Fried perch, calamari, onion rings, and hush puppies!

I woke up this morning with a migraine. I went back to bed until 3:00 p.m. and still had the migraine. Finally, I took some narcotics and got moving, because I’d promised to do a Fish Fry for dinner, and I had people counting on me.

OK… so I chopped the onions and celery and potatoes and bacon, and started the pot of New England -style clam chowder. Actually, it’s Seafood Chowder, because I added some crabmeat and shrimp along with the clams.

Having gotten the soup going, I mixed up the cole slaw (bagged slaw mix with Marzetti slaw dressing) and got it into the fridge so I could start playing with hot oil.

I had bought some frozen calamari at Marc’s, so I got that out and put it in cool water to thaw. I sliced a sweet onion to make onion rings, then started oil heating while I rinsed and cut up the calamari.

Fried calamari is very simple. I dredged the wet pieces in Zatarain’s Fish Fry (which is gluten free but does have MSG in it; if you happen to be sensitive to MSG, you can season some plain corn flour with salt, pepper, and a little onion and garlic powder, and add cayenne if you like it spicy) and dropped into hot oil to fry. It took four batches to get it all fried. I drained on paper towels and put on a baking sheet in the oven at about 300F to keep hot.

For my next trick, I made hush puppy dough and set it aside to stiffen while I made the fish.

I had bought 2-1/2 pounds of perch. Perch is my favorite fish to fry, but I didn’t realize how much fish that was. It turned out to be 16 good sized pieces, or 8 generous servings. So since only 4 of us were eating, I now have some left in my freezer. It freezes well after cooking and reheats to a crispy finish in the oven.

The beer batter is from a recipe I found on Recipezaar. I use Better Batter flour in place of the all-purpose flour the recipe calls for, and whatever gluten free beer I happen to have on hand. The Better Batter flour continues to thicken as it sits, so I thin down the batter with water as needed. I dredged the fish in plain corn flour and then dunked in batter, transferred to my cast iron pan of hot oil, and turned once while frying. The beer batter puffs up beautifully while cooking. Drain on paper towels. I kept the fish warm alongside the calamari while I kept on frying.

When I ran out of fish, I made onion rings until I ran out of batter. The trick is to be sure the onion pieces are dry before dipping in batter, that way the batter sticks.

Finally, I made the hush puppies and fried them up. While they were frying, I added the clams, shrimp, and cream to the soup and heated it through.

Happy tummies all around!