Ceviche

Cubed raw fish in lime for minutes rather than hours, with the marinade poured off and drunk.

Fish. Not vegetarian — contains fish.

Ingredients

For the ceviche

• 600 g very fresh firm white fish fillet, skinned
• juice of 10 to 12 limes
• 1 red onion, sliced paper thin
• 1 ají limo or red chilli, in fine strips
• 1 teaspoon ají amarillo paste, as on its own page
• a small piece of ginger, grated, optional
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• a handful of coriander, chopped
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt

To serve

• boiled sweet potato, in thick slices
• cancha, as on its own page
• boiled corn on the cob, in rounds
• lettuce leaves

Method

1. THE FISH IS IN THE LIME FOR MINUTES, NOT HOURS. Two to five minutes, and then it is plated. The lime firms the outside of each cube and leaves the middle translucent and almost raw, which is the texture the dish exists for. Left for an hour -- which is what a great many recipes still say -- the acid works all the way through, the fish goes opaque, chalky and faintly cottony, and no amount of good fish or good lime gets that back.
2. SO EVERYTHING ELSE IS READY BEFORE THE LIME IS SQUEEZED. Sweet potato boiled, corn cut, onion sliced and soaked, plates out. The marinating is the last thing that happens and the clock does not stop for anything.
3. THE FISH MUST BE BOUGHT TO BE EATEN RAW and the fishmonger told so. Firm white fish -- sea bass, bream, sole, halibut -- cut into 2 cm cubes against the grain, trimmed of every scrap of membrane and dark flesh. Kept on ice until the moment it is used.
4. THE LIMES ARE SQUEEZED BY HAND AND NOT TO THE LAST DROP. The pith and the skin oils are bitter, and a press extracts them. Squeeze until the juice stops running freely and then stop.
5. THE ONION IS SOAKED AND ADDED AT THE END, as on the salsa criolla page, so it stays crisp and does not bleed pink into the fish.
6. AND THE MARINADE IS THE DISH TOO. What is left in the bowl, mixed with the fish juices and the chilli, is leche de tigre, and it is poured off and drunk from a small glass alongside. Tipping it down the sink throws away half of what was made.
7. Sweet potato boiled whole 20 minutes until tender, peeled and cut into thick slices. Corn boiled and cut into rounds. Both left to cool.
8. Onion sliced paper thin, soaked in cold water 10 minutes, drained and patted dry.
9. Fish trimmed hard and cut into 2 cm cubes. Kept COLD.
10. Garlic, ginger, ají amarillo paste made as on its own page, and the salt stirred together in a wide cold bowl.
11. The limes squeezed by hand into the bowl.
12. THE FISH TIPPED IN and turned gently with a spoon so every cube is in the juice.
13. LEFT 2 TO 5 MINUTES ONLY. A cube cut in half should be white at the edge and still translucent at the centre.
14. The chilli strips, coriander and most of the onion folded through, and the salt tasted and adjusted.
15. Lifted onto cold plates with a slotted spoon, the rest of the onion on top, sweet potato, corn and cancha as on its own page arranged around it. The leche de tigre poured off into small glasses and taken to the table with it.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Peru · All recipes