July 14th, 2012
I had dinner at Amaia’s house this week and was thrilled and delighted when she served mojama as a starter.
Mojama is salted tuna loin. Using a traditional Spanish method for curing and preserving fish, the tuna is salted for two or three days before being washed and left to dry under the sun. The result is a hard red block that’s sliced and eaten like ham. We ate it with bread, drizzled with extra virgin olive oil. Mojama smells like tuna, has a dry, ham like texture and is a little reminiscent of smoked salmon, though less salty. I loved it and could have eaten the whole piece!
The main course was a large piece of pork, marinated overnight in a mixture of five spice, garlic, ginger, soy sauce, salt and pepper to give it a Chinese flavour. The skin was left untouched so that it would turn to crackling. Amaia roasted the pork slowly for a couple of hours in a medium oven. When it was cooked, the crackling hadn’t come to much, so I put the grill on and watched it patiently, until it had blistered perfectly. Making crackling just right under the grill, is very quick and simple, but it can change from perfect to burnt within 30 seconds, so you can’t take your eye off it for a moment.
To go with the pork, Amaia made a delicious fennel gratin
and stir fried noodles, with baby sweet corn, spinach and sweet chilli sauce.
Above is the stir fry finished off with soy sauce.
The pork was beautifully tender and had absorbed the Chinese seasoning throughout.
For pudding, Adam (another guest) brought an apple and cherry pie
and Amaia baked a rhubarb crumble! I got very lucky and was allowed to take home the tiny remaining portion of crumble at the end of the evening. I’m not normally a pudding fan, but I do love sharp things like rhubarb. We had some ginger ice cream, on the side.
I drank rather a lot of Spanish temperanillo wine throughout the evening, which was nicely rounded off by a glass of home made sloe gin.
This is just all amazing and I want to come to your house for a mash-up meal….!
Wow, that would be great – food bog pot luck!
food bog? or blog? 😉
Ha ha, food bloggers pot luck dinner party under the same roof 🙂
You had me worried about the kitchen facilities there…
What a meal!
Thanks 😉
The mojama sounds amazing. I have eaten it once and never forgotten it. I must see if the Spanish market stalls in La Rochelle have any. Wonderful dinner, you lucky man.
Thanks Roger.
Wow what a lovely meal, some of my favourite things here, I love mojama too.
Cheers
Marcus
It was excellent – Amaia did an amazing job.
Aha – another mojama fan! What a great dinner party – there is nothing here I don´t love 🙂
Thanks Tanya – I’ve been dying to try mojama for ages 😉
What a lovely dinner!
Thanks Michelle 🙂
That mojama sounds divine, but i guess you would not be drying it in the sun where you are!! and i am growing pigs precisely so that i can have roast pork WITH the crackling. In the US you cannot buy a roast like that i (in fact pork here does not have a taste.. weird!) i miss crackling! I also finish it under the grill and NO TOUCHING it while roasting! perfect job.. Now i must zoom off and check out the ginger ice cream! c
Thanks Cecilia, I think I’ll be making monsoon mojama here.
It is quite weird when animals don’t taste of anything – they must be feeding the poor pigs something really bland to achieve that. To be fair to America, I have had the most amazing hog roasts down south 😉
What a fantastic meal! Lucky you! I’m not familiar with a lot in this post.. mojama almost reminds me of a lovely proscuitto?? and crackling.. that’s something I’ve not done before. I would have loved to be there just to explore new sights and tastes!!
Thanks Smidge – you are very welcome to come to the next one if you can get here 😉
What a feast! I’m sure you enjoyed every morsel, MD. I’ve never heard of mojama and would be at a loss to find it here. Although I know of plenty of Latino and Hispanic markets, I don’t know of any Spanish ones. Too bad because I’m sure I’d enjoy it. And you needn’t sell me on crackling. It’s the best part about roasting a porchetta.
Thanks John. I can’t say with any certainty, but you might find mojama in one of the markets – lots of Spaniards emigrated to South America (and less so to North America) while Franco was in power. It would certainly keep and travel well.
Is home made Mojama out of the question ? I have been looking for something to do with fresh tuna . Do we need sun or can we fake it ? I might ask my local sun bed shop if I could hire a bed for a day .Lovely food Amaia!
Ha ha, you do need to dry it with sea breeze and sunshine – I think that’s an important part of the curing 😉
Everything looks great!
Thanks Jen!
What a wonderful meal! I’ve never eaten mojama but I’m definitely going to look out for it now because it sounds delicious.
Thanks – apparently the origins are Phoenician so it’s conceivable that you might find it in Mediterranean France 😉
My goodness, my mouth was watering reading those pork ingredients!
Thanks 🙂
Pingback: Bacalao | Mad Dog TV Dinners
Sliced mojama !! Is delicious !!!!!!
Eliser, Spain
Pingback: Cajun Roast Pork | Mad Dog TV Dinners