Pan Fried Black Pomfret with fried garlic

I have always loved eating fish but seriously, I always end up clueless as to how I should cook my fish as I love variety and I don't wish to always stick to the same old kind of steaming fish with tomatoes, ginger and salted vegetable.

So decided to buy black pomfret fish so that I can fry it as I love my fish crispy! (once in a while I fry
 as cleaning up the oil after cooking this isn't exactly very pleasant)

Ingredients
- garlic (minced)
- shallots (diced finely)
- ginger sliced
- black pomfret
- spring onions/ corianger as garnish
- black sauce
- salt

Steps
1) Marinate the fish with salt
2) Heat the oil in frying pan
3) Put in the minced garlic and fry in low heat. Stirring all the time until crispy and golden. Set aside. Make sure it doesn't turn black if not it will be bitter!

4) Use the oil to cook the fish. Remember to remove all bits and residue of the garlic if not it will get burnt will cooking the fish. Top up more oil if needed...just make sure its enough oil to cook one side of the fish
5) Pat dry the fish before adding it into the heated pan. Fry in medium heat. Make sure the side is golden brown before turning over.
6) Once turn over, I add the shallots and ginger together at the side to cook it up

7) Finally, remove the fish onto a plate, drizzle with black sauce on it and top it up with the fried ginger slices and shallots as well as the fried crispy garlic. Then garnish with either spring onions or coriander.

Great dish with rice as the garlic and shallots as well as black sauce is alone to go with the rice, in my opinion.

 

Enjoy!

Oven Baked Seabass

Recently, my friend, Cheryl invited me over to her house together with Dorcas and Adelyn to learn cooking from Shawn who used to work in an Italian Restaurant with an Italian Chef. We all knew each other as we are from the same church. So it was a good time of bonding in the kitchen as Shawn teaches us 3 dishes which he learnt from his restaurant.

This recipe is so easy that I am sure anyone can do this! Its a recipe definitely for all the fish-lovers!

Ingredients
- FRESH Sea bass (which costs only about $5.50-$6 per fish!)
- fresh rosemary (about 7-8 stalks)
- garlic (3-4 cloves)
- salt
- black pepper
- olive oil
- onion (1/4)

Steps

1) Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celcius
2) Clean the sea bass especially the belly area
3) Put the parchment paper on the baking tray and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper

4) Place the cleaned Sea bass on top of the paper and put in about 2 cloves of garlic (chopped) and 2 stalks of rosemary each into the sea bass belly. Top the fish with diced onions and rosemary as shown in picture. Season with salt and pepper on the top as well

5) Place the fish in the oven for 15 mins. Don't worry about overcooking this fish. Sea Bass is a hardy fish. It wont be overcooked so easily. You can leave in there for extra 5 mins if you want the top part to be slightly crispy

This recipe is so easy. So give it a try!

Guilt-free Crispy Ikan Bilis (anchovies)

My children simply loves anything crunchy and crispy- from crispy fish skin, chicken skin to fried ikan bilis. I have recently read a recipe online in noobcook blog and there was this crispy baked ikan bilis recipe which I had to try because I do not like to cook dishes with lots of oil. My helper usually fries the ikan bilis with lots of oil which I feel so sinful eating and seeing the oil go to waste like that.

So this recipe is simple, guilt-free and ends up with the same crunchy, crispy result. So why not?

Ingredients
- dried anchovies (the ones that are cut in halves already with the bones)

Steps
1) Wash the anchovies for two rounds to remove most of the salt content
2) Pat dry them and lay them out on the baking tray
3) Air dry it for about an hour
4) Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius
5) Place the baking try with ikan bilis inside for 10 mins

6) Take out the tray and use a spatula to just toss it around so that the ikan bilis get evenly browned on all sides
7) Turn up the oven to 200 degrees Celsius for just 5 more mins and it should be done! How brown you want it is simply up to you..

After that, I let it cool down for 10 mins before placing it into a zip lock bag which I eventually placed it in the airtight container.

Great compliment for your lunch or dinner!You can also pound this up into powder to make a soup base stock for your porridge or noodles as well. Very nutritious!

Enjoy!