The market · Fish and seafood · Southern Europe

Hake

Spain's favourite fish: a long, silver relative of cod with soft, sweet, delicate flakes — the fish for salsa verde with clams, and for kokotxas, the gelatinous throat.

mild · sweet · soft-flaked

What to do with it

Classics built on it
CatalanSuquet de peixA fishermen's stew of white fish and potatoes in a saffron-tinted broth, thickened at the end with a picada of garlic, almonds and fried bread.No one here has made it yetBretonCotriadeThe Breton fishermen's stew: several kinds of fish simmered with potatoes and onions, the broth poured over bread and the fish eaten after with vinaigrette.No one here has made it yet

Kinds

Loin
The thick back fillet, for pan-roasting.
Kokotxas
The throat; gelatinous, for pil-pil.

Goes with

parsleygarlicclampotato

Knowing it

Where to buy
Fishmongers. Line-caught hake (merluza de anzuelo) is prized in Spain for its firmer flesh. It goes soft quickly, so buy it the day you'll cook it.
Worth knowing
Its flakes are soft: cook it gently, mostly skin side down, turning once. For merluza en salsa verde, poach it in olive oil, garlic, parsley and fish stock, shaking the pan so the gelatine thickens the sauce, with clams in at the end.

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