Rollmops

Recipe courtesy Alton Brown, 2009

Show: Good EatsEpisode: The Once and Future Fish

Rated: 5 stars out of 5Rate itRead users' reviews (2)

RECIPE
COMMENTS & REVIEWS(2)

Cook Time:
5 min
Level:
Easy
Yield:
16 to 20 rollmops

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Times:

Prep: 45 min
Inactive Prep: 12 hr 0 min
Cook: 5 min
Total:: 12 hr 50 min

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Ingredients

For the brine:

1/2 cup kosher salt
1 quart water
1 pound trout filets from small, 6 to 8 ounce whole fish, scaled, skin on, and cut into 16 to 20 (4 to 6-inches long by 1-inch wide) pieces

For the pickle:

2 cups water
2 cups cider vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
8 whole cloves
8 whole allspice berries
6 whole black peppercorns
4 dried bay leaves
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
16 to 20 cornichon and/or pickled onion
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
1 medium onion, julienned

Directions

Place the salt and water into a 4-quart container and stir until the salt has dissolved, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the trout filets, making sure they are submerged. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Combine water, vinegar, sugar, cloves, allspice, peppercorns, bay leaves, and red pepper flake in a 2-quart saucepan set over medium high heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the liquid comes to a boil, approximately 5 minutes. Cool to room temperature and then refrigerate overnight.

Remove the trout from the brine and rinse thoroughly under cold running water for 1 minute. Submerge the filets in clean cold water and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Drain and rinse the filets. Pat dry. Lay the filets in a single layer, skin side down and brush each with mustard. Place a cornichon or a pickled onion on the filet. Roll up each filet and secure with 1 or 2 toothpicks. Alternate layers of rollmops and julienned onion in a glass jar or ceramic crock.

Pour on the chilled pickling mixture, cover and refrigerate for at least 5 hours and up to 2 days. Drain and serve chilled with crusty bread.

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Comments & Reviews

recipe Rollmops
BILL Chesapeake, VA 11-14-2009
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Good stuff - not hard to make.
Rated: 5 stars out of 5

When I saw AB do recent ?The Once and Future Fish? episode, I new I had to try those rollmops. I lived in West Berlin during... the early 1980?s ? brought back a lot of memories of the good food to be found. Does anyone remember ?Green Week? in Berlin? The recipe is easy to follow. I could not get the fish to say submerged when it was soaking in the brine. Just poured everything into a zip top bag and it worked out well. Same as when the fish needed to be soaked in cold water. Tip, found the cornichon?s at my local Trader Joe?s. None of the local Mega Marts had them. I came up a tad short on the pickling liquid for my 1lb of trout in a half-gallon mason jar. The pickling recipe did not completely cover the rollmops. I just poured in the remainder of the cornichon pickling liquid; it was a water and vinegar mix ? no problems. They tasted best after the second day in the pickling liquid. They really are a good accompaniment for beer. Hey AB, how about a good Doner Kebab recipe?? You no doubt had some of these during your ?Berlin pub crawling days.? Read more
recipe Rollmops
Ross Raleigh, NC 11-07-2009
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Curious, yet tasty pickled fish experiment.
Rated: 5 stars out of 5

Having never eaten, let alone prepared any pickled fish, I was a little nervous about the possible outcome. I was pleasantly... surprised by the delicious results. I could not find any cornichon at the local grocery, so I substituted baby kosher dills. I might be missing out on some of the flavor, but they're still worth making again.Read more