Fish and Seafood

Scallops. Impress your guests!

Hey guys! Excluding this awesome, simple and yet satisfying recipe, I have a question for you. Have you ever gone out from your comfort zone? Are you doing anything unusual or off-limits during the week or month, that people usually don’t expect from you?

Can you take a bicycle instead of car and go to work? Or can you stop eating desserts just for a week? Or may be say ‘yes’ to green tea, even if you never drink it, instead of your fav coffee? Can you stop drinking cola (I hope you don’t drink it at all)?

Or may be to call a person, who is really dear to you, and you’ve been shy to speak to, and invite him/her for a dinner? 😉

Start from simple things, try out new recipe! Prepare this amazing and delicious appetizer! Impress yourself and only then others! 🙂

Scallops with avocado puree and strawberries

Servings: 2
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You can serve tender scallops with strawberries or just with sauce. A glass of bubbly or chilled white wine would be perfect here!

Ingredients

6 scallops

1 avocado

60-80g cream cheese

2 tsp lemon juice

8 strawberries

2 Tbsp finely chopped coriander

1-2 Tbsp olive oil, for frying

sea salt, white pepper

Sauce:

60-80ml dry white wine

1 tsp garlic puree (roasted garlic is great here)

1 tsp finely chopped coriander

1 Tbsp butter

Chop and blend avocado, add cream cheese, lemon juice, salt and pepper to taste.

Cut strawberries into small cubes, mix with fresh coriander.

Season scallops with salt and pepper, fry in the piping hot pan 2 minutes on each side.

In the middle of serving plate, arrange avocado puree, top with strawberries; then arrange scallops.

If you don’t like avocado, you can serve scallops simple as is with a sauce. In the same pan, where you fried scallops, add wine and deglaze the pan’s bottom. Add garlic, coriander, season to taste and bring to boil. Add butter, mix well and cook for few minutes more. Pour the sauce over the scallops.

Enjoy!

Faskar (fish) with Aromatic Potato Wedges

I love fish. When I was a child I ate a lot of river fish, especially during summer. The city, where I grew up is located on a bank of big and great Russian river – Volga, moreover, there are also few small rivers and lots of lakes around it. My father is addicted to fishing, so quiet often during warm summer days we went to one of those lakes, where dad was fishing, while rest of the family (including myself) was swimming, sun-bathing and enjoying lovely summer. Even though most of the caught fishes were small with lots of bones, we liked to grill it mostly, or make some fish-soup. It was such a great time and delicious meal for the appetite you get on a fresh air!

To be honest, living on the Arabic coast, I don’t buy and eat lots of local fish… I wish they could promote it better; certainly you can buy it in hypermarkets, but in small markets I’ve seen local fish only once or twice. Another option is to go to the fish market and choose good and local fish there, but it’s not always convenient.

Surprisingly, there is only one fish market I know in Dubai, despite the city itself is quite large (generally speaking, there is one fish market per each emirate). And all UAE fish markets open early in the morning, and I do like sleep in the mornings, so it’s not quite convenient for me to visit fish markets at noon, when all fishes has been sold out already 🙂 Most of the fish or seafood available on the market is local and freshly caught straight from the sea, and some type of the fish can be found only on local fish markets, while supermarket fish stalls are selling mix of local and imported seafood. I will show you fish market in Dubai soon 😉

In that way, to support Emirates Wildlife, from time to time I’m buying sustainable species of local fish, like Faskar. You can substitute this fish with any local fish, what you can find at your market.

It is beautiful, isn’t it? 😀

Faskar Fish with Aromatic Potato Wedges

Servings: 2
Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients

2 fishes Faskar, cleaned

½ lemon or lime, sliced

½ lemon, juice

2 garlic cloves, sliced

2 sprigs of fresh rosemary

fresh flat leaf parsley, small bunch, roughly chopped

sea salt, white pepper

Garnish

4-6 baby potatoes, washed, cut into 4 wedges

some broccoli, optional

1 sprig of fresh rosemary or 1 tsp dried

1 tsp turmeric

½ tsp paprika

1 tsp sea salt

2-3 Tbsp olive oil

Method

Place fish in a baking tray, squeeze the lemon juice over it. Season with salt and pepper. Stuff each fish with rosemary, parsley, lemon slices and garlic.
Parboil potatoes for 17-20 minutes. Put in a bowl along with broccoli, if using, toss it with rosemary, spices, salt and olive oil. Arrange vegetables around the fish.

Bake in preheated 190C/380F oven for 25 minutes.

Healthy option!

Let’s eat the fish!

Grilled Tiger Prawns

Summer is a lovely time to spend outdoors, having a barbecue, grill meat and veggies, enjoying weather..with some exception for Dubai, it’s terribly hot; the barbecue standing lonely, and waiting for the chilly days to be dust off.. If you are lucky and enjoying weather, I recommend to try this one of the most flavorful grilled prawns recipe I have tried (or grill it in the oven). The recipe is on my list of easy and impressive dishes!

I’d like to invite all bloggers who’s parting @FF to try these scrumptious prawns! I’ve got a couple of bottles of white wine.. 😉 I’m sure today evening will be a hit!

Grilled Tiger Prawns

Servings: 3-4
Difficulty: easy
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2-3 prawns per person are enough for an appetizer, but for the main course increase the quantity as many as desired.

Can be served with a glass of good wine and pineapple salsa.

Ingredients

12 tiger prawns

1 shallot or small red onion

3 garlic gloves

1 small red chilli, optional

1 Tbsp fresh coriander, finely chopped

½ lemon, juice

sea salt, black pepper to taste

Butter Sauce

60g butter

2 Tbsp coriander, finely chopped

2 Tbsp lemon juice

Cut prawns in the middle and clean. You can cut off heads or leave it. Arrange them in a big shallow dish.
Finely chop shallot, garlic and chilli. Sprinkle it over prawns along with coriander, add salt and pepper to taste. Cover the dish and let it marinate in the fridge for 1-3 hours or overnight.
Remove from the fridge 30 minutes before grilling. Grill for 5-7 minutes.
Make the sauce. Heat the butter in a small pan, add remaining coriander and lemon juice; adjust seasoning.
Serve hot! Enjoy!

Middle Eastern Salmon steaks

Salmon is a very popular fish in Russia. We pan-fry and roast it, make delicious cured salmon, pies, like worldwide famous Koulebyaka. Less fatty varieties, such as pink and hunchback are well-known and in high demand, they are less expensive, but still good and healthy choice. As you may know, such fish is an excellent sauce of Omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins A and B. 🙂

My husband and I love salmon and are always trying to find new ways to prepare it. The below recipe requires about 30 minutes and is guaranteed to please family or friends. It is simply amazing recipe, rich salmon, coated in aromatic Middle Eastern spices.

Middle Eastern Salmon steaks

Servings: 2
Time: 30mins
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Ingredients

2 salmon steaks

2 round lemon slices

1 tsp whole white peppercorns, crushed

1-2 tsp coarse sea salt, crushed

2 tsp zaatar*

2 tsp sumac

2 tsp sesame seeds

2 tsp lemon juice

2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

*Make your own zaatar: 2Tbsp thyme+2Tbsp oregano+2Tbsp sesame seeds+1Tbsp sumac+1/2tsp ground cumin+1/2tsp salt

Preparation

Rub salmon steaks evenly with salt, white pepper and sumac. Place fish on a baking tray (you may line it with baking paper), drizzle with lemon juice and olive oil. Leave to marinate for 10-20 minutes.
Preheat the oven 180C/ F. Sprinkle zaatar and sesame seeds over steaks; top with lemon slices. Bake for 18-20 minutes.
For the side dish, you can roast some potatoes, turnips or carrots along with salmon. Cut veggies into thin slices, sprinkle with salt, pepper, sesame seeds and olive oil. Potatoes usually need more time to be cooked, so you may parboil them before.

Bon appetite!

milkandbun.com

Top with zaatar and sesame

Aromatic carrot!

Healthy&Delish

Pancake Pie

Today is ‘Forgiveness Sunday’, the last day of the ‘pancake festival’ (Butterweek) in Russia.

According to one old tradition, the more pancakes have been eaten during the Butterweek, the more successful will be the year.

As per another custom, a girl at the twilight, should took a pancake, went out and asked the first stranger his name. It was believed, that man’s name and look is similar to the future husband’s appearance. In case if the girl didn’t like the name ‘n’ look, she had to give a pancake to the guy. If she liked it, she had to eat a pancake herself. 🙂

There are lots of pancakes varieties, with savoury or fruit fillings. Mine 3 favourites: with cottage cheese, sweet condensed milk and salmon 🙂

Making pancakes could be really exciting and interesting, you can involve the whole family, invite friends and enjoy the holiday.

You can surprise your family by preparing this delicious pancake pie!

What’s more, I decided to participate in Fiesta Friday, organized by Angie from TheNoviceGardener. I’m happy to be involved in such virtual parties and get new friends. 🙂

The basic Russian pancakes recipe

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

650ml full fat milk

50ml warm water

250g all-purpose flour

2 eggs

a good pinch of salt

2 tbsp of sugar

2 tbsp of sunflower oil

1/3 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp of lemon juice or vinegar

Preparation:

Break the eggs into large bowl, add salt and sugar, whisk.
Add the oil and milk, whisk again.
Sift the flour into the bowl, whisk thoroughly.
Add warm water and whisk to incorporate any lumps.
Pour lemon juice or vinegar into a spoon with baking soda on it (to dissolve the soda), quickly add it into the batter and whisk a couple of times.
While the mixture is resting (it allows the ingredients to blend together better), heat the pan; grease the pan with some oil, if needed.
Evenly coat the pan with the batter. Cook about a minute, then flip the pancake and cook for 15-30 seconds more.
Keep prepared pancakes in warm place.

You can already enjoy the tastiest pancakes, dipping them into a raspberry preserve or hazelnut sauce, or prepare the pancake pie with salmon. It could be wonderful lunch or dinner for the weekend.

Pancake pie with salmon and cream cheese

Serves 4-5

Ingredients:

8 pancakes

200g salted or smoked salmon, always better homemade (find the recipe here)

120-150g cream cheese

2tbsp sour cream (substitute with crème fraîche, or single/double cream)

4-5 tbsp finely chopped dill

I used red caviare for the decoration, you can do it with salmon or just keep the top as is.

Assembling:

Blend the cream cheese with sour cream until smooth.
Cut the salmon into small cubes.
Arrange the first pancake on a plate, spread the cheese mixture and sprinkle with dill.
Cover with the second one. Spread some salmon on the pancake.
Cover with the third pancake.
Repeat all steps.

Have a lovely pancake time! 🙂