Ingredients (4 persons):

• 2 scorpion fish (1,100 g)
• 6 eggs
• 1 leek
• 1 lettuce
• 250 ml of liquid cream
• 250 ml tomato sauce
• butter and flour for the mold
• extra virgin olive oil
• salt
• pepper
• parsley
• For the pink sauce:
• 1 egg
• extra virgin olive oil
• vinegar
• salt
• 2 tablespoons orange juice
• 2-3 tablespoons ketchup
• 1/2 teaspoon hot sauce
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 tablespoon of whiskey

Scorpion fish pudding recipe step by step

Clean the leek (removing the lower part, the upper part and 2 layers). Cut the green part on one side and the white part on the other.

Heat a casserole with plenty of water. Add the heads, bones and loins of the scorpionfish. Season and add the green part of the leek cut into julienne strips. Cook the loins for about 10 minutes, remove them, let them cool and crumble them. Continue cooking the rest of the ingredients for 15 minutes more, strain the broth and reserve it for another occasion.

Heat a frying pan with a couple of tablespoons of oil. Finely chop the leek, add it and sauté it for 5 minutes. Remove, drain and set aside.

Beat the eggs in a large bowl, add the cream and tomato sauce, leek and fish, season with salt and pepper and mix well.

Grease a rectangular baking pan with a little butter and sprinkle it with a little flour. Cover the base of the pan from side to side with a wide strip of baking paper, leaving a flange protruding from each side. Place it in another larger pan filled with water.

Heat the oven to 200º, place the pudding in it, lower the oven temperature to 170º and bake it in a bain-marie for 40-45 minutes. Remove it from the oven, let it cool down and unmold it.

To make the pink sauce, place an egg in a mixing glass. Add a pinch of salt, a dash of vinegar and 175 ml of oil. Insert the electric mixer up to the bottom and beat the ingredients until smooth. Add the whiskey, Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, ketchup and orange juice. Mix well and set aside.

Clean the lettuce, dry it and cut it into thin julienne strips.

Cut the pudding into slices and serve one on each plate. Accompany with lettuce and a little pink sauce. Garnish the plates with a few parsley leaves.

Tips for making Arguiñano's scorpionfish pie

This time we have used fresh fish but they also sell frozen scorpion fish loins that we can use perfectly.

As the scorpionfish has a large amount of bones, it is a little more complicated to eat and cook than other species and it is a fish that can also be prepared in the oven.

There are several recipes you can prepare with this fish, such as this delicious scorpion fish and clams casserole or this variety of scorpion fish cake with garlic mayonnaise.

What to serve with scorpionfish pie or pudding

The scorpion fish cake has a very strong seafood flavor, so it is usually served with pink sauce or mayonnaise and toasted bread.

In addition, it is also very common to serve it on a bed of lettuce of your choice.

History of scorpion fish cake

To talk about the origin of this scorpion fish pudding, nothing better than to hear it from its creator, Juan Mari Arzak:

"It was 1971 and like every morning, after shopping at the Brecha market in San Sebastian, I would go to the nearby bars in the old part of town to eat and drink. One of the bars obligated of my gastronomic tour was the Astelena of my friend Alfonso Gonzalez (father of the current owner of the bar Hikamika ).

There, I was particularly struck by the tremendous success of one of their skewers, the hake pie which was nothing more than a succulent and juicy pudding served on a slice of bread and whose main ingredient was a fish so much ours.

My reflections were directed to how to introduce a cake of this style in the menu of my house, giving it an air in line with the culinary trend in vogue at that time.

I experimented for more than a month I reduced the quantity of fish to make it fluffier, which was also helped by the cream I decided to add. Finally, a little tomato sauce gave the cake a pinkish hue that was result ".