Thai style deep fried snapper
DifficultyEasy
Servings4 people
Ingredients
- 800-1000 g whole snapper, cleaned, rinsed and dried
- 1/2 cup fine rice flour
- 1.5 L vegetable oil, to deep fry
- 1 long red chilli, de-seeded and sliced, to serve
- 1/4 cup fried shallots, to serve
- juice of lime, to serve
Thai sweet & sour sauce
- 2 coriander roots, washed and roughly chopped
- 3 long red chillies, de-seeded and roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp crushed garlic
- 1 tbsp grated ginger
- 3 red eschalots, peeled and roughly chopped
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup tamarind paste
- 1 tbsp palm or brown sugar
- 1 tbsp fish sauce
Instructions
- To make the sauce, place the coriander root, chillis, garlic, ginger, eschalots and oil together in a food processor and pulse ingredients to a smooth paste.
- Heat a medium saucepan over a medium heat, add paste and cook for 2 minutes or until aromatic.
- Add tamarind paste, sugar and fish sauce with 80ml water, stirring to combine. Cook for 3-4 minutes or until reduced by a third. Remove from heat and check balance, adjusting accordingly so that the sauce is sweet, sour, hot and salty. Set aside for later.
- Meanwhile, heat oil in a wok over a high heat, (about a third full), until a piece of bread sizzles and becomes golden.
- Score the fish from the head to the tail, at 1cm intervals, cutting through to the bones.
- Evenly coat the fish in the rice flour, removing any excess.
- Carefully slide the fish into the hot oil and cook for 5 minutes each side or until skin is crispy and fish is just cooked.
Notes
To serve, place half the sauce down the centre of a platter, place the cooked fish on top and spoon the remaining sauce over the fish. Garnish with chilli, spring onions, fried shallots, coriander leaves and lime juice.