Kinilaw

Raw fish cured in vinegar rather than citrus, which changes both the taste and the clock.

Fish. Not vegetarian — contains fish.

Ingredients

• 500 g very fresh tuna or mackerel, in 2 cm cubes
• 200 ml coconut vinegar
• 100 ml coconut milk
• 30 ml calamansi juice
• 1 thumb ginger, in fine matchsticks
• 1 red onion, finely sliced
• 3 siling labuyo, sliced
• 1 teaspoon salt

Method

1. THE CURE IS VINEGAR. A ceviche is cured in citrus and a kinilaw is cured in vinegar, and the difference is not pedantry -- vinegar bites faster and shallower, so the timing below is minutes where a ceviche would take half an hour.
2. Take a splash from the measured vinegar, turn the fish through it, and pour that vinegar away. It carries off the surface slime and firms the cut faces.
3. Salt the fish and leave it 2 minutes.
4. Add the ginger, onion, chilli and the rest of the vinegar. TEN TO FIFTEEN MINUTES, no longer. Past that the cubes go opaque to the middle and chalky, and there is no recovering them.
5. Pour off most of the vinegar, stir the coconut milk and the calamansi through, and serve at once.
6. The fish has to be good enough to eat raw, because it is being eaten raw. Vinegar firms the surface; it does not make doubtful fish safe.

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 Philippines · All recipes