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Pisces Assos (Baked Fish)

Pisces Assos (Baked Fish) is a traditional Ancient Roman recipe for a classic thick sauce of spices and dried onion in a vinegar, date, aniseed, honey, liquamen, olive oil and wine base thickened with an egg yolk. The full recipe is presented here and I hope you enjoy this classic Ancient Roman version of: Baked Fish (Pisces Assos).

prep time

20 minutes

cook time

20 minutes

Total Time:

40 minutes

Serves:

4

Rating:

Tags : Sauce RecipesSpice RecipesHerb RecipesAncient Roman Recipes

Original Recipe

Pisces Assos (from Vinidarius' Apici Excerpta) x

Pisces Assos: Teres piper, ligusticum, satureiam, cepam siccam, suffundes acetum, adices caryotam, anethum, ovorum vitella, mel, acetum, liquamen, oleum, defritum. haec omnia in uno mixta perfundes.

Translation

Baked Fish: Grind pepper, lovage, savory and dried onion [in a mortar]. Moisten with vinegar and add dates, anise, egg yolks, honey, vinegar, liquamen, olive oil and defritum. Blend all these into a single mixture, [heat and] pour over [the baked fish].

Modern Redaction

Ingredients:

1/2 tsp freshly-ground black pepper
1 tsp lovage (or celery) seeds
1/2 tsp dried savory
2 tbsp dried onion
generous pinch of aniseed
4 dates, finely chopped
2 tsp honey
2 tsp white wine vinegar
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp liquamen (fish sauce)
200ml fish stock
60ml defritum
1 raw egg yolk

Method:

Pound together the black pepper, lovage (or celery) seeds, dried savory, dried onion and aniseed in a mortar until very fine. Add the dates and pound to a smooth paste. Moisten with the honey, white wine vinegar, olive oil and liquamen then scrape into a saucepan.

Work in the stock and defritum then bring the mixture to a boil. Continue boiling for 15 minutes then take off the heat. Beat the egg yolks in a bowl. Whisk in a ladleful of the stock to temper then pour into the pan and whisk to combine. Heat gently until thickened (do not boil) then use hot as a pouring sauce for baked fish.

Find more recipes from Vinidarius' Apici Excerpta on this site's page dedicated to the Vinidarius Excerpts from Apicius with Translations.