Pandemic Pantry - Crispy Fish Cakes
john barry
Cooking during a pandemic is interesting. It has its upsides - there’s always someone home to check the oven, and downsides, like not being able to get certain things when you want them. I’ve been waiting until we have no produce left, then placing a large grocery order online so that we’ll be set for several days. When the food first arrives, I organize it all, freezing some proteins and staples like butter. At first, the fridge is overflowing but before I know it, we are completely out. I never realized how much we eat! Usually, we all eat our lunches and snacks outside of the house and go out to eat as a family from time to time. Eating everything at home makes a huge difference in how much we need to buy and how fast it goes. So it’s been strange. There are periods of having TONS of food and then periods when almost everything is gone and I have to be creative with pantry items just to keep us going. Today was a pantry day. This week I cleaned and organized our pantry. Paul thought I was losing it, but staying home ALL THE TIME means that the messes that I’m normally not around long enough to let bother me are driving me nuts. And given the changes in how we’re cooking and eating these days, I feel like it’s more important to know what we have and make use of items that have been pushed to the back of the pantry. Also, having a clean and organized pantry makes me want to cook from it. Motivation is so important, especially right now.
When I found a can of salmon and one of tuna in the back of the pantry this morning, I knew immediately what I would make. Fish cakes! These would also rid me of the bag of crusts saved from the kids’ sandwiches that has been sitting on my counter for days. Yippee. Nothing I love more than reclaiming my counter space. I threw the crusts in my blender until they were crumbs, toasted them in the oven, and finely chopped the vegetables I had in the crisper. After sauteing those for a few minutes, I combined them with the tuna and salmon, a couple of eggs, some Worcestershire sauce, old bay seasoning, salt and shaped them into cakes. Then I threw together a scallion-garlic-yogurt sauce to go with them (make extra, it stuff goes with everything) and left it all in the fridge so that I could quickly put together a home-cooked lunch in between the day’s work and homeschool obligations. #makingitwork
It was a treat to have a real lunch and it felt good to use up some of my “incidental” food stash. I know it’s hard to follow a recipe these days. I happen to have lots of eggs at the moment but I know that they have been hard to find for some. I pan-fried these cakes in bacon fat, because I’m out of butter. Turned out just fine. Delicious in fact. So we’re all tweaking recipes and doing the best we can with what we have. It’s like we are all on some crazy episode of “Chopped”, making meals with whatever is around, multiple times a day. Sometimes frustrating, other times a fun challenge.
Nope. I did not bother to make them uniform in size and shape. I don’t think it matters much as long as they are around the same thickness.
I’m trying to view this entire quarantine as more fun and challenging than as a source of anxiety. Some days that works better than others. We are all human. My kids, all of the kids, everywhere, are showing so much resilience. They miss their family, friends, teachers, babysitters, school, the park, being able to do ANY of the things they usually do, but they take it in stride, even the ones that are too young to understand why it has to be this way. They are amazing. I’m learning so much from them and from being home with them more. I’m watching them grow in ways that I didn’t see or notice before. Having more real conversations with them. Listening to their conversations with each other. I’m honored to witness how they are coping with this situation in positive ways, like building closer bonds with each other as playmates and confidants. Emmett and Isla are so much more excited about going to the same school together next year (fingers crossed) than they were before.
I’m learning about myself too. Until now, I never knew that, apparently, I hoard sponges, and have unopened bulk packages of sponges in all of my cabinets. Also powdered sugar. So send over your powdered sugar sponge craft ideas! No seriously, I’m thinking more about what I really want my life to look like than ever before and how I can take the best parts of this quarantine and incorporate them into my new normal. I know I want things to slow down. I want to have more time with my children. I don’t know how I plan to do that but it looks like I will have at least another month of stay-at-home time to figure it out. Where’s your head right now? What are you enjoying about all this time at home? What are you excited about doing once things start to open back up?
How did I never know that you could just stick the ends of your scallions in a jar with some water and grow more? At least I won’t run out of these!
Ingredients
For fish cakes:
10 ounces canned fish
1 cup bread crumbs
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
⅓ cup mayo
1 tablespoon dijon mustard
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 rib of celery, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
½ large or 1 small onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1-2 scallions, finely chopped
1 tablespoon capers
Old bay and salt to taste
Oil or butter (I used bacon fat!) for frying
For scallion-garlic yogurt sauce:
⅔ cup plain yogurt
1 tablespoon mayo
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1 tablespoon capers
2 scallions, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon lemon zest
Salt to taste
Directions
Make the sauce. Combine all sauce ingredients and stir until fully combined. Place in the fridge to let flavors come together.
Turn the oven up to 400F. Toast bread crumbs in the oven for about 5 minutes.
Combine fish, Worcestershire sauce, mayo, mustard, scallions, capers and toasted bread crumbs in a large bowl and mix with a spoon.
Heat oil in a large frying pan, add veggies and garlic and saute until softened.
Add veggies to the bread crumb mixture and season with salt and Old Bay. Crack eggs into the bowl and mix everything well. I do this with my hands. If the mixture seems dry, add a little bit of milk or yogurt to hold the mixture together. It shouldn’t be wet but it shouldn’t be so dry that it falls apart when you try to form it into a disc.
Allow mixture to rest in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
When you are ready to eat. Heat oven to 400F. Remove mixture from oven and form into patties.
Heat oil, butter or bacon fat over medium-high heat in the same pan you used to saute the vegetables.
Add patties to pan and cook until browned on one side, about 4 minutes. Flip and cook about 3 minutes more.
Place the pan in the oven and cook until the patties are cooked through, about 7 more minutes.
Serve with yogurt sauce.