You are reading a paid Steam Oven Insiders member journal. Journals drop into your inbox on the 15th and 30th of each month.
Would you like to view all previous journals? You can find those in the journal archive
Hello, my Insiders!
Easter is relatively late in the calendar this year, and doesn’t fall for another couple of weeks. When it finally does come around, though, today’s new and beautiful combi steam baked fish is an excellent centerpiece to an Easter feast. Or, if you participate in Lent, try it out as a Friday fish meal.
I’ve included lots of other nice Easter-ish cooking ideas below, complete with steam oven swaps and directions. I hope you find something interesting that you haven’t tried before.
In other steam oven food news, I am onto my third batch of test croissants, after our recent Insiders poll about whether you’d like to bake your own. I’m *almost* happy with them, and I’ll be sharing the recipe in our next journal issue on April 15. That’s just in time to try baking your own croissants for Easter weekend!
Happy steam oven cooking, see you with those croissants in a couple of weeks.
Emily x
To Learn (rewind)
I wrote a collection of Easter ideas and dishes for our Insiders newsletter a year ago, and it’s still just as relevant! Worth a read if you weren’t an Insider back then, or if you need some extra inspiration as Easter approaches.
And, last year’s special Easter Insiders recipe was for these truly beautiful little steamed lemon pots. They’d be an excellent dessert to serve after today’s baked fish recipe – an elegant, creamy and rich counterbalance to the rustic brightness and vibrance of the main meal.
New to Cook
One-pan tomato and fennel combi steam baked fish is a complete meal, pairing flaky fish with tender vegetables and garlicky toast. Loosely based on the Italian Acqua Pazza, or Fish in Crazy Water, it’s fancy enough for Easter entertaining but also simple enough for a midweek dinner. Your combi steam oven makes the cooking fast and foolproof.
The Season Flip
Tasty fishy things from around the world, to give your Easter menus a twist!
Southern Hemisphere
It’s rare that Nigella Lawson’s recipes fail me, and her fish tacos are a solid hit every time. It looks like a lot to do when you view the ingredient list, but it’s mostly just an assembly job, and there’s very minimal cooking. To bake the fish, I set my oven to Combi Steam at 425°F/220°C, and use 60% (high) humidity. It won’t take long to cook; only 4-6 minutes if you have thinnish fillets and have cut them per Nigella’s instructions.
Northern Hemisphere
This is an excellent and punchy steamed fish recipe from beloved Australian cook and writer Marion Grasby. It’s a straight swap from Marion’s method into the steam oven – instead of making a foil trivet and cooking in a steamer over a wok, just put the fish into a pan and cook using your oven’s steam setting at 212°F/100°C. If you aren’t in a hurry and want the fish to come out a little softer and more ‘poachy’ textured, drop your temp to 176°F/80°C and cook it for a few extra minutes.
A Thing I'm Loving
I have been using the new Anova Precision Oven 2.0 for a good while now, and I cannot tell you just how much has improved between the first generation of these ovens and the second. I’ve spoken about how much I enjoy the Anova ovens a few times now, but with the new version ‘out in the wild’ at last, I wanted to highlight it again. I use mine daily. The Anova staff would be horrified at my old school approach wherein I frequently don’t bother using the fancy connected app (which is admittedly very cool), preferring the interface on the front of the oven panel instead. But if anything, I think that speaks to the fact that the oven is a great combi steam unit in its own right.
Ask Me Anything (AMA)
Here’s your opportunity to ask me anything you like related to combi steam cooking!
I really encourage you to submit questions, and will do my best to answer as many as possible. Though I may not be able to get to every single question, I will carefully curate ones which are relevant and represent a variety of topics. We all learn from each other, and I often learn new things based on questions from all of you!
If you have an AMA question, please email it to [email protected]. Make sure you include the phrase INSIDERS AMA in the subject line so I can collate and read all your submissions.
From Laura:
Q: I want to cook this recipe for treacle sponge. My wider family has one lactose intolerant, and gluten intolerant member which requires much recipe tweaking plus guessing the steam oven setting!
Think I can swap olive oil for butter, and use gluten free flour….and then how would I set my beloved Miele to make this a steam pudding?!
A: I’m not sure about the dietary swaps but the ones you’ve suggested would be my own starting point, so hopefully they’ll work well! As far as the setting goes, I would not cover the pudding as the recipe states. Go with a temp of about 320°F/160°C, and steam 80-100%. Your cooking time, even with the lower temp, will likely be shorter than the recipe states (check it from 20 minutes onwards!). I’d also add twice the amount of water to the syrup in the first step of the recipe. I know it sounds counterintuitive with steam, but sponge puddings cooked using combi steam seem to need additional liquid for the saucy component.
From Clair
Q: My question is about bananas, I absolutely hate them and can taste them lurking in any recipe. In recipes where bananas are there for texture not taste (eg muffins) is there anything I can use as a substitute in recipes to cook in the steam oven?
A: Clair, your question made me laugh because I can also taste bananas lurking in recipes where I frequently find them unwelcome!
Bananas used in baked goods like muffins and cakes are usually there for both sweetness and binding qualities. In some recipes, like a simple muffin batter, you can sub in applesauce or cooked and pureed pears for the mashed banana. The texture won’t be as plush and the keeping qualities not as good, but if you’re eating the muffins the same day it’ll be fine. If you aren’t worried about the sugar content, you can skip the fruit mashes and purees, and add an extra tablespoon or two of sugar, and an additional egg to cover the binding part.
