Hake with Warm Tomatoes and Chorizo Crumbs

Serves 4

Takes 70 minutes

Chorizo with fish can be rather overpowering but this works really well, a satisfyingly tasty, quite exotic plateful of loveliness. It also involves both frying and baking the fish, so it is possible to cook fish for up to eight people this way. If you can’t get hold of hake, any other sustainably caught firm fish fillets could be substituted, but they should be at least 2cm thick

There are two great by-products of this lovely dish. Both the chorizo oil dressing, and the tomatoey oil are great with salads, pasta dishes, etc etc.

4 fillets of sustainably caught hake, about 125g each

4 large plum tomatoes

Light olive oil

80g breadcrumbs

25g butter, melted

For the dressing:

20g very finely diced mild cooking chorizo

2 - 3 tbsp ground nut oil

1 pinch salt

1 pinch English mustard powder

1½ tsp runny honey - chestnut honey works particularly well

Juice of half a lemon

To serve:

4 large outer leaves of an iceberg lettuce

• Gently fry the diced chorizo in 2 tablespoons groundnut oil for a couple of minutes, till the diced chorizo crumbs are a bit crunchy. Remove from heat, drain the chorizo, keeping the oil, set aside the oil and the crumbs, and keep warm

• You should have about 75ml of chorizo oil – this depends on the fat content of the chorizo. If it is less than 75ml top up with groundnut oil. Then add the salt, mustard powder, honey and lemon juice. Whisk together and check the balance of flavours. It should be sweet-sour with the smoky paprika flavour being balanced by the honey

• Blanch the tomatoes in boiling water for 2 minutes, drain, and plunge into cold water. Skin, then cut into quarters lengthways and de seed them. Pack the tomatoes into a small shallow oven proof dish, carefully flattening them as you do, sprinkle with salt and leave for 15 minutes. With 5 minutes to go, heat the oven to 130 degrees

• Cover the tomatoes with olive oil. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes. Set aside and keep warm

• Increase the oven temperature to 180 degrees. Spread the breadcrumbs on a plate. Brush the skinless side of fish with the melted butter, then press this side into the breadcrumbs - you are only crumbing one side of the fish

• Heat 2 tbsp of olive oil in a frying pan, then add the fish crumb side down and fry for 3 minutes. Turn onto a baking tray, crumb side up. Bake for about 5 minutes - the timings will vary depending on the thickness of the fish

• Place 2 leaves of iceberg lettuce on each plate. Then drain the tomato segments (save the oil) and carefully flatten them on top of the lettuce. Place the hake, crumb side up, on top of the tomatoes and sprinkle the chorizo crumbs around the edge of the plate with a good trickle of the chorizo oil dressing (about a dessertspoon per person)