Mackerel for tea with a sweet treat for afters.

For me, hangovers usually bring out one of two approaches to food; I either want to gorge on rubbish and stodge all day, or I want to eat incredibly healthy food to undo the badness of the night before.

Today is a mixture of both. I decided to make brownies to distract myself from the pain, and because I’ve got to work on Bank Holiday Monday, so I thought they would brighten up a quiet newsroom.

Chocolate Brownies:

I don’t have a massively sweet tooth, and I’m not great at baking, but I can just about stretch to some cookies or brownies. I think the trick is to get the best possible chocolate with lots of cocoa in it; cooking chocolate just doesn’t cut it.

Melt about 200 grammes of dark chocolate with about two thirds of a bar of butter. (The recipe I used suggested 165g of butter; my scales aren’t that precise). 

When it’s melted and cooled a little beat in about 200g of brown sugar, preferably muscovado but I only had Demerara. Add a pinch of salt, and some vanilla extract.

Beat in three eggs one by one, then some plain flour. (Again, the recipe I used for amounts said 85g, but my scales are not that good.) Put in a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper. 

Bake at 160 degrees for about 40 minutes. Allow to cool on a wire rack.Then slice.

And now for the healthy (ish) supper…

Mackerel fillets with chorizo, leeks and peas.

I’m going through quite a chorizo/paprika phase at the moment. 

First slice a leek and fry in a little butter and vegetable oil, with a pinch of salt. Put some potatoes on to boil.

Take the papery skin off a good chunk of chorizo, and cut it up into chunks. Technically you should use cooking chorizo for this, but it’s not that easy to get hold of, so I used some ordinary chorizo. When the leeks are starting to collapse a bit, add the chorizo to the pan along with a good pinch of paprika. You want the edges of the chorizo to go a little crispy. 

 Add the nearly cooked potatoes to the pan to allow them to crisp a little, before adding a small amount of vegetable stock and some frozen peas. If you want, you can add a few spoonfuls of cream to the sauce, but it doesn’t necessarily need it. Add a good squidge of lemon juice, and turn the heat right down.

Season the mackerel fillets. Heat a little vegetable oil in a pan until it’s fairly hot, then put the fish in, skin side down.  If you want to be really healthy you could just grill the mackerel.

It doesn’t take long – just three or four minutes, then turn the heat off and flip the fish to finish cooking in the residual heat.

Serve the fillets on top of a big mound of chorizo leek-y loveliness. If you can hack it, have with a nice chilled glass of white wine.

I’m off for a lie down.