What you need:
– ca 400 g of de-boned frozen pangasius fillets
– 500 g fresh tomatoes (cooking time will be longer) or 400 g pureed tomatoes
– 1 glass of white wine
– 1 teaspoon of (olive) oil
– at least 5 large cloves of garlic (there is no such thing as too much garlic here)
– 1 large onion
– half a teaspoon dried oregano
– half a teaspoon dried parsley
– half a teaspoon dried basil
– as much chili as you like
– 1 liter of vegetable or fish or chicken stock
– 1 tablespoon of tomato paste
– 1-2 bay leaves
– salt and pepper to taste
How to make:
Roughly chop your onion and garlic, heat the oil and put the chopped vegetables there with dried herbs. (If you use fresh herbs, wait for the soup to be mostly cooked until you add them.) When the onion has turned glassy, add tablespoon of tomato paste and stir for a second, then throw in the frozen pangasius and add white wine. Cook for 2-3 minutes, then add tomato puree, throw in your preferred bouillon cube and add around a liter of hot water. Let the soup simmer for 30-40 minutes, until the fish has thoroughly cooked through, then shred the larger pieces of fish a bit, salt and pepper to taste and enjoy!
How much does it cost:
Fish is usually expensive in Estonian supermarkets (like almost everything else), but you can find pangasius bargains for around 6 euros/kg. This makes the cost for the fish around 2,5 euros. Pureed tomatoes come for around 1.3 -1,6 euros, wine will be around 1 euro. Stock, oil and herbs if you need to buy them, still won’t be much more than a euro. This will make the total cost for the soup around 5-5,5 euros and as always, it is enough for 2 very hungry eaters or for 4 moderately hungry ones.
This soup borrows heavily from Italian kitchen and the Italians definitely know what they are doing…. And they have so many more affordable types of fish options. If you can get your hands on other types of seafood for this soup, by all means, do! Shrimps, mussels, any type of your favorite fish would be great for this one – the more stuff, the merrier. If you are lucky enough to get fresh ingredients, then don’t hold back! This can work as soup or as a stew, depending how you customize it. In case you use different types of fresh seafood, you could easily get away with throwing some potatoes and carrots into the mix, but with only one sad frozen pangasius, potatoes would water down the taste of the broth. Switch out the herbs with your favourite ones, play around with different types of seafood and have fun!