The Secret to Making Authentic African Fish Anywhere

One of the tricks to putting together a menu at Merkato, my new African-inspired restaurant in New York, is to create authentic dishes when you are so far away from the Continent. One issue we encounter is that we can't buy African fish. Instead, what we do is use the freshest fish and prepare it with African-style flavors.

For example, the other day I got beautiful black cod. It was so fresh, and I really wanted to give it a Northern African treatment. First, I rolled the fish in olive oil and chermoula (a Moroccan spice blend that you can find commercially blended at Whole Foods or any good spice store) and sprinkled it with a little bit of corn flour to make it crispy. Then I sautéed half a lemon with olive oil, garlic, black olives, and some chopped tomatoes. When the lemon was nicely roasted and the garlic softened, I added the fish and cooked it on both sides. It was a simple and delicious way to take people on a little trip to Morocco with easy-to-find ingredients.

As long as you know the basics of preparing fish, you can easily adopt this same technique at home to take your own family on a little trip at the dinner table.