Scallibut Ceviche

We had our Father's Day manly meal on Saturday, complete with grilled skirt steak and all of Shack's favourites like grilled corn, asparagus and coleslaw so that we could go over to Jen's for some tacos and cocktails. My contribution to the festivities was ceviche and because I couldn't decide between the halibut and the scallops, I bought both. We scored these beautiful, huge local radishes at St Lawrence Market and I knew they would be perfect in a ceviche. Kind of peppery, crunchy, watery and crisp - since I never put fresh chili peppers in my ceviche so that Little Shack will be able to enjoy it, radishes will give it a nice spicy kick without making it hot. I have never met a ceviche I didn't like and I really liked this one a lot.

Scallibut Ceviche
1/2 lb fresh halibut
1/3 lb fresh scallops
juice of 4 or 5 limes
1 clove garlic
1 tomato , fine dice
1/2 small red onion or vidalia onion, fine dice
big handful of cilantro, washed and chopped
3 large radishes, sliced very thin and julienned
splash of good extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt to taste

Cut your seafood into small, bite sized pieces and put them in a glass or ceramic bowl - I don't like doing this in plastic and you might not care so if you don't care that the plastic might give it a bit of a weird flavour, by all means, use a plastic bowl. I don't want you to accuse me of being all bossy boots.

Squeeze the juice of 3 or limes over the seafood, give it a good stir, cover the bowl and put it in the fridge for at least an hour and up to about 4 hours. You should take it out a few times and give it a stir to make sure that all the fish gets to spend ample time submerged in the lime juice.
About 20 minutes before you plan to serve it, take it out of the fridge and drain it, discarding that lime juice. The fish and the scallops will taste strongly of the lime and they will have "cooked" in the juice so you don't need that fishy marinating lime juice anymore.

I just give my bowl a quick rinse in cold water and the put the drained seafood back in the bowl. Add the tomato, onion, cilantro, radish and garlic and mix it in. Squeeze one or two more limes over the bowl, add a small glug of olive oil, a good pinch of kosher salt and mix it all together. Taste it at this point and adjust any seasonings. You might want a bit more salt or more cilantro or it might be perfect as is.
Put it back in the fridge to let them ingredients mingle and get to know one another until you are ready to eat it.
You can serve it in small bowls with good corn tortilla chips on the side to scoop it up or you can spoon a little bit onto individual chips and eat it like a little h'orderve.

Share this post