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Ignacio Ovalle and the secrets of a fish head
The Chilean chef shows how it is done at La Calma, where fresh produce is the key to success
Fresh fish. Two words that are key to the existence of La Calma, in Santiago de Chile. So important, in fact, that the selection and collection of the seafood to be cooked is incorporated into the restaurant's work shifts: one team is in charge of selecting it after closing time, and another cleans it from eight o'clock in the morning. "We spend four or five hours buying the fish, which we call diving. We work with 15 different types of fish and more than twenty types of seafood products every day," explained the restaurant's owner, Mauricio Fredes, during the presentation at Madrid Fusión Alimentos de España.
"Our restaurant is quite difficult to run," admitted Ignacio Ovalle, La Calma's chef since 2021, who assured that this search for fresh fish involves markets all over the country, and direct contact with fishermen and harpoon divers. The chef demonstrated one of his signature dishes, 'cabeza de vieja' (old woman's head), which he had to make with anglerfish because he could not find it in Spain.
The dish came about when the chef observed the amount of fish heads, with all their meat content, that were wasted every day. The chef wanted to change this situation and came up with the idea of making this dish. Ovalle explains that, after cleaning the head, a garlic dressing is made, "then we use aji cacho de cabra (the most typical in the country), and a fermented paste that helps us give the flavour power. Everything is coated", he adds, before being floured and fried.
At the same time, a traditional demi-glace is made with lamb bones. More sauce is then added to the fish head, which goes into the oven, an operation he repeats a few times. "We finish with very fresh parsley and lemon zest on top", he says.
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