Chef Isabel
Abanico Ibérico a la Plancha
Extremadura's dehesa gives us this fan-shaped, marbled rib cut: salt it at the last moment, lay it on a fierce plancha, and count in seconds so the centre stays juicy.
Culinary Explorer
A cooking platform built around craft, culture, and the stories behind what we eat.
Tollos en Salsa Canarios
Created by
Canarian tollos en salsa turns dried dogfish into tender, meaty strips in a dark garlic, pimentón, cumin and tomato sauce. The full day's soak decides it, drawing out harsh salt before the pot.
Main Dishes
Spanish
Easter
Comfort Food
Make Ahead
25 min
Active Time
1 hr 25 min cook•26 hr 10 min total
Yield4 servings
Tollos en salsa belong to the Canary Islands: strips of dried, salted dogfish soaked back to suppleness, then simmered in a red-brown sauce of garlic, onion, green pepper, tomato, sweet pimentón and cumin. This is sturdy Canarian cooking for Lent, born from preserving the catch. Fresh fish won't give you the same firm, meaty bite. It is another preparation.
The soak decides the dish. Give the tollos a full 24 hours in cold water, inside the refrigerator, and change that water four times. Rush this and the surface softens while the middle stays fiercely salty and stiff. No sauce can mend it afterward. Once the fish is pliant, a gentle preliminary simmer finishes the work before it meets the sofrito, the slow onion and pepper base cooked until dark gold and sweet.
Far from the islands, ask a Canarian or Iberian grocer for tollos, cazón seco or dried salted shark strips from a traceable source. If none can be found, properly soaked bacalao is the honest household alternative for this sauce, but it flakes rather than chews and the finished dish is bacalao en salsa, not tollos. Skip the preliminary simmer and add salt cod only for the final 8 to 10 minutes.
Let the finished pot stand for 20 minutes. The sauce settles around the fish and tastes fuller, which is why it is better still the next day. The Margin beside this recipe says only, "Taste before the salt cellar." Dried fish has the last word there. Siempre sale, si lo sigues.
Tollos come from the fishing communities of the Canary Islands, where cazón and other small sharks were cut into long strips, salted and dried so the catch could be kept beyond the fishing day. The word names the preserved strips themselves, which had to be softened in repeated changes of water before cooking. Simmered in a pimentón sauce, they became closely tied to Semana Santa, when abstinence from meat put durable fish dishes at the centre of the table.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
dried salted dogfish strips (tollos or cazón seco)
Quantity
500 g
cold water
Quantity
enough to cover by 5 cm
changed 4 times, plus more for simmering
white wine vinegar
Quantity
30 ml
divided
extra virgin olive oil
Quantity
60 ml
onion
Quantity
300 g
finely chopped
green bell pepper
Quantity
150 g
finely chopped
garlic
Quantity
20 g (about 5 cloves)
finely chopped
ripe tomatoes or canned whole peeled tomatoes
Quantity
400 g
grated if fresh, crushed if canned
sweet pimentón
Quantity
8 g (about 2 teaspoons)
cumin seeds
Quantity
2 g (about 1 teaspoon)
lightly toasted and ground
dried thyme
Quantity
1 g (about 1 teaspoon)
bay leaves
Quantity
2
dried pimienta picona or cayenne pepper (optional)
Quantity
1 small
seeded
dry white wine
Quantity
150 ml
water
Quantity
300 ml
divided
fine sea salt (optional)
Quantity
0 to 3 g
add only after tasting
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| dried salted dogfish strips (tollos or cazón seco) | 500 g |
| cold waterchanged 4 times, plus more for simmering | enough to cover by 5 cm |
| white wine vinegardivided | 30 ml |
| extra virgin olive oil | 60 ml |
| onionfinely chopped | 300 g |
| green bell pepperfinely chopped | 150 g |
| garlicfinely chopped | 20 g (about 5 cloves) |
| ripe tomatoes or canned whole peeled tomatoesgrated if fresh, crushed if canned | 400 g |
| sweet pimentón | 8 g (about 2 teaspoons) |
| cumin seedslightly toasted and ground | 2 g (about 1 teaspoon) |
| dried thyme | 1 g (about 1 teaspoon) |
| bay leaves | 2 |
| dried pimienta picona or cayenne pepper (optional)seeded | 1 small |
| dry white wine | 150 ml |
| waterdivided | 300 ml |
| fine sea salt (optional)add only after tasting | 0 to 3 g |
Equipment Needed
- •Large nonreactive soaking bowl
- •Medium saucepan
- •Wide heavy sauté pan or cazuela, about 28 cm
- •Mortar or spice grinder
- •Fine-mesh strainer
Instructions
- 1
Rinse and soak
Rinse the tollos under cold running water. Put them in a nonreactive bowl, cover with cold water by 5 cm and refrigerate for 24 hours. Change the water four times, roughly every 6 hours. The strips should bend without snapping by the end, and the final water should be much clearer than the first.
Keep the bowl refrigerated throughout the soak. Warm water softens the outside too quickly and gives the dried fish an unpleasant smell before the centre has shed its salt. - 2
Simmer until pliant
Drain and rinse the soaked tollos. Put them in a saucepan, cover with fresh cold water by 3 cm and add 15 ml of the vinegar. Bring just to a boil, lower the heat immediately and simmer gently for 18 to 25 minutes. A knife should enter the thickest strip with slight resistance. Drain, cool enough to handle, trim away any hard cartilage and cut the fish into pieces about 5 cm long.
- 3
Cook the sofrito
Warm the olive oil in a wide heavy pan or cazuela over medium-low heat. Add the onion and green pepper without salt. Cook for 18 to 20 minutes, stirring often, until very soft and dark gold at the edges. Add the garlic and cook for 2 minutes. Stir in the tomato and cook for another 12 to 15 minutes, until its water has gone and the sofrito is thick enough to leave a clear trail behind the spoon.
Don't hurry the sofrito. Cooking out the tomato water and letting the onion sweeten is what makes the sauce cling to the tollos instead of running thin beneath them. - 4
Wake the spices
Take the pan off the heat. Stir in the pimentón, ground cumin, thyme and pimienta picona, if using, for about 20 seconds. Return the pan to low heat, pour in the wine and the remaining 15 ml vinegar, and simmer for 3 minutes. Add the bay leaves and 250 ml of the measured water.
- 5
Braise in the sauce
Set the tollos into the sauce and turn them gently to coat. Bring to a quiet simmer and cook uncovered for 20 to 25 minutes, turning the pieces once or twice, until the fish is tender but still meaty and the sauce is glossy and spoonable. If it tightens before the fish is ready, add the reserved 50 ml water a little at a time.
- 6
Rest before serving
Remove the bay leaves and rest the tollos off the heat for 20 minutes. Taste the sauce only now, then add no more than 3 g salt if it truly needs it. Serve with papas sancochadas, plain boiled potatoes, or coarse bread for the sauce. The fish should be supple, the sauce deep red-brown and the pimentón oil just visible at the edges.
Chef Tips
- •Buy tollos from a seller who can name the fish and its source. Dogfish is shark, and some stocks are under pressure. If the source is doubtful, use bacalao and accept the change of dish.
- •After soaking and simmering, the tollos should smell cleanly marine, not sharply ammoniacal. A strong ammonia smell that remains after rinsing is a reason to discard them, not a seasoning problem.
- •Semana Santa often arrives before fresh tomatoes are worth buying. Good canned whole tomatoes are the sensible choice then. Drain off only the thinnest liquid, crush the fruit and cook it down properly.
- •For salt cod, soak according to its thickness, usually 24 to 36 hours with several water changes. Do not give it the preliminary simmer. Lay it in the finished sauce for the final 8 to 10 minutes so the flakes stay whole.
- •Do not salt the sofrito or the simmering sauce. Even well-soaked tollos release more salt as they braise, so make the final judgment after the pot has rested.
- •A dry Listán Blanco from the Canary Islands suits the garlic, vinegar and firm fish. Use the same clean, dry wine in the pot; sweet cooking wine muddies the sauce.
Advance Preparation
- •Begin the tollos 24 hours before cooking. Keep them covered in cold water in the refrigerator and change that water four times.
- •The entire dish can be made one day ahead. Cool it promptly, cover and refrigerate, then reheat gently with 30 to 60 ml water until hot throughout.
- •Refrigerated leftovers keep for up to 2 days. The sauce thickens in the cold, so loosen it with water rather than stock and taste before adding any salt.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 450g)
Calories
550 calories
Total Fat
18 g
Saturated Fat
3 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
15 g
Cholesterol
190 mg
Sodium
1200 mg
Total Carbohydrates
17 g
Dietary Fiber
4 g
Sugars
7 g
Protein
77 g
Where cooking meets culture.
Culinary guides, cultural storytelling, and the editorial depth that makes cooking meaningful.
Discover Culinary ExplorerMore from Fish in Sauce & Baked
Browse the full collection
Chef Isabel
Aletría Murciana
Aletría Murciana is Murcia's humble noodle guiso: fine fideos, pork ribs, potato, saffron, and a dark sweet sofrito. Get that base right and the pot knows where it's going.
Chef Isabel
Andrajos Andaluces con Conejo
Andrajos are Andalucía's dough-rag stew from Jaén and Granada: a slow rabbit guiso thickened with torn sheets of flour dough, rolled thin so they cook tender instead of gummy.
Chef Isabel
Ànec amb Peres
Ànec amb peres is Catalan celebration cooking: duck braised in a dark sofregit, firm autumn pears added near the end, and an almond-garlic picada that turns the juices into a close, glossy sauce.