Mind-Changing Anchovy Stew (Hamsi Buğulama)

As the winter slowly crawls in hamsi claim larger part of the fishmonger’s stalls and of the weekly ration in Istanbul. Hamsi (also known as anchovy) are a finger-long fish with a shiny silver belly and dark grey back. It smells and tastes sea like no other fish does. Every time I cook hamsi with my cooking class participants I feel on a mission: the odds that my guests are suspicious (at best) about this fish are very high. I don’t blame anybody who got introduced to anchovy through the infamous pizza topping. But the hamsi I am talking about belongs to a different category of food. So bear with me.

In Turkey hamsi is always associated with the Black Sea that offers a wild abundance of this fish in winter (unless the winter is warm, and you need to chase hamsi as Robyn Eckhardt and David Hagerman did last year trailing along the Black Sea coast). Hamsi cooking methods are countless, and on the Black Sea they go out of their way to use up this seasonal fish: pilaf with hamsi, hamsi fritters, hamsi köfte, soup of hamsi, bread with hamsi and what not. No wonder, the Black Sea folks are teased to be adding hamsi even in their baklava.

In Istanbul hamsi enthusiasts would not bother. Most buy hamsi with the guts removed, bath the fish in a pile of corn flour, arrange it in a flower fashion all tails touching in the middle of the pan and shallow-fry them: the bones are soft and completely eatable. If you know your way around and have time at hand, you do dishes like hamsili pilaf that I religiously cook every winter. Surprisingly, I don’t see around much hamsi buğulama, a stew in which the little fishes are cleaned of their spines, heads and tales, tossed with vegetables and then cooked on the stove top or in the oven.

I love hamsi buğulama as it is an incredibly versatile dish: the outcome depends on your choice of vegetables and cooking method. The common themes that remains are 1) plenty of the cooking liquid so you can mop up the sauce with your bread; 2) tomato to lend its juices to the cooking liquid; 3) parsley for the herby note, and finally 4) lemon to compliment the sea-tasting hamsi with some tartness.

Hamsi buğulama is a quick fix my mother-in-law puts together on the days she does her weekly shopping. She slices onions, red Romano peppers, green peppers and lemons (yes, plural for lemons), dices a few tomatoes and garnishes the whole deal with a generous handful of chopped parsley and cooks it on the stove top. But this is for a quick family meal. If there are guests to wow she’d throw in a few unexpected things - a bit of potato for a full fledged main course, spinach to emphasize the season and salça to deepen the flavor. She’d arrange the lemons on top and bake the whole affair until the potato cooks in the abundant sauce and the lemons on top slightly roast.

I have adapted the quick hamsi fix philosophy from my mother-in-law. One may wonder how quick this fix is given you need to fillet these little fishes because there is nothing more inconvenient that separating the bones from the stewed fish that had tightly hooked up with the rest of the ingredients. But after peeling tons of hamsi every winter I think nothing of peeling a kilo or two. I hope you will not be intimidated by the simple procedure and give it a try.

Last time I was making hamsi buğulama I realized the pepper season is over, and last batch of the summer tomatoes is finished. So I revised the usual version prepared in our family by adding some chard leaves and stalks, sun-dried red bell peppers and sun-dried tomatoes as well as the homemade red bell pepper paste and Antakyan tomato paste. It came out wonderful - juicy and flavorful, simple and in-sync with the season, so I thought I’d share the recipe.

Anchovy Stew (Hamsi Buğulama)

Take chopping for this dish very seriously: anchovy cook fast, and any large chunks of the vegetables will take longer to cook than the fish resulting in the overcooked (meaning way too hard) anchovy.

Prep Time: 30 Min
Cook Time: 20 Min
Total Time: 50 Min

Serves: 6

Ingredients

• 1 kg anchovy (or sardines)
• 2 medium onions, sliced into paper-thin half rings
• 2 dry red bell peppers, soaked in hot water for 1 hour, drained and sliced into 0.5 cm/0.2 inch strips
• 4 sun-dried tomatoes, soaked in hot water for 1 hour, drained and sliced into 0.5 cm/0.2 inch stripes
• 100 g chard, leaves chopped into 1 cm/0.4 inch stripes and stalks cut into 0.5 cm/0.2 inch dices
• 3 tbsp parsley, coarsely chopped including the stalks
• 4-5 pinches sea salt
• pinch freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 lemon, thinly sliced
• 2 bay leaves (optional)
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 tsp high-quality tomato paste
• 1 tsp red bell pepper paste (omit if not available)

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/355F.

2. Trim anchovies: Hold an anchovy the silver side up. With your thumb rip up its belly: stick the thumb into the middle of the belly and move your thumb up to open the belly and pull out the anchovy intestines. Then work your way down to the tail and somewhere midway you will feel the anchovy spine: pull it up and then towards the head (the head comes out), and then finally towards the tail (the tail is removed too)! Once the whole batch is cleaned, rinse the anchovy fillets in the cold water and transfer to a colander to drain well. Finally, sprinkle with 2 pinches of sea salt and set aside.

3. Prepare vegetable mix: In a large mixing bowl sprinkle the sliced onions with 2 pinches of sea salt and black pepper and give them a good squeeze for a minute, so the onions start releasing their juice and somewhat cooking. Toss in the slices of dry pepper, dry tomato, chard and parsley.

4. Assemble dish: Season a medium-size baking tray with the olive oil. Transfer the cleaned anchovy and the vegetable mix on the tray and toss to combine. Then arrange the lemon slices on top. Season with one pinch salt. Stick in the bay leaves if using. In a small bowl whisk the water, tomato and pepper paste; pour over the assembled dish. Bake for 15 minutes covered with aluminum foil to let the vegetables cook and then for 5 min under the broiler to let the lemons slightly roast. Serve with the cooking liquid and plenty of bread to mop up the sauce.