I don’t like fish, but I LOVE eel. I had it for the first time last year on sushi, and it blew my mind. If the idea of eating eel makes you squeamish, I’m begging you—please please PLEASE give it a try! It’s truly lovely. It has a delicacy similar to fish, but it has a meatier, heartier flavor that reminds me of chicken.
Spicy Eel is my favorite food from the game STARDEW VALLEY. When eaten in-game, it adds buffs to speed and luck, making it perfect for when you plan to spend the day racing all over the map collecting foragables or delving deep in the Mines.
Apart from eel, hot pepper is the only other ingredient listed in the in-game recipe for Spicy Eel. Judging by the dish’s thumbnail, it looks like the eel is brushed with a red sauce. I decided to make my sauce with gochujang (spicy chili paste) for my hot pepper element, taking my inspiration from tteokbokki. Basically I just played with the ingredients and consistency of the sauce until I was happy with it. It’s important to make sure eel is fully cooked (see the note in the Instructions below), so I consulted the cook temp/time in a Serious Eats recipe for whole eel and tweaked it to suit the size of my fillets.
As a self-professed spice wimp, this dish was a little too hot for me, but it was ultra flavorful. I’ll definitely make a milder version for myself in the future, but if you like your food to bring the heat, Spicy Eel is the dish for you! 🙂
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Spicy Eel
“It’s really spicy! Be careful.”
— Stardew Valley
INGREDIENTS:
- 1/2 cup water or chicken broth
- 3 Tbsp mild gochujang
- 2 Tbsp mild miso
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 tsp onion powder
- 3 4-oz conger eel fillets
- I found mine in the frozen fish section of H-Mart.
Makes 3 eel fillets
INSTRUCTIONS:
- NOTE: Make sure your eel is fully cooked before eating. There are toxins in eel blood (and in some eel species’ skin) that are dangerous to consume raw. These toxins are sensitive to heat, so eel is perfectly safe to eat as long as it is fully cooked.
- Preheat oven to 375°F. Coat a baking sheet with cooking spray and set aside. Add all the ingredients except the eel to a small saucepan and whisk until the gochujang and miso have completely dissolved. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for 5 minutes until thickened, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat.
- Cut the eel fillets in half width-wise and brush generously with spicy sauce on both sides. Lay skin side down on the baking sheet (this will help prevent the ends from curling). Cook for 15 minutes or until the internal temp is at least 145°F. Brush the tops with sauce every 5 minutes.
- Enjoy before heading out to the Mines to dig for jewels and fight monsters. It will make you speedy and lucky!
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