Mackerel Nanbanzuke

This recipe was recommended to me when I wanted to make smelt. Very sustainable, smelt. Small and fishy, like sardines. I wanted to form an opinion on the fish, having never tried it before. Unfortunately, I looked in three supermarkets and one fish shop the day I wanted to make this and suddenly all the smelt had disappeared from St. John's. Who knows why? Here one day, gone the next. That's definitely more understandable with less sustainable fish. Probably it just didn't come in that regularly because not many people buy it. I mean, how many people go out of their way to buy the reject fish that most people don't want?

I did find fresh mackerel at the Fish Depot downtown, and bought some of that. Close enough for jazz. It got chopped into bite-size pieces. The other nice thing about this recipe is that it meant I got to buy a bottle of sake (Japanese rice wine). I don't particularly like drinking this sake (there was only kind, the Hakatsuru draft sake, at the liquor store), but it's great for cooking and means I need to come up with more Japanese recipes to use it up.

Ingredients:
2lbs mackerel
1 inch ginger, grated
1 tbsp sake
cornstarch (potato starch is more traditional but cornstarch works the same)
1/2 cup vinegar (it just says "vinegar" but rice vinegar is probably standard. Regular white vinegar worked fine, though)
1 1/2 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp soy sauce (or tamari)
1/2 an onion, thinly sliced
1 lemon, quartered and thinly sliced

1. Sprinkle the bite-sized pieces of mackerel with the sake and ginger...hmm...the recipe says to then pour out any liquid. I figured I'd toss the mackerel a little in the sake to make sure it got all over the fish.
2. Dust the fish with cornstarch (or potato starch) and deep-fry it in hot oil until lightly browned. I'm not such a huge fan of deep-frying, and mostly just afraid of over-cooking or not cooking enough, or not having the heat right. When deep-frying is done right by someone who knows what they're doing, it's a good way to cook. By me? Not so good. So I decided to fry in about 2 tbsp of oil. The pieces were small and they cooked quickly. I tried really hard to not overcook them and make them tough. I didn't want to just sear the outside, though, and leave the inside uncooked. Delicate balance. I think I fell off the proverbial see-saw, unfortunately. Searing didn't make a whole lot of sense, in retrospect, with such small pieces of fish.
3. Toss the hot fish in the combined sugar, salt, vinegar and soy sauce mix in a bowl. Then layer some onion slices, some lemon slices and then some fish. Repeat the layering until you run out of slices and fish. The recipe is a bit ambiguous about when to layer and when to toss...after the layering? Before the layering? I did a bit of both to be safe.

The recipe is to be served warm immediately or cold the next day, but I highly recommend the cold the next day option. The sugar from the vinegar, sake and the added sugar itself soaked into the lemon and kind of candied it. I wanted to keep eating lemon like a snack. Kind of like if lemonade came in fruit form. The fish was mild enough that the vinegar stuck out, and made a good pairing with the simple flavours of the Korean jap chae. Sesame didn't really go well with the fish, though, so I think a bowl of steamed rice would be a better idea. The noodles benefited from the vinegar, and I can't really complain about the fish. The other nice thing about waiting until the next day to eat the fish is that the fat solidifies and you can avoid it. Or you can eat it, or melt it over your rice or noodles. As you wish. I am far from traditional, and I apologize for that, but I don't think I messed the dish up horribly all things considered. The upside is now I'll know what the dish is when, or if, I see it on a menu. All in the name of cultural education...and dinner. Next time I see sea smelts...