There’s No Knead For That!

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Yesterday I cooked one of my favourite comfort food meals, fish pie, it really is such a nursery classic. You may remember the last time I blogged about a fish pie I’d used a recipe from The Good Granny Cookbook: Traditional Favourites for Modern Familiesby Jane Fearnley-Whittingstall, this time I used her son Hugh’s recipe with a wee bit of adaptation along the way.

Any white firm fleshed fish would be suitable for use here, I chose to use common ling but another good choice would be pollack. Personally I would avoid cod or haddock simply because of the steep decline in their numbers due to overfishing, they are now dangerously low, an issue that we the consumer need to address by changing our eating habits and becoming more informed about alternative fishes. A good guide to seafood/fish can be found here.

As I hate eggs in meals such as this I replaced them with some clams, giving a lovely texture, and some crab meat which enriched the sauce no end.

To serve with the pie I simply cooked some buttered peas, the only suitable vegetable in my opinion for this kind of comfort food, bread & butter being essential of course.

The bread followed a no knead recipe, given to me by Gail a friend on a food forum I frequent, and was made using spelt flour. Spelt flour is an ancient relative of modern wheat and the spelt grain, (triticum speltum) was widely grown by the Romans however it was originally grown in Iran around 5000 to 6000 B.C. It is a highly nutritious grain, being higher in protein than wheat and it is also thought that this protein is easier to digest too. 

I used half wholemeal and half white spelt as I didn’t want the loaf to be too dense or too highly flavoured, sometimes all wholemeal can be a little too overpowering, especially when it’s to be served with an already ‘heavy’ meal. The balance worked perfectly, giving a slightly nutty flavoured bread with a lovely soft, close texture. It couldn’t be said it was a light loaf but it wasn’t heavy either, does that make sense?

Ahh you’ll just have to bake it yourselves

The Recipe:

• 600g spelt flour (can be 1/2 white and 1/2 wholemeal or whatever proportions you like) 
• 1 sachet fast action yeast
• 2 teaspoons salt 
• 2 tablespoons sugar (optional) 
• 500ml warm water 
• 2 teaspoons sunflower oil

1. By hand mix all the dry ingredients together in a bowl, make a well, pour in oil and enough water to make a stiff dough. 
   
2. Cover the dough with cling film and allow to double in size. 
   
3. Turn onto a floured board and shape in to a smooth ball, divide in half and shape each half. 
   
4. Place both halves into a 700g pre seasoned bread tin and allow to double in size. 
   
5. Place in a preheated oven at 210C or the equivalent and cook for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown.

 

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Filed under Bread, Fish & Seafood