Seafood recipes for Good Friday

Do you eat fish on Good Friday? Whatever your religious preference, there’s never been a better season to savour seafood. Well, let’s be honest – anytime is the right time for a fresh slab of fish, a handful of sweet prawns or the bright white flesh of a full crab. Here are 4 delicious Good Friday recipes.

Crab Stack

Serves 2

These little beauties make the perfect meal/appetiser for two, but you can double or even triple the recipe for your Easter festivities.

Ingredients

200g crab meat

5 caperberries (2 crushed and 3 for garnish)

2 tbsp seafood sauce (pg 193)

Juice from ½ a lemon

1 avocado, diced

2 tomatoes, deseeded and diced

100g cooked quinoa

5 stalks coriander leaves, removed and diced finely

Salt and pepper, to taste

Balsamic vinegar, to serve

Method

1. Set out three small bowls. In the first bowl, mix crab meat, crushed caperberries and seafood sauce. In the second bowl, squeeze lemon juice over avocado. In the third bowl, mix tomatoes, quinoa and coriander. Sprinkle salt and pepper over bowls.
2. Then, using three round open-top mould stacks (or, in an emergency, disposable cups with the bottom removed), layer ingredients one at a time. Start with the avocado, gently pressing 1/3 of the mix to the bottom of each mould, making a thin layer. Then do the same with the tomatoes and then the crab, gently pressing down after each addition to create colourful layered stacks.
3. Carefully pull the moulds away, drizzle with vinegar and top with remaining caperberries. Serve immediately.

Note: This recipe is designed to make three stacks, with one each … and one to share. No need to steal from each other’s plate!

 Thai-style Mullet

Serves 8

Ingredients

6 whole mullet, gutted,

cleaned and patted dry 230g salt

700ml rice bran oil

100g red curry paste

2 brown onions, diced 600ml coconut milk 600ml coconut cream

2 tbsp sugar

14 whole bird’s eye chillies 1 ½ limes, sliced

400g cherry tomatoes 180g shredded coconut

Method

1. Using a sharp knife, make three vertical slits down each side of the individual mullet.
2. Sprinkle salt on the outside of the fish and then, using your hands, massage it all over and into slits.
3. In a frying pan – large enough to fit whole fish – on medium-hot heat, warm 1 inch oil and slowly lower in one mullet. Fry until skin is golden and crisp and inside of slits is cooked, about 3 minutes. Turn over and cook the other side, about 2 minutes.
4. Carefully remove mullet and place on a plate lined with a paper towel to drain excess oil. Repeat process for all fish.
5. Transfer 4 tbsp oil to a large saucepan over medium heat and discard the rest.
6. Add curry paste and onions.
7. Cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid is aromatic.
8. Pour in coconut milk, then coconut cream and sugar.
9. Add chillies and 2/3 of lime slices, and simmer.
10. Once curry starts to thicken, add tomatoes and coconut.
11. Cook for another minute then remove from heat.
12. Plate mullet and then pour over curry mixture (remove chillies if desired).
13. Garnish with remaining lime slices and serve.

 Macadamia Dukkah Prawns

Makes one platter

Ingredients

225ml plain Greek-style yoghurt

100g mint leaves, chopped finely

1 tbsp lemon juice

100g macadamia dukkah

1kg whole green prawns, peeled and deveined, with tails intact

1 egg, beaten

½cm rice bran oil, for shallow frying

Lemon wedges, to serve

Method

1. In a medium-sized bowl, thoroughly combine yoghurt, mint and lemon juice. Set aside.
2. Pour dukkah onto a large plate, reserving 2 tbsp. Holding on to tails, draw each prawn through the egg and then dukkah.
3. Add oil to a large saucepan over high heat, ensuring it is hot before you start shallow frying prawns in batches of 10. Gently turn prawns once after 20 seconds and finish cooking on the other side, which should take less than 15 seconds.
4. Remove from pan and set on a paper towel to drain excess oil.
5. Place on a serving platter, sprinkle with reserved dukkah and serve with yoghurt and lemon wedges.

Macadamia dukkah

Fills medium jar

250g macadamia nuts

½ cup sesame seeds

1 tbsp ground coriander

2 tbsp ground cumin

1 tsp pepper

1-2 tsp flaked sea salt

1 tsp chilli flakes

Method

1. Pre-heat oven to 180C.
2. Lay macadamias on a lined baking sheet and roast until golden, about 10 minutes, then set aside to cool.
3. Heat a frying pan to medium heat then gently toast sesame seeds until golden. Transfer to a bowl and set aside to cool.
4. Put coriander and cumin in frying pan and cook, stirring, until fragrant, then add to sesame seeds.
5. When macadamias are cool, crush into fine pieces with a mortar and pestle.
6. Add sesame seeds, coriander, cumin, pepper, salt and chilli and continue crushing until you have the desired consistency. Take care not to over-work the blend or it will turn into a paste.
7. Divide between sterilised jars, it will last for up to a week.