Cod al pil pil

Cod al pil pil (bacalao al pilpil in Spanish) is one of the most celebrated dishes of the Basque Country and perfect for fish lovers. In order to prepare it, you only need four ingredients: cod, garlic, dried chillies and oil. You will see that with a very interesting but simple technique you will be able to get a silky and beautiful sauce. Do you want to give it a go?

Cod al pil pil

With just a few ingredients, you will achieve this amazing recipe that only takes half an hour. Delicate, special and full of flavour, it will be like instantly travelling to the Basque Country from your home.

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Prep Time 5 mins

Cook Time 10 mins

Resting Time 15 mins

Total Time 30 mins

Course Main Course

Cuisine Asiática, Basque, Spanish

Servings 4 people

Ingredients

  

• 4 fillets unsalted code if salted, remove the salt previously to the actual preparation
• 6-8 cloves garlic
• 3 dried chillies
• 250 mL olive oil extra virgin
• salt to taste

Instructions

 

• Ideally you should buy fillets with the skin on. In our case we could not find it with the skin on and it makes it more difficult to prepare the sauce.

  If the cod comes salted (which is very common in countries like Spain or Portugal), you have to remove the salt by leaving the fillets in a bowl full of water for 48h and changing the water from time to time.
  
• Now to the actual cooking, firstly we have to remove any excess water from the cod with some kitchen towel.
  
• Heat the olive oil (medium heat) in a pan or pot with a long surface and made of ceramic or stone, never Teflon.
  
• While the oil is increasing its temperature, we chop some of the garlic and keep also some whole (one per fillet, for decoration purposes).
  
• Firstly, we add the whole garlics and dried chillies to the oil for a couple of minutes. Then we add the chopped garlic.

  This will infuse the olive oil with a lot of flavour.

  Cook everything until the garlic is lightly golden (not brown). Then remove the chillies and garlic from the oil and place them on a kitchen towel to absorb excess oil.
  
• Now it is time to fry the cod in the infused oil.

  Let the cod cook for 2 or 3 minutes per side (time will vary depending on the size of your fillets). If yours have skin on, firstly cook them skin up.

  When the fish is ready, remove it from the oil and turn the heat off.
  
• You will see that after cooking the fish, the oil now has some of its gelatin. This will help us make the sauce.

  First of all, the oil has to cool down a bit.
  
• Once the oil is between 40 – 60 °C (100 – 140 F), it is time to prepare the sauce.

  In order to get an emulsion of the oil and the fish gelatin, we will use a metallic colander.
  
• In this video you can see the colander technique to make an even sauce.

  It will take you between 3 and 5 minutes to get the emulsion ready.
• Test the salt levels and correct if necessary.
  
• For the plating you can pour the sauce on the fish and add a chilli and a whole garlic on top.

  And…that’s it!
  

Keyword Basque country, cod, fish, garlic, olive oil, traditional