Jamaica's national dish of ackee with salted codfish, brings out the bold flavours of the island nation. Traditionally eaten for breakfast, ackee and saltfish can be eaten at any time of the day particularly served with breadfruit, dumplings, boiled green bananas and even on top of white rice.
Prep Time30 minutesmins
Cook Time20 minutesmins
Total Time50 minutesmins
Course: Breakfast
Cuisine: Caribbean, Jamaican
Keyword: ackee, salted codfish, saltfish
Servings: 6servings
Author: Monique Creary
Ingredients
300gramsboned, salted cod fish
2tbspcanola oil
1mediumonion
2clovesgarlicminced
1/2Scotch bonnet pepperfinely diced
3sprigsfresh thymeor 2 tsp dried
1mediumtomato
2stalksscallions or green onionsbias-sliced, with 2 tbsp reserved for garnish
1/2tspground black pepper
1canackee540mL, rinsed and drained
Instructions
Fill a medium saucepan with cold water and add the salted codfish. Bring to a boil, then simmer on medium heat for 15 minutes, and drain.
Repeat the process by replacing the water, bringing it to a boil for 10 minutes and draining to remove the excess salt. Allow to cool for 5 minutes before handling.
Remove any bones and skin if present. Flake with your hands or break into small pieces using a fork. Set aside.
In a large frying pan, add the oil and saute the onion over medium high heat for 3-4 minutes.
Add in the garlic, scotch bonnet pepper, thyme and continue to cook for another minute.
Stir in the tomato, scallions, and flaked saltfish. Cook over medium heat for 5-6 minutes, stirring occasionally.
In the last couple minutes of cooking, add in the black pepper and gently fold in the the rinsed and drained ackees to heat it through.
Garnish with remaining scallions. Serve with boiled dumplings, roasted breadfruit or your choice of ground provisions.
Notes
If you like, you can add red bell pepper to this dish in place of the tomato. Both add a nice colour and flavour to the dish.
Saltfish can be purchased in several forms. I usually go with the "boned salted cod bits" version, because it doesn't have any bones, nor skin, plus it's already in smaller pieces. Larger fillets usually have the skin and bones intact, so it will take more prep time. Remove the skin before you boil it.
You can opt to soak your saltfish overnight instead of boiling in order to removed the excess salt.
If using the saltfish straight from the package, while it's boiling, you can chop your vegetables, and drain ackee to help save on time.
You can add it all the scallions or green onions with the saltfish, otherwise save a couple tablespoons to use as garnish (hence why I prefer to thinly slice these on a bias or 45° angle).
Be sure to gently fold in the ackee in the final stages of cooking. If you're using the canned variety, it's already cooked, thus more fragile, so it simply needs to be heated through.
You'll notice that there's no additional salt used in this recipe. The saltfish should give it the right amount you need, but you may need to add some back in if you over-boiled the saltfish.