Mmmmm moqueca, moqueca, moqueca!

After a long absence from the kitchen (yes, Sharon is finally back with her apron on!), decided to try my hand at a Brazilian fish stew (moqueca de peixe). Took a huge liking to this dish when I sampled it for the first time at "Barraco" - a little Brazilian bar / restaurant tucked away on a side street of West Hampstead. This fondness for the dish was reconfirmed when I had it for a second time at "Las Iguanas" at the O2 in Greenwich (although it was the version at "Barraco" that won first place), so I decided to recreate the meal at home.

Instead of the recommended monkfish, salmon and mahi mahi fish (this was the first time I had heard of mahi mahi fish - it sounded like a hawaiian cocktail to me. Although it turned out that I wasn't far off - mahi mahi is commonly known as dolphin-fish in Hawaii), I opted for seabream. And a superb choice it was: succulent, fleshy and flavoursome (and not too boney, if I may add). The only problem was that that recipe stated that I was to cut the fish into bite size pieces and this proved to be no mean feat. I also took it upon myself to skin the fish, so by the time I had finished my surgery on it, it resembled a pile of shredded fish than bite size pieces.

Surprisingly though, it was a plain sailing journey from here. With the messiest task out of the way, I was able to soldier on with the cooking without any upsets. Having marinaded the fish and chopped the vegetables, I layered my sauce pan as instructed: -- vegetables-fish-vegetables -- before adding the spices, coconut milk, palm oil and herbs. And 40 minutes later, I served up the bubbling pot of stew with fried plaintain, toasted cassava and rice!

Fuzz scored me 8.5/10 for the dish. However my joy was shortlived as a result of the dialogue that followed:

SHARON: Given the treat I knocked up for you, I thought it fair that you do the washing up.

FUZZ: But you promised to do the washing up as well.

SHARON: Oh well, I guess I'm entitled to change my mind....

FUZZ: A promise is a promise.

SHARON: Promises are made to be broken (well may be just on this occasion, hunny!)

(Suffice to say, up till now --the morning after the night before-- the washing up hasn't been done...how the war of wills is resolved remains to be seen...!)