Rundown

As tradition built it

Rundown

Serves 4. About 30 minutes, plus soaking the mackerel 4 hours or overnight.

Ingredients

• 450g pickled (salted) mackerel
• 1 large onion, sliced
• 1 Scotch bonnet, whole
• 6 small tomatoes, chopped
• 960ml coconut milk
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 1 stalk escallion, chopped
• 1 sprig thyme
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 60ml white cane vinegar, to taste

To serve

• to serve boiled green bananas or roast breadfruit

Method

1. Soak the mackerel in water about 4 hours, or overnight.
2. Slice the onion and chop the tomatoes.
3. Bring the coconut milk to the boil in a saucepan. Add all the seasonings and simmer 3 to 4 minutes.
4. Flake the mackerel, taking out the bones if you like, and add it to the reduced milk. Keep cooking until it thickens to a custard. Add vinegar to taste.
5. Serve with boiled green bananas or roast breadfruit.

Notes

Also called "dip and fall back" in Patois.

The recipe is Grace Foods', under the dish's other name, dip and fall back; salted salmon can stand in for the mackerel. Keshia Sakarah, of Caribe' in Brixton, boils the fish twice to desalt it, cooks 150ml of coconut milk in oil with peppers, bay and ginger until it curdles, lays the fish on top unstirred, and serves it with cassava dumplings.

What a modern chef changes

Two-stage reduction, a dehydrated mackerel dust

Method

1. Reduce the coconut milk in two stages: a first, faster reduction for body, then a second, slower one at a lower controlled heat, closer to a sous vide-style infusion than a rolling boil, so the coconut fat separates and re-emulsifies rather than splitting.
2. Dehydrate a portion of the salted mackerel into a fine, concentrated seasoning dust, ground in the spice grinder, finished over the dish at the table rather than folded entirely into the sauce.