Starter ideas for Monkfish

Monkeybonkers

I'm doing a Come Dine With Me in a couple of weeks. I'm going to do a Monkfish main course and I'm looking for a starter that will compliment it. Would a fish starter be too much of a fish overload?
Any ideas greatly welcomed.

Tazz T

Mussels would make a nice starter perhaps in a soup/broth.

Or even oysters grilled with breadcrumbs, bacon and garlic topping.

Darkginger

How're you cooking the monkfish? If it's with a creamy sauce, I'd go for something more acidic for the first course, and vice versa - if you're cooking it with tomatoes or something, go for a creamy starter. Although monkfish is a meaty fish, it's not got a lot of punch to the flavour, it's more subtle, so don't give them anything too spicy to start with - give them a chance to appreciate its flavour.

Having said that - I think a fishy starter might be a fish too far - what about something veggie or cheese based? How about something like grilled asparagus wrapped in prosciutto, or individual goats cheese and sun-dried tomato tartlets? You could think about a nice homemade coarse paté with melba toast, or something simple like watercress soup with homemade bread rolls. I'd definitely include something crunchy/crispy to contrast with the following course (unless that already has a crunchy/crispy element?).

You could always serve some fish-based amuse-bouches with pre-dinner drinks - how about one bit of salmon caviar inside dill-flavoured cream cheese, wrapped in a sliver of smoked salmon and tied with a chive leaf? Like a little flavour bomb Pretentious, perhaps, but fun!

My cooker is hors de combat at the moment, as we're in the middle of decorating the kitchen (been without it for 5 days now - argh!) so I'm fantasizing about food - does it show?

Monkeybonkers

Lol, it certainly does show.
Thanks for the suggestions. I was thinking maybe a tomato sauce of some kind with the fish. I might try something simple like the watercress soup you mentioned. It's my first time doing something like this so I think I'll keep it simple enough this time. Thanks for the input. Hope you get back cooking soon!

Anyone else any ideas?

Minder

Keep it light - maybe a few home made ravioli parcels. Flavour some ricotta with lemon rind and parmaesan cheese, salt & pepper. Make your own pasta dough and you can keep the ravioli parcels reasonably big. Three or five per plate. They don't take long to cook. Dress the plates with a warm mixture of lemon juice, olive oil, chopped parsley and maybe a touch of dried chilli.

You could make these in advance and dust with plenty of semolina flour to stop them sticking together.

UrbanSea

Just in relation to the above poster's suggestion of ravioli,I had a lovely spinach and ricotta ravioli there a few weeks ago,it was lovely. Done in a basic tomato sauce,was a perfect start to a meal.

olaola

I had an AMAZING starter of Monkfish up in Castle Murray in Donegal there last month. It was done in an escargot dish, in a similar fashion to the snails in garlic butter. And it was gratinated... Deeeelllissshhhh.

UrbanSea

olaola you're turning me on :P

kenco

Yep keep it simple

Couple of easy ones might be some bread and anitpasto (i.e. salami, parma ham, etc). Though this might not work if you were doing the monfish wrapped in parma with some pesto on fish (mmmmmm.....)

Some Mozzerlla, Tomato and Sage would do a nice rustic salad (drizzle with 2:1 olive oil and balsalmic vinegar)

Monkeybonkers

Thanks for the ideas everyone. My mouth is watering just reading them. Keep them coming if anyone has any more. Still haven't settled on a final menu yet. I'll post it up when I finally do decide.

Chewabacca

You don't want anything too powerful as monkfish has quite a subtle flavour. As far as time and effort is concerned I'd recommend leek and ricotta canneloni. You can make the filling and sauce earlier in the day and leave it sitting in your fridge. Theres a fantastic Rick stein recipe for it but my concern is that the tomato sauce with the gastric would be a bit too powerful so maybe just serve one or two(depending on size) canneloni with a small amount of the gastric sauce over the top. Best thing is this will be fine if, god forbid, you have any veggies eating. I'm feeling to lazy to link so just google rick stein canneloni if you want the recipe.