Bacalhau à Brás

A popular Portuguese dish made with flaked cod, crispy potatoes, caramelized onion and egg to make is golden.

Bacalhau is the salted, dry cod and has been a staple food eaten in Portugal during Lent (right before Easter) - when eating meat is forbidden, yet eating fish and eggs is allowed.

Salting the fish is an ancient practice that helped preserve it longer (when fridges were not yet available) and should help provide the fish with a sweeter, milder flavor after rehydration.

Soaking the fish in water (changed multiple times), for a total of 8-24 hours, helps re hydrate the fish and eliminates some of the salt used for drying (after re hydration the fish should not taste too salty).

I've provided a less traditional alternative of cooking this dish with fresh/ frozen cod - in case you need to watch your salt intake or if finding this delicacy in your local supermarket proves to be a challenge.

While it is said that there are more Bacalhau recipes than days in a year, Bacalhau à Brás is one of the most popular ways of cooking this fish.

Add a simple tomato-cucumber-green pepper salad on the side, for a complete meal.

This recipe combines ingredients from 196flavors, finedininglover and leitesculinaria.

This recipe is part of the 2020 - Week 32 - Portuguese Menu. Look under Menus for all other recipes of the series or Subscribe to our mailing list and receive complete weekly menu ideas with everything from the grocery shopping list to all standardized recipes in a menu, as well as an organized Order of Cooking list to save you time in the kitchen.

Download the recipe here:

Bacalhau a Bras

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Bom appetite!