Raw and real: Tongan-born Ane Fotu and Irish chef Vinnie Callaghan swapped recipe ideas based on the traditional Tongan dish Ota.
Ane Fotu was born and raised on the island of Tonga before migrating to Shepparton with her family eight years ago.
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“For the first four years or so, I was really into the Aussie way of life. It was all so new and exciting,” Ane said.
However, when she took her kids back to her homeland for the first time in November, she suddenly realised how Australian they had become.
“When we returned to Australia I thought if I don’t teach my kids about their culture then they could lose it. And food is a huge deal in Tongan culture,” she said.
Passion: Ane Fotu prepares the traditional dish Ota.
“When this project came along I jumped at it — it was an opportunity to share what we have,” she said.
Ane has worked with Irish-born Mitchelton Winery head chef Vinnie Callaghan to develop Ota, a traditional Tongan meal using raw fish, into a contemporary restaurant dish.
“There are many versions of Ota in the South Pacific,” Ane said.
“This was my favourite dish growing up in the Islands. It is so popular that almost every hotel in Tonga has this on their menu — and it’s enjoyed by many of our tourists.”
Cutting edge: Vinnie Callaghan gets to work on his modern version of Ota using Murray cod, lime and avocado.
Vinnie said after meeting and talking with Ane, he had developed his own version of Ota using fresh Murray cod marinated in lime juice. Vinny said he liked it so much, his “ceviche” version of Ota was now on the Mitchelton menu.
“I haven’t tried to reinvent the wheel with this,” he said.
“I wanted to pay homage to the traditional way of doing it without introducing any exotic flavours.”
Ane said when it came to cooking traditional Tongan food for her family, she found it difficult to source a lot of the ingredients in Shepparton.
“So I had to be creative myself and start making do with whatever I could find here,” Ane said.
“Then I thought, wouldn’t it be great to get a professional chef to come up with his own ideas?”
The result is a perfect summer entree dish using fresh Murray cod, lime juice, avocado and coconut cream that melts in the mouth.
Ane said she loved the changes Vinnie had come up with.
“This has been cooked the same way for years and years in Tonga, but this is so ‘modern restaurant’ — it’s wonderful,” Ane said.
Ane Fotu’s Ota dish uses lemon, tomatoes and snapper.
Ota
Serves 8 generously
Ingredients
• 1kg fresh snapper fillet, skinned
• Juice of 3 lemons
• Several spring onions, finely sliced
• 2 medium-sized tomatoes, finely diced
• 4 cups coconut milk
• chilli
• Salt
• Coriander for dressing
Method
1. Dice the fish into 1cm pieces, discarding any bloody tissue.
2. Put in a bowl with salted water to marinate (best overnight).
3. Drain the fish and add the spring onion, tomato and coconut milk with lemon, chilli and salt to taste.
4. Mix well, chill well and enjoy.
New twist: Mitchelton head chef Vinnie Callaghan’s version of Ota uses Murray cod marinated in lime juice, red chilli and avocado.
Murray cod ceviche
This dish should be served cold as the fish is raw and will cure over time in the lime and coconut cream mix. The fish can be mixed with the coconut cream mixture three hours ahead of time if you wish for a more cooked fish texture.
Ingredients
• 160g Murray cod
• 80g avocado
• 10g red chilli
• 3g native finger lime
• 5g coriander leaves
• 5 tomato blossom (tomato flowers)
• 5 coriander blossom (coriander flowers)
• 2 Kaffir lime leaves
• 3 limes
• 100ml coconut cream
Method
1. Place coconut cream in a pot and bring to a simmer.
2. Crush one lime leaf in your hand and add to the coconut cream. Zest and juice the 3 limes and stir through. Take off the heat and cool. As it cools the lime will infuse its flavour in the coconut cream.
3. Cut the chilli in half, remove the seeds and finely slice into thin batons 3cm long.
4. Fold the 1 remaining lime leaf in half along the spine of the leaf and finely slice, discarding the tough leaf spine.
5. Dice the Murray cod into 3cm pieces.
6. Dice the avocado into 2cm pieces.
7. Mix the Murray cod and avocado, season with salt and pepper.
8. Add the infused coconut cream.
9. Gently fold through, being careful not to puree the avocado.
10. Spoon the mixture into your serving plate.
11. Scatter chilli batons and sliced lime leaf over the top.
12. Arrange tomato blossom, coriander blossom and coriander leaf on top.
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