something to replace gefilte fish

Ima2NYM_LTR

Fri, May 18 2007, 3:35 pm

We love gefilte fish, but it really is quite pricy, so we dont get it as much anymore as we used to.

But the Shabbos meal feels empty without it.

Can anyone reccomend a gefilte fish substitute (appatizer) that can be used either for dinner (hot or cold) or lunch (most likely cold)?

The 3 things I am looking for are theat it is low cost, fairly easy and healthy. it is only for 3 people (unless we have guests) so it doesnt need to be a lot.

Also, it doesnt neccesarily need to be fish.

thank you much

Ambassador-to-KJ

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:23 pm

If you are only three people on good thing to do maybe is to buy the least expensive roll available and only prepare half and freeze the rest for the next week. (thats of course if thats enough fish for one shabbos) Otherwise maybe make a nice Pasta Tuna salad with diff veggies depending on your taste, thats pretty good and you can make that with one can of tuna

Sparkle

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:24 pm

Cold fruit soup

egg salad served with an ice cream scooper

exotic salad...

Ambassador-to-KJ

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:26 pm

Sparkle I may be wrong but maybe the poster is looking for fish dish, there is an inyan to eat fish on Shabbos.

Ima2NYM_LTR

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:31 pm

fish or not is fine, while I would like fish for traditions sake, I know thats a bit harder because the only fish I willingly eat are gefilte, lox, tuna and whiting.

Making a pasta/tuna salad is a good idea.

Egg sald is usually part of shabbos lunch already.

The cold fruit soup sounds intereting but I sort of live for Matzah ball soup!

DefyGravity

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:41 pm

Almost any side dish you serve at a meal can be an appetizer (which is why I feel that appetizers are silly).
You can serve:
Meatballs over rice
Chef's salad
a slice of deli roll
sushi
sesame noodles
boureka with mushroom sauce
liver

bonzie

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:43 pm

you could do a tuna fish roll, which isn't to hard to make, looks nice, tastes nice, and is pretty low cost

you just take puff pastry, mash up tuna with mayo (spices) and pickles, spread it on the puff pastry roll it up, probably better served warm...

MommyLuv

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:44 pm

sometimes instead of gefilte fish I make salmon salad:

1 can of atlantic salmon, some mayo, lemon juice, black pepper, a touch of celery seed, any combo of sliced scallions or olives or green pepper or chopped celery etc.

it's quite good and much cheaper than g-fish!! Tongue Out

Crayon210

Fri, May 18 2007, 4:58 pm

DefyGravity wrote:

Almost any side dish you serve at a meal can be an appetizer (which is why I feel that appetizers are silly).

You are so wise. I would love to incorporate this wisdom into my life. :-)

batya_d

Fri, May 18 2007, 5:12 pm

If you want a fish alternative, how about baked or broiled salmon filets:

Salmon with Dill sauce
salmon w/ teriyaki sauce and sesame seeds

Salmon's not cheap either though; if you really want cheap maybe you could invent something w/ chunk tuna, like make a fancy salad w/tuna chunks, or a pasta salad w/ tuna chunks.

I like Defy's bourekas idea; any kind of turnover would work, I make one from KBD-Short on Time with Chicken chunks, sour cherries and mushrooms as an appetizer.

DefyGravity

Fri, May 18 2007, 5:34 pm

I've noticed that people basically just take a side dish, serve it on individual plates as a separate course - and that makes it an appetizer. Think about it! Meatballs are a side dish (or main dish), but when they're served on a little plate - poof - they've become an appetizer.

Crayon210

Fri, May 18 2007, 5:36 pm

Right. It would be much easier to serve fish at the meal, except for the meat-fish thing. Otherwise, yeah, it's kind of arbitrary to serve an appetizer.

DefyGravity

Fri, May 18 2007, 5:43 pm

Exactly. Although sometimes I've done the appetizer when I've needed to drag out a meal a bit.

Raisin

Sat, May 19 2007, 6:12 pm

You could make tuna or salmon fishcakes, mock chopped liver, real chopped liver stretched out a bit with egg to make it more economical.

In my house ppl just want something to dip the challa in - hummous, chatzilim, avocado dip etc

shalhevet

Sat, May 19 2007, 6:31 pm

Sparkle wrote:

egg salad served with an ice cream scooper

Only if you portion it out before Shabbos. Putting food into a special shape is forbidden since it's the melacha of moreach.
Of course you could always spoon egg salad onto the plate...

batya_d

Sat, May 19 2007, 11:09 pm

DefyGravity wrote:

I think this is an adorable idea-- I'd serve a few cocktail meatballs in sauce over orzo as an appetizer. yum!

btMOMtoFFBs

Sat, May 19 2007, 11:31 pm

My neighbor serves "franks in blankets" sometimes. She also made such a cute thing once.... boiled some large pasta shells (fish, sea shells...get the connection....) and served them stuffed with tuna salad - a little lettuce salad underneath was kinda like seaweed...

MOM222

Sat, May 19 2007, 11:36 pm

shalhevet wrote:

Sparkle wrote:

egg salad served with an ice cream scooper

Only if you portion it out before Shabbos. Putting food into a special shape is forbidden since it's the melacha of moreach.
Of course you could always spoon egg salad onto the plate...

Why moreach? If anything boneh, but not everyone holds that its boneh.