Rick Stein’s grilled snapper stuffed with a shrimp and lemongrass curry paste. Mmm, Malaysian styles… You just have to try it. You could also roast the snapper whole for an amazing seafood experience.
To make Grilled Whole Snapper, you will need:
4 x 350-400g snapper, scaled and trimmed
Vegetable oil, for brushing.
Salt
For the curry paste:
2 tsp. each of coriander seeds, cumin seeds, fennel seeds, turmeric powder and black peppercorns
30g coconut cream
3 dried red chillies, such as Kashmiri
15g peeled garlic, roughly chopped
15g peeled ginger, roughly chopped
2 lemongrass stalks, outer leaves discarded and core roughly chopped
2 tsp. balachan (shrimp paste)
2 tbsp. lime juice
2 tbsp. palm sugar or brown sugar
½ tbsp. salt
3 tbsp. vegetable oil
How to make Grilled Whole Snapper:
1. For the curry paste, cover the dried chillies with boiling hot water and leave to soak till soft. Put the coriander seed, cumin seed, fennel seed, turmeric and black peppercorns into a spice grinder and grind to a fine powder. Tip the powder into a mini food processor and add the coconut cream, drained red chillies, garlic, ginger, lemongrass, balachan, lime juice, sugar, salt and vegetable oil. Blend to a smooth paste.
2. To prepare the fish, cut off the heads and then starting at the head end, start to cut the top fillet away from the bones until you get the whole blade of the knife underneath it. Rest a hand on top of the fish and cut the fillet away from the bones until you are 3-4 cm away from the tail. Turn the fish over and repeat on the other side, then pull back the top fillet and snip away the backbone close to the tail with scissors. Repeat with each of the fish.
3. Season the cut face of each fillet with some salt and then spread a generous tablespoon of the curry paste onto one fillet. Push the fish back into shape and tie along its length in 3 places to keep it in place.
4. Preheat your grill to high.
5. Brush the fish with a little oil and season with salt. Grill for 4 minutes on each side until crisp and lightly golden on the outside, and cooked through.