Something to make ryvita taste good - Smoked Mackerel Pate

 

 

...although, it has to be said that ryvita doesn't resemble the cardboard I remember having when I first tasted it many years ago. But, for me, it does need help and pate is my rescuer of choice. I spent a lot of the summer polishing off the wild mushroom pate I brought back from France with me, and it tasted really good on ryvita crackers which by their very consumption meant that in my own mind I kidded myself I was being virtuous in my choice of 'light lunch'

 

Well, sadly, the mushroom pate is long gone, but I had a whole pack of the aforementioned crackers and nothing left to adorn them with. It was at this point I remembered the recipe for mackerel pate that I had in one of my cookbooks somewhere. For some reason I had convinced myself it was Jill Dupleix, but once I had bought the ingredients (simple shopping list to remember without seeing the recipe - packet of smoked mackerel fillets plus a tub of quark) a trawl through her books revealed nothing, which unhelpfully makes me doubt my sanity. Luckily, a google trawl turned up this Waitrose recipe which you see below. It's not the first time that Waitrose has rescued me gastronomically in my hour of need, though usually it's through the supply of good wine and nice cheese rather than an emergency recipe, but there you go. Life is unpredictable.

 

If you like mackerel (which I do; not least for their stupidity to jump into the back of our boat after 'falling for the bits of silver wrapper on the end of a fishing line' trick, meaning that in the past I have had a good portion of the freezer full of them) then you will like this. It's tasty, creamy but still with the oily density of mackerel. And it's filling too. And it likes ryvita. We're all happy.

 

Smoked Mackerel Pate, taken from the Waitrose website

 

Serves 6 (or Lola and Finn's Mum, snacking or lunching, over a couple of days)

 

Ingredients:

 

One or two smoked mackerel fillets depending on size

Half a 250 g tub of Quark

You will need a blender

 

Method:

Pick out one or two smoked mackerel fillets. (Keep the remainder in the original wrapper, put in a polythene bag, seal, and store in the freezer.)

 

 

 

Peel back the skin from the fillet and discard. Break up the fish as you pop it into a blender, or small bowl or jug if you use a hand blender.

 

 

 

Spoon out about half a tub of Quark into the mackerel. (You can freeze the remainder.)

 

 

 

Blend. You will have to scrape down the sides of the blender until the ingredients mix properly.

 

 

 

Serve on toast, in sandwiches, or on ryvita!