Hake stuffed with shrimp and Basil

Hake. A blue fish that costs very little, It has a beautiful white flesh firm, It contains omega 3. Just a little imagination and you can make this fish a refined dish, maintaining intact its lightness. I wanted to invent a roll a little’ different from the usual: I wrapped hake in thin slices of eggplant and I stuffed with basil leaves and pink shrimp. I put everything in the oven and I accompanied the dish with zucchini and fresh peas glazed in a little butter. The eggplant tastes sweet and spicy, hake remains soft, the pink shrimp. Give it a try.

Ingredients for 4 people: 

• 2 hake from about 300 grams each
• 200 grams of pink shrimp
• a small bunch of basil leaves
• two Zucchini
• 100 grams of fresh peas
• 30 grams of butter
• extra virgin olive oil as required
• salt and pepper

Squamare, gut and fillet hake (except that you did not do your fishmonger) and remove all the plugs with the help of tweezers. Shell the shrimp and remove the intestine wire. Place each fillet between two sheets of parchment paper and beat lightly with a meat mallet (do plan or you will rip the flesh) to make them thin and uniform. Lay the center of each fillet along its length, from head to tail, basil leaves and lay on the widest part of the thread 4-5 shrimp. Salt everything together and season with a little oil. Roll the hake fillet on itself in the lengthwise direction, taking care not to spill the shrimp.

Cut the eggplant into slices thin with the help of a mandolin. Place on a sheet of parchment paper many slices of eggplant, slightly overlapping each other, as necessary to wrap the stuffed fillet. Place the filet on eggplant and roll up together gently. Grease the eggplant with a drizzle of olive oil and salt.  Do the same with the other fillets.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees and in the meantime prepare vegetables: shelling peas and thinly slice the zucchini with a mandolin. Melt the butter in a non-stick frying pan and add the peas, brown them over low heat and cook 8 minutes, then add the zucchini, fry-up, being careful not to break them, season with salt, pepper lightly and cook the vegetables for 5-7 minutes. They have to become soft and shiny, but remain crisp.

Bake the fish for 15 minutes: When the eggplants are golden is ready, because the hake must remain soft and juicy. Serve the hake roll with sauteed vegetables and garnish with a few leaves of basil.

THE PAIRING: Taste and delicate perfumes for this dish from sweet note conferred by shrimps and peas. It goes well with white as delicate as the Collio DOC White, The wine produced by Rajade, in Friuli Venezia Giulia. A fruity wine, fresh and mineral with moderate alcohol content (12,5% ABV.).