30 October 2010

Chermoula

chermoula
Chermoula is a seafood marinade used in Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria. Although it's traditionally used just as a marinade, it's pretty good used in other applications, a spicy mix of garlic, cilantro, olive oil, lemon, chili pepper, and seasonings. It's not unlike chimichurri in Argentina. Often fish or seafood are rolled in chermoula, and then layered in a dish with onions and tomatoes and other ingredients to make a tagine. Stay tuned for a tagine recipe coming soon.

chermoula

Chermoula

1 large bunch cilantro
1 small bunch flat-leaf parsley
1 small red chili pepper, seeds removed and pepper chopped
1 small garlic glove, minced
1 teaspoon each cumin, coriander, salt
juice of 1 lemon
1/3 cup olive oil

1. Dice the cilantro and parsley leaves as finely as possible. Combine remaining ingredients.

4 comments:

Zoubida said...

It's a very nice "start" recipe for chermoula. But I don't see garlic in it, or onion. One or the other or both are added, depending on the final use of the marinade.
An other ingredient I see missing is flat leaves parsley. Parsley and coriander go hand in hand in moroccan cuisine.
For excellent north-african cuisine reference cookbook, I suggest one written by a north-african author rather than an american one, even if she lived in Morocco for quite a while as it is the case with Paula Wolfert. Somehow important things get omitted, may be for adaptation to american palate sake?
An excellent book I offer my north-american friends is "The Momo Cookbook: A Gastronomic Journey Through North Africa", by Momo (Mourad) Mazouz.
Check it out, I promise you won't regret it.
I have no interest or ties with the author.
I would have prefered to send you this comment privately, but I didn't find an email address. I hope I'm not offending you...

Zoubida said...

I love chermoula and use it extensively in my cooking. I'm moroccan. For fish I usually add garlic to the mix, then I warm it slightly (really barely brought to a very hot bath temperature) and let cool before using it. I also always use flat-lefed parlsy in my chermoula mixes.
I love you r blog!

Yosha said...

Yum! I have recently found some love for cilantro, so looking fwd to trying this. Can I just marinate the fish in ths and bake?

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