FRIED SPRATS

...with crispy potatoes, mangetout and yellow courgette

Sprats are great if you like fishy fish. My partner wolfed them down happily and said it was a great meal. I gingerly ate some then stuck to veg! They are small herrings, but I don't know what a herring tastes like, so I'd say they are a lot like mackerel...except more so. That slightly metallic taste of mackerel is there but they are not as meaty and mild as mackerel (which I've learned to love). From my point of view they are not worth the phaff but I'm sure my partner will be begging me to make them again!

I started off gutting them. This was so much easier than I thought. A small cut behind the head at the top of the back bone and then pull the head slowly. All the guts come out in one this way and you can do a quick rinse in a bowl of cold water, pat dry and they're ready to cook.

Sprats ready to cook

I decided to use a spice mix I got in Turkey last summer that went well with mackerel. I think you could replace this with something along the lines of: dried garlic flakes, sea salt, chilli flakes and cumin in equal quantities. I used about a teaspoon of this and a tablespoon of plain (all-purpose) flour to lightly coat the sprats before shallow-frying in sunflower oil. After about 2 mins the fish feels a little harder and the skin starts coming away and crisping up, this seemed to be the right time to take them out!

I served them with steamed mangetout (overcooked - oops) and yellow courgette, as well as some little cubes of baked crispy potato. I used a trick found on pinterest for these, soak them for 20 mins in cold water before draining, patting dry and baking in olive oil. They go crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside, and this did seem to work quite well. I've attempted to write the full recipe for this meal below including a couple of tweaks I'd use next time.

RECIPE

Serves 2

Ingredients:

• 20 Sprats, beheaded and gutted (yum!)
• 1 Tablespoon Plain All-purpose Flour
• 500ml Sunflower oil
• Pinch each of garlic flakes, chilli flakes, sea salt and cumin
• 2 handfuls Mangetout
• 1 Yellow Courgette, cut into strips
• 2 large potatoes, peeled,cut into cubes, and soaked in cold water for 20 mins

1. Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 6/220C/425F. Drain the Potatoes and pat dry. Put them on a baking tray, coat with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.Bake in the oven for 40 mins turning half way through.

2. Mix the flour and spices together and lightly coat the sprats using this mixture.  

3. Put the sunflower oil in  a large pan over a high heat. Drop in one sprat, when it begins to bubble then drop in a few more. The sprats should be crispy and cooked through after about two minutes in the oil.

4. Add the vegetables to a steamer at this point and steam whilst cooking the sprats in batches. 

TIPS AND TWEAKS

Hopefully, the potatoes veg and sprats should all be ready about the same time if you follow this order, though you may want to start them ten minutes before step two (my potatoes were done too soon as I started them way too early).

The veg will literally only need a few minutes or it'll be overcooked like mine!

I would serve the fish with some sort of dip, like garlic mayonnaise, and a wedge of lemon.

Happy experimenting!