The other day whilst picking Netti up from work Paul called in at our local Morrisons where he thought; knowing I like a nice bit of mackerel; it would be a nice gesture to bring me one. A couple of days later I was clearing out and tidying the fridge when I decided I would have it for my dinner that evening. Once I had finished the job in hand I got the fish out to give it a bit of a clean. Good job I did. It was a whole bloody fish! Which meant it wasn’t going to be just a quick rinse under the tap, I had to gut the thing as well and it’s a fair while since I’ve had to do that. These days I generally ask the fishmonger to do it for me but with all the cutbacks in supermarkets these days the fishmonger is no more and it seems everything now comes pre- packed. Looks like I’m back to Donny market on Tuesdays or Fridays for my fish. Anyway, I digress. Out came my sharpest knife; my filleting knife died a while back when the handle fell off, I was gutted I can tell you; and off I went. I won’t go into graphic detail on how to behead, gut, de-bone and clean a fish, it’s all on YouTube if you really want to have a look.
Since I had also found a packet of cooked beetroot hiding away at the back of the salad drawer and I had some small easy peel oranges I decided to adapt and make a beetroot and orange salad to go with the mackerel. Although in future I think I’ll go a little easier on the vinegar in the dressing and probably replace the onion with grated carrot for less of a bite. To complete my meal I chucked a few baby potatoes around the mackerel and cooked the lot in the air fryer.

Ingredients

Method