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Fish Fumet (3/4 litre, 3 cups)
Dutch version of this recipe

A good beef stock is made with  meat bones, a good fish fumet (concentrated stock) needs fish bones. Ask the fishmonger to collect the bones when he is filleting, you'll need about one kilogram. The bones have to be from lean fish like sole, halibut, plaice, flounder,  etc., no bones from salmon or maquerel. By the way, if the fishmonger gave you more bones than you need: the Japanese grill the fishbones and pluck the leftover meat from it.
There are some links in the recipe to the tips & tricks of broth making. There you can find descriptions of how to strain, reduce, cool and keep your broth. Because that is the same for all broths and stocks, this information is gathered on one page. On that page you can also find links to other recipes for stocks and soups.

To end up with about 3/4  litre (6 cups) fish fumet you'll need:
1 kilo (2 pounds) fish bones
4 stalks of stem celery
1 leek
1 chopped onion (skinned)
1 teaspoon crushed white peppercorns
some mace
2 bay leaves
3 litres (6 pints, 3/4 gallon) water

Wash and clean all vegetables, cut them coarsely.
Rinse the fish bones under the running tap. Put them in a pan with vegetables and spices, bring to the boil but immediately lower the fire. Skim carefully, let the stock simmer without boiling for three hours. Some recipes prescribe a much shorter time, notlonger than twenty minutes to prevent the fish stock turning bitter. In my opninion a longer simmering (without actually boiling) results in a tastier fumet.

Strain the stock, and reduce with 75%. That means that from the three litres of water plus additional liquids from the vegetables you'll end up with about 7.5 decilitres. If you plan to use the fish stock for a fish soup, you can limit reducing the stock to 1.2 litres. Let it cool quickly. Now you can freeze what you don't need immediately. A fumet is often used in small quantities. Use an ice cube holder to freeze the fumet. One cube equals one table spoon.

All text and pictures of dishes are the intellectual property of Coquinaria and may not be reproduced without permission and acknowledgement.