Our Wee Farm

Finally...we caught some fish for dinner!

Alan and Mary, lovely friends of ours, have a rather gorgeous boat and offered to take us out fishing today. Alan fishes a lot, so knows good places to go, what bait to use and all that sort of stuff!

It was a glorious day as we headed out into the Bay.

I don't know exactly where we were but we caught fish! The first few snapper were too small and were put back. Then we all caught something. Lloyd got a snapper and a trevally, I got a snapper and a porae ( it was HUGE, biggest fish I have ever caught in my life, ok I realise that's not exactly saying much as I have caught approximately 6 fish to date) and Alan caught several snapper, rather expertly.

 

this is my porae

       Lloyd, not a bit happy to be catching fish. 

 

Lloyd with the porae, see it's pretty big.

    
After a few hours fishing we went to Whale Bay, which is stunning, to fillet the fish ( Alan did them all ) and clean the boat before heading back home.

resting

bliss

don't look if you are a bit blergh about dead things...

 

filleting 

 amazing clouds on the way home.

Fish and chips for dinner tonight - fish from the sea, potatoes from the garden.

We've broken our duck.

 

I am really happy we caught dinner, but I have to admit to having a sad feeling too, I really hate killing anything and if I hadn't been fishing today there would be 2 more fish swimming around in the sea this evening and that makes me feel bad, but not bad enough that I don't want to do it again!

A huge thank you to Alan and Mary!

 Now, the pipis from yesterday, some people asked what they are.

Well, they are a small shell fish. Also known as a surf clam. smaller than mussels and lovely and sweet.

A good recipe is

In a large pot with a lid, lightly fry 3 minced garlic cloves in 2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil for 30 seconds, making sure it doesn't brown. Add 1kg of well-washed pipis, 2 chopped ripe tomatoes, a 1/2 cup of chopped flat-leaf parsley and 2-3 chopped red chillies (optional). Turn the heat right up, season with a little salt and pepper and give the pipis a good stir for a few seconds.

Add 1 cup of dry white wine and place the lid on the pot. They should all open in 3-4 min. Check that they have; sometimes it's just a matter of giving the pot a good shake or stirring the pipis so they have room to open.

Season with salt and pepper.We sometimes serve them with spaghetti.