Marinade for baking/barbecuing fish

[Paul]

Sorry I have not written anything for ages, but work has been so busy with the birth rate exploding, and swine flu has made it all much harder.  I also had a knee op last week, so I've been hobbling around doing nothing, least of all cooking.  A friend dropped off a huge reef fish the other day, his brother in law had caught it and didn't want it.  It was about 5-6 kg, I could only weigh it on the bathrooms scales (which I never stand on).  So I put it in the Weber, and used an old Charmaine Solomon recipe for a fish marinade and adapted it for the TMX.

1 cup yoghurt
Vegetable oil
1 red chilli
3 cloves garlic
lump of ginger
salt
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp garam masala

(I needed twice this amount for my fish)


Chop the chilli, ginger and garlic on about 7 for a couple of seconds.  Scrape down, add 1-2 tbsp oil.  Cook on Varoma temp at speed 1 for 5 minutes.  Add the cumin and garam masala and cook for another 2 minutes.  Turn off the heat, but keep stirring until the temp has dropped to normal.  Add the yoghurt and salt to taste and mix on 4-5 for a few seconds.

With a sharp knife cut a few deep cuts into the fish, and rub the marinade into the cuts and the body cavity.  Bake in the oven or cook in the bbq.  I'm hopeless at timing the cooking of fish, and last night's meal was nearly a disaster.

I got the fish last week and had to freeze it after cleaning it (confronting job).  I forgot to scale it, so yesterday I thawed it and scaled it late in the day (it never really completely thawed despite being out of the freezer for 8 hours).  Scales all over the place.  As we were setting up for dinner, we realised we had thrown out the coal panniers for the Weber BBQ, and had to rush to the shops to buy some more - made it 2 minutes before closing time.  The fish was way too big to fit into the oven, so there was no other option if they had been closed.  I wanted to wrap it in banana leaves, where I live in Cairns there is a lot of public access land near gullies and waterways and people have planted a lot of fruit trees, you can always find something there.  I sent Mark off in the dark with a pocket knife, but he cam back empty handed.  So I had to use aluminium foil.  If you want to use the banana leaves, cut out the middle spine and use the leafy bits on each side.  They are very brittle, so you have to pass them over a flame (stove top) until they go darker green and more pliable.  The fish tastes so good wrapped in these, but it tasted pretty good in foil.  Luckily I guessed the cooking time correctly, even though it was still semi frozen when it went in, and we enjoyed the fish with some delicious chocolate icecream to follow.

[judydawn]

Sounds great Paul, nice to see you back.  Boy, you have a lot of friends who give you food Can you give them my address

[Paul]

Sounds great Paul, nice to see you back.  Boy, you have a lot of friends who give you food Can you give them my address

I know it's strange isn't it?  One of the great things about living here is that everyone is generous about giving away excess food, particularly the nurses.  When we visit the smaller hospitals in country towns, people always leave large boxes of fruit in the tearoom for people to take.  Also, in the smaller country roads in farm areas, there is fruit and veges for sale with honest boxes, which I think is really nice.

[judydawn]

Lucky you.  Forgot to wish you well with your knee operation too Paul.  A pretty painful recovery I am told.  Hope you are having a break from delivering babies so that you can fully recover and do your physio.

[Paul]

Lucky you.  Forgot to wish you well with your knee operation too Paul.  A pretty painful recovery I am told.  Hope you are having a break from delivering babies so that you can fully recover and do your physio.

Thanks Judy, it's all going well

[Thermomixer]

As JD said - hope all is well with the knee.

Sounds like the sort of story that you think is going to end badly, but somehow it is all good, especially after some wine.

The marinade and cooking ideas sound good.

It is a bugger when you forget to scale the fish  before thawing.  Even worse, as happened to me once, that the cook doesn't realise and cooks it with the scales on !!  Poor thing - steamed in parcels and then a seething mess of scales and slim when we opened it.

[Paul]

As JD said - hope all is well with the knee.

Sounds like the sort of story that you think is going to end badly, but somehow it is all good, especially after some wine.

The marinade and cooking ideas sound good.

It is a bugger when you forget to scale the fish  before thawing.  Even worse, as happened to me once, that the cook doesn't realise and cooks it with the scales on !!  Poor thing - steamed in parcels and then a seething mess of scales and slim when we opened it.

Yuck - guts too?

[Thermomixer]

No, the fishmonger had removed the guts. 

[Paul]

No, the fishmonger had removed the guts. 

Phew