Bahamian Conch Fritters
When you are in the Bahamas, one of the local foods you eat is Conch. They are easy to catch because they don't crawl around too fast if you even see them crawaling at all, however they are a pain to clean. We have cleaned them but the easiest thing to do is buy them cleaned from locals. It helps the locals out too. You have several choices of what to do with the conch. I also like conch burgers and conch salad but sinch this is about conch fritters, then it is time to create the recipie the way I would like it done verses what you find in most restaurants. The fritters you find in most restaurants have more batter and you really barely tast the conch or the other ingredients. Perhpas that is so they can save money but I want conch fritters with conch as the star verses the batter. I found a recipie in a bahamian cookbook that was more to my taste and then slightly modified it. Deb told me they were better than the ones we purchased and I agree with her.
You can see where I modified the recipie because I put the mod's in italics.
Conch Fritters
4 fresh conchs, finely minced
- before chopping up the conch, I used a meat beater to tenderize it. Also,
I didn't mince it finely but used a courser chop because that gives you chunks
and you will find it in the fritter, again the conch is the star. It was still
tender because I tenderized it before chopping.
1 green pepper, chopped - a small green pepper is fine otherwise use half
a large one.
1 red pepper, chopped - I only had green pepper so I left this out. If I
was using both, I would only use half of green and red.
2 celery stalks, chopped - I used 1 1/2.
1 onion, finely chopped - I used half of a red onion for more taste.
1 egg, slightly beaten - I measured up 1 1/4 eggs from an egg beater box.
1 ¾ C all purpose flour (or enough to bind batter)
3 tsp baking powder
½ teaspoon salt - I used a teaspoon of cajun seasoning
dash of pepper
dash of Bahaminan hot sauce - Any hot sause will do and I used 4 shakes
Oil for deep frying - I don't have a deep fryer on the boat so I modified
this and you can see that below
Combine ground conch owth chopped veggies. Add egg. Mix flour, baking powder and salt; add to conch mixture. Season to taste or use my seasonings in italics. Form into balls 1 1/2 inches in size. (TIP: before making the balls, place some oil on your hands and rub them so the fritter mixture won't stick to them as much.)
If you have a deep fryer, heat oil to 375. Drop one fritter at a time into pan, waiting a few seconds before adding additional fritters. Fry 3-5 min until golden brown on all sides, turning the fritters as they rise to the surface. Drain on paper towels.
If you don't have a deep fryer, Pre-heat your oven to 350. Pour some oil into a fry pan and heat it until a drop of water sizzles when you drop it in. Brown the fritters on all sides as best you can. When the fritters are browned, place them in the pre-heated oven for 7-10 minutes to finish cooking the inside of the fritters.
Serve with cocktail sauce or Jim's
Remoulade. Note: use the second version with the hot sauce.
Web Page by Jim Faughn