RecipeMuncher

Well, I promised you a trooty affair for the third instalment of Scottish Scran… and here it is… Trout in Oatmeal!

Trout always reminds me of my childhood in Alloa. My poppy (grandad!) used to go out fly fishing for trout down to the River Devon; many a morning I’d come down the stairs bleary-eyed to be started awake by the sight of two or three specimen waiting in the sink to be cleaned. (And on a couple of occasions, a bunny that he had managed to do a trade for if he’d got a good haul that day!)

Now, I look back and wish I had that sort of produce available to me now… but at the time I wasn’t a huge trout fan - only really loving it in fish pie. I think maybe it was just a bit too strongly flavoured for my young palette - definitely not the case now.

Though I have cooked with trout many times since then - this was the first time I’d tried my hand at this very simple, but very tasty Scottis…

The wine was poured, the curry was almost ready and the rice resting, when I spotted a pack of trout fillets in my fridge. I had bought them for the bargain price of £1 earlier that day - but had totally forgotten them!

After initially cursing myself at the waste - I decided to give myself 10 minutes to turn them into something to go with dinner. (After all, they had to be used that day and couldn’t be frozen - I’d be as well trying!)

I remembered I had a courgette left in the bottom of the fridge from the week before… would it be a pile of mush in the bottom of the veggie bag? Huzzah, it was as green and crisp as the day I bought it.

So… I chopped the trout into bite sized pieces, then tossed them in a mix of garam masala and chilli powder - rubbing it in a bit for maximum flavour. I put them to one side while the courgette was effectively (if not neatly) neatly chopped into similarly sized chunks.

I heated a wee bit of ghee (or it …

[js]
I’ve been quite dejected of late.

I have lost my desire for grilling fish.

Mind you, this is big news. Ding-dong, sound the gong: the death of Desire, with a capital D. (Oh no, I’m having a flashback to my pretentious years in school. Heaven forbid.)

Recalling the capital D, I do not think my lack of desire lately has anything to do with our general lack of industry. This is different: I’ve been foiled by failure and I’m now fearful of destroying more specimens of fishly beauty.

After those gorgeous(!) pike mackerel about a month ago, I’ve been having trouble grilling fish. I’ve tried it with three different fish now. I wish I knew what I was doing wrong, because then, I can write myself a cautionary tale of how not to turn beautiful fish into ugly fish.
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