Cod with Eggplant and Honey: Recipe by Ada Parellada

Ada Parellada and the cuisine of contrasts

Ada Parellada is one of Catalonia's great chefs, known for her ability to transform everyday ingredients into surprisingly unpretentious dishes. From Semproniana, her restaurant in Barcelona's Eixample, she has demonstrated for decades that signature cuisine doesn't need impossible ingredients or laboratory techniques — it needs quality produce, sensitivity, and a clear idea.

This recipe for cod with eggplant and honey is a perfect example of her philosophy of contrasts. Each element of the dish serves a precise function: the eggplant provides softness and fleshiness, the cod contributes its deep flavor and firm texture, the cream sauce with rosemary and honey envelops everything with herbaceous sweetness, and the crispy cod skin breaks the creaminess with an unexpected crunch.

What makes this recipe special is its apparent simplicity. There are four components that are prepared separately and assembled at the end. None require advanced technique, but the combined result is much more than the sum of its parts. It's intelligent cooking: few ingredients, precise combinations, clean execution.

Ada Parellada has a key tip for this recipe: "Use good cod cheek cut into small pieces — it only needs 5 minutes of cooking. And cod skin is the easiest crispy element in the world: you just have to dry it in the oven, without salt or spices." These kinds of tricks, born from years in the kitchen, are what turn a good recipe into a great recipe.

For this recipe, the quality of the cod is absolutely crucial. Premium Icelandic cod, with its white, firm, and clean-tasting flesh, significantly elevates the dish. At Bacalalo, we have been selecting the best North Atlantic cod at our stall in Barcelona's Mercat del Ninot since 1990, and we know that the difference between a correct cod and an extraordinary one is especially noticeable in recipes like this, where the fish is the absolute star.

Ingredients for cod with eggplant and honey

Serves 4 — Time: 40 minutes — Difficulty: Medium

For the cod and eggplant

• 600 g of desalted cod, cut into 2-3 cm dice (preferably cheek)
• Cod skin (reserve when dicing)
• 3 medium eggplants
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt

For the cream, rosemary, and honey sauce

• 1 liter of liquid cooking cream (35% fat)
• Fresh rosemary sprigs (3-4 sprigs)
• 100 ml of honey (preferably wildflower or rosemary)

The cream, rosemary, and honey sauce

This sauce is the common thread of the dish. Sweet, herbaceous, and creamy, it envelops the cod and eggplant with a mantle of flavor that unites and elevates them. The technique is a classic reduction — reducing the cream by half its volume concentrates flavors and intensifies texture — but the addition of rosemary and honey makes it unique.

Step-by-step preparation

Pour the liter of liquid cream into a wide saucepan (the wider, the faster it will reduce). Add the whole fresh rosemary sprigs — do not strip the leaves, you will remove them at the end. Pour in the 100 ml of honey and mix well with a whisk.

Bring to a gentle boil over medium heat. When it starts to bubble, reduce to medium-low heat and let it reduce uncovered. Stir every 3-4 minutes to prevent it from sticking to the bottom. The reduction will take between 20 and 25 minutes — the volume should be reduced by half.

You will know it's ready when the sauce has a creamy consistency that coats the back of a spoon without dripping immediately. The color will have changed from white to warm ivory, and the aroma of rosemary and honey will be intense and enveloping. Remove the rosemary sprigs.

Some important tips for the sauce:

• Don't turn up the heat to speed it up: Cream on high heat burns at the bottom and adds a bitter flavor. Be patient with medium-low heat.
• The type of honey matters: A rosemary honey will enhance the herbaceous note; a wildflower honey will be more neutral. Avoid very dark honeys (like forest honey) which would dominate with their intensity.
• Prepare it first: The sauce can be made in advance and gently reheated. In fact, it keeps well and can be prepared the day before and stored in the refrigerator.

Crispy cod skin: the master touch

This is the component that transforms the dish from excellent to memorable. Crispy cod skin is a high-cuisine technique that Ada Parellada demystifies with her usual pragmatism: "Cod skin is the easiest crispy element in the world — you just have to dry it in the oven, without salt or spices."

Preparation of crispy skin

When dicing the cod, carefully remove the skin using a sharp knife. Try to get pieces as large and intact as possible. Scrape off any remaining flesh clinging to the skin — it should be as clean as possible.

Lay the cod skins flat on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Place them completely flat, scale-side up. If they curl, press them down with another sheet of parchment paper and a second baking sheet on top (this keeps them flat during drying).

Bake at 150°C (300°F) for 20 minutes. The skin should dry completely in the oven — it will come out of the oven still flexible, but as it cools, it will become completely crispy and rigid, like a cracker. This is the magic moment: the transformation happens upon cooling, not during baking.

Do not add salt, oil, or spices. Cod skin has enough flavor on its own, and any additions could cause it to burn or not dry properly. Simplicity is key.

Once cool and crispy, you can break it into irregular fragments of your preferred size or leave it in large pieces for a more dramatic plating. It stays crispy for several hours in an airtight container at room temperature.

Eggplant and cod in the oven

The eggplant and cod are cooked in two phases in the oven. First the eggplant alone, then the cod is added on top. This sequence is important because eggplant needs more cooking time than cod, and the cod should be cooked just right — barely done, juicy, not overcooked.

Step 1: Roast the eggplant

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Cut the eggplants into 2-centimeter (0.8-inch) dice — don't make them too small or they will dry out in the oven. Spread them on a large baking sheet (don't pile them up) and drizzle generously with extra virgin olive oil. Salt them lightly.

Bake for 20 minutes at 180°C (350°F). The eggplant should be tender inside but not fall apart. It will have a golden appearance at the edges and be creamy in the center — that point where the eggplant stops being spongy and becomes silky.

Step 2: Add the cod

Remove the baking sheet from the oven. Distribute the cod cubes over the roasted eggplant, trying to make sure each piece of fish rests on a bed of eggplant. Drizzle the cod with a fine stream of olive oil.

Return the baking sheet to the oven and bake for 5 more minutes at 180°C (350°F). Only five minutes. Cod, cut into small cubes as Ada Parellada recommends, cooks quickly. It should be opaque on the outside but still juicy and slightly translucent in the center.

If you use cod cheek, as suggested in the original recipe, the natural gelatinous texture of this part of the fish will make the cubes especially juicy and tender even with oven cooking. The cheek is the most flavorful part of the cod and works best cut into small cubes.

Plating and serving

The plating of this recipe is where all the components come together to create the complete experience. Ada Parellada proposes a layered arrangement that builds flavor and texture from the base to the crown.

The final assembly

1. Eggplant and cod base: With a spoon, place a generous portion of the roasted eggplant and cod dice mixture in the center of each plate. Do this carefully to maintain the integrity of the cod dice.
2. Cream, rosemary, and honey sauce: Pour the warm sauce over the cod and eggplant. Do not drown the dish — the sauce should partially cover, leaving part of the cod and eggplant visible to create visual contrast. Two or three generous tablespoons per plate are sufficient.
3. Crispy cod skin: Crown each plate with fragments of crispy cod skin. Stick the pieces vertically into the sauce to create height and drama, or delicately rest them on the cod. The textural contrast between the creamy sauce and the crispy skin is the signature of this dish.

Serving tips

• Temperature: Serve immediately after assembling. The cod and eggplant should be hot, the sauce warm, and the crispy skin at room temperature. If the sauce is cold, gently reheat it in a saucepan.
• Warm plates: Preheat plates in the oven (2 minutes at 60°C/140°F) so the food doesn't cool down quickly.
• Garnish: This dish doesn't need additional garnish, but if you want to add greens, a few arugula or watercress leaves on the side add freshness without interfering.
• Pairing: A full-bodied white wine (oaked Chardonnay, Viognier, or a Godello from Valdeorras) perfectly complements the creaminess of the sauce and the sweetness of the honey.

Recipe variations

With roasted pumpkin instead of eggplant

Butternut or violin squash, diced and roasted just like eggplant, adds a natural sweetness that amplifies the honey in the sauce. This variation is especially suitable for autumn and winter. Roast the pumpkin for 25 minutes instead of 20 — it's denser than eggplant.

With honey and soy sauce

For an Asian-inspired version, replace the cream and rosemary sauce with a reduction of honey with soy sauce, grated ginger, and a splash of rice vinegar. Less creamy but equally addictive, with an umami profile that enhances the flavor of the cod.

With garlic chips instead of crispy skin

If you don't have cod skin (for example, if you're using already peeled cod), thinly slice 4-5 cloves of garlic and fry them in olive oil until golden and crispy. Drain them on paper towels and use them as a topping. Less spectacular than cod skin, but excellent in flavor.

Version with roasted peppers

Add diced red peppers to the tray with the eggplants. The pepper adds sweetness and color to the dish. You can also completely replace the eggplant with a mix of roasted colorful peppers — this is a lighter and more colorful variation.

Frequently asked questions