1 red chilli, finely chopped
1 tbsp tomato purée
500g tomatoes, roughly chopped
100ml white wine
175ml fish stock
2 strips orange zest + juice
500g skinless halibut fillets, cut into large chunks
250g clams
250g large raw prawns
handful flat-leaf parsley, chopped
This is just the kind of cookery I love – simple, healthy and delicious! At only 400 cals per serving it’s also pretty diet friendly – but not with all the fizz we drank!
Great minds think alike - Flic and I managed to get Jo the exact same card... she is a wiley fox after all!