The Marche is a coastal region and it should come as no surprise that fish plays an important part of the diet along the coast (since fresh fish doesn't travel well, inland people ate baccalà or snails on days when meats were prohibited). Much of what the fishermen ate were small fish, salted, because they sold the more prestigious elements of their daily catch. Someone who was a little better off might have enjoyed this mackerel, with wild fennel from the mountains inland. To serve 4:
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:
- 2 1/2 pounds (1.2 k) mackerel
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 clove garlic
- 10 button onions
- 4 carrots
- A rib of celery
- A small bunch of wild fennel fronds (or use those of a cultivated fennel bulb, with some ground fennel seed)
- A small bunch parsley
- A piece of orange peel
- The juice of half a lemon
- A tablespoon tomato paste
- Salt & pepper to taste
Preparation:
Boil the fish in salted water (figure 10 minutes per inch, measuring the thickest part of the fish). Carefully remove the cooked fish from the pot and filet it.
In the meantime mince the onions, carrots, celery, fennel fronds, parsley, orange peel, and garlic, and sauté the mixture in a pot with the oil, seasoning it to taste with salt and pepper. Stir often and regulate the flame to keep the mixture from burning; after about ten minutes stir in the tomato paste, diluted in about a cup of water or warm broth.
Continue cooking until the sauce is fairly thick, and in the meantime arrange the filets on a serving platter. Pour the hot sauce over them; you can either serve the fish hot or let it cool and chill it in the refrigerator (which will make the dish quite refreshing in the summer months).
The wine? A Verdicchio dei Colli di Jesi.
In the meantime mince the onions, carrots, celery, fennel fronds, parsley, orange peel, and garlic, and sauté the mixture in a pot with the oil, seasoning it to taste with salt and pepper. Stir often and regulate the flame to keep the mixture from burning; after about ten minutes stir in the tomato paste, diluted in about a cup of water or warm broth.
Continue cooking until the sauce is fairly thick, and in the meantime arrange the filets on a serving platter. Pour the hot sauce over them; you can either serve the fish hot or let it cool and chill it in the refrigerator (which will make the dish quite refreshing in the summer months).
The wine? A Verdicchio dei Colli di Jesi.
