Bakalarios Skordalia

If Bakalarios sounds you like "cod" you are right. In contrast, the word "skordalia" no longer has such a familiar sound.

Skordalia is a compound word of skordos (garlic in Greek) and agliata (also garlic, in Italian). That is, it is a redundant word that translated into English would sound like "garlic garlic." It is what is called pleonasm, admitted in Greece because it is formed with a foreign word and does not seem like a stupid repetition.

Skordalia consists of a mixture or soft emulsion of garlic with mashed potatoes or bread with olive oil, although I also know that it is made with nuts (which I have never tried). In some cases, egg is added as an emulsifying agent, but in this case it is more similar to aioli mayonnaise than to authentic skordalia.

There are many ways to make this sauce-puree but the Greeks usually do it by hand and using a mortar.

The dish consists of portions of cod (it can be fresh or desalted) coated in batter and served with the skordalia, which is dipped or pinched a little before taking it to the mouth, depending on whether you make it more or less liquid.

It is a very typical Greek mezze dish.

INGREDIENTS (4 people)

For the cod

• 600 grams (1.3 lbs) of salted cod, preferably from the loin, with few bones
• Wheat flour
• Olive oil for frying (can also be fried in sunflower or corn oil)

For the batter

• 1 cup (200 ml) white wheat flour
• 1 cup of sparkling mineral water
• The juice of half a lemon
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt*
• Black pepper

* Be careful with the salt that is used since the cod, although desalted, still has enough. If the strong salty taste bothers you, use only half a teaspoon.

For the Skordalia

• 400 grams (14 oz) of potatoes
• 4/6 cloves of garlic
• Half a cup (100 ml) of extra virgin olive oil
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• We put the cod to soak (if it is salted) in abundant water

First we are going to boil the potatoes without skin and whole. When they are soft, we put them to drain the excess water.

While we are going to incorporate the garlic cloves (without the green germ), the oil and the teaspoon of salt in a mortar and we will start to mash them until we get a homogeneous paste (if we like it a lot, but a lot, the garlic taste we will use 6 cloves, otherwise 4).

Then we pass the potatoes through the potato masher and slowly incorporate the mixture obtained in the mortar. Mix well with the help of a spoon adding the lemon juice. We try to rectify salt and lemon and it's ready. It will depend on whether we want it more liquid or dry that we add a little more oil and lemon juice or leave it as is. We reserve it.

Now we are going to fry the cod.

Remove fish from soaking and drain well.

After draining the fish, we coat it in white flour.

We prepare the batter by mixing all the ingredients that we have indicated. Cover the pieces of cod with this batter.

Pour a generous stream of oil into the pan and over medium heat, coat the fish until it is well browned.

It is served alongside the skordiala immediately. You can be sure that you will repeat this dish more than once.

The skordalia is also used for many things. It is a good accompaniment to other fish, meat and even vegetables. If you like, you can use it in many other recipes.