Poached Wing of Skate with a Confit of Vine Grown Baby Plum Tomatoes
To me, skate has one of the most subtle, interresting tastes, but it is often passed by because it looks like a lot of work for a little amount of fish. This is a real shame, as it is quite easy to prepare. Once you have learnt the technique in preparing it, I will bet it is on your shopping list often.
Portions: 4 portions
Ingredients
Ingredients
- 4 x 8oz (240g) skate wings (skinned and wing one removed)
- 1/2 kilo vine grown baby plum tomatoes (must e sun ripened for the best flavour)
- 3 banana shallots, halved and finely sliced
- 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
- 6 marinated (not salted) anchovy fillets
- 8 sprigs of thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 level tablespoons of caster sugar
- 1/2 cup (125ml) olive oil (preferably Spanish, as it has a wonderfully oaky flavour)
- 1/2 cup of flat leaf parsley roughly chopped
- sea salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Poaching Liquid
- 2 pints (1.138 litres) of cold water
- 1/2 onion
- 1 carrot, chopped
- 1 leek, cleaned and chopped
- 6 peppercorns
- 1 bay leaf
To Serve
- roughly chopped parsley
Method
- Poaching Liquor: In a large pan place water and poaching ingredients, and gently simmer for 20 minutes. Remove the vegetables and bay leaf and set it aside for poaching wing of skate later.
- Baby Plum Tomato Confit: Fry the shallots and garlic in olive oil on a low heat so as not to colour the onion, but to soften. Then as the Thyme. Bay leafs, halved tomatoes, caster sugar and coarsely chopped anchovy fillets, simmer gently on a low heat.
- Skate: Return the poaching liquid to a gently simmer (in a pan large enough to hold the skate wings). At this point gently place your skate wings in the poaching liquid. They should take about 6-8 minutes to cook, be careful not to over cook the skate. Serve:
- To Serve: Remove the skate from liquor and place on the serving dishes. Remove the thyme sprigs and bay leafs from the tomatoes confit, season to taste with a little sea salt and ground pepper. Spoon the confit of tomatoes over the skate and finally garnish with coarsely chopped parsley.
- Always make sure you cook skate soon as possible after purchasing as it does not keep fresh for long.
- Dutch tomatoes are usually grown in heated green houses and do not have the wonderful summery flavour of sun ripened tomatoes.
- Spanish olive oil (of quality) is matured in oak casks so it has a wonderfully oaky flavour to it.
- Marinated anchovies are readily available in most supermarkets and are much more subtle in flavour than the salted variety.