Our new daughter-in-law loves fish and so the main course at the wedding recently held at home was baked ocean trout fillets in an Asian marinade, served with sugar snap and shredded snow peas, green beans and asparagus tossed with poached peanuts and sesame oil. A pyramid of rice topped with dried chilli threads rounded off the dish.
As always being prepared is the key. We bought the fish, fresh as a daisy, from the fish market the day before the wedding, and I immediately skinned, pin boned, portioned and marinated it. The next morning I removed all the marinade, placed the fish portions on oven trays, brushed them with a little oil and returned them to the fridge.
I also prepared all the vegetables and poached the peanuts the day before, under-blanching the vegetables on the morning of the wedding. I have a rice cooker, and borrowed a couple more, so the rice cooked itself.
The fish came out of the fridge forty-five minutes before going into the oven for 8 minutes, resting for 4. While one tray of fish was resting and another in the oven, the rice and vegetables for the first round were served, topped with the fish, garnished and delivered to the guests. It only took three trays of fish to feed everyone – they are big trays!
Rosie
MARINATED OCEAN TROUT WITH WARM GREEN VEGETABLE AND POACHED PEANUT SALAD
Serves 40
5 kg ocean trout sides, skin off, pin bones out
(you can ask your fish monger to do this)
5 lemongrass stalks, sliced
5 bunches coriander, roots and stems for marinade, leaves for garnish
150 gm ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
15 cloves garlic, peeled
850 ml ketcup manis (sweet soy sauce)
250 ml honey
10 long red chillies, finely sliced on the diagonal
2 bunches shallots (green onions) finely sliced on the diagonal
3 bunches mint, leaves picked
Portion the ocean trout into 120gm portions. Refrigerate while you make the marinade. Place lemongrass, coriander roots and stems, ginger and garlic in the food processor and process until very finely chopped, scraping down the sides of the bowl. Add the ketcup manis and process until you have a thick marinade. Pour over fish and marinate in the fridge for 3-4 hours or overnight.
Preheat the oven to 200°C. Line baking trays with non-stick baking paper.
Remove all the marinade from the fish, patting dry with kitchen paper towels. Place fillets on the prepared baking trays. Bake for 8-10 minutes depending on how loaded up your trays are, being careful not to overcook the fish. Allow to rest for 4 or 5 minutes before serving garnished generously with the sliced chillies, sliced shallots, mint and coriander leaves and served with the Warm Vegetable and Poached Peanut Salad and steamed rice with chilli threads.
WARM GREEN VEGETABLE AND POACHED PEANUT SALAD
Serves 40
1.2 kg snow peas
1.2 kg sugar snap peas
1.2 kg fresh asparagus
1.2 kg green beans
600 gm peanuts, raw, blanched
Sesame oil
Sea salt flakes and freshly ground black pepper.
Preheat oven to 150°C. String snow and sugar snap peas. Remove woody ends from the asparagus. Top and tail the beans. Bring a very large pot of water to the boil and blanch (briefly plunge into boiling water, strain and refresh under cold water, strain) each vegetable variety separately being careful to just undercook them. Slice the snowpeas lengthways into ½ cm lengths.
Simmer 400gm of the peanuts in a saucepan with ample salted water to cover. Simmer for around an hour, adding more water as necessary, until the peanuts have a soft, swollen, cooked texture. Drain. Store vegetables and peanuts in the fridge until ready to serve.
Roast the remaining 200gm peanuts on a tray in the preheated oven for 15 minutes or until lightly golden brown. Allow to cool then roughly chop.
When ready to serve, bring a large pot of water to the boil, plunge vegetables and poached peanuts into the water. Cook until they are warmed through and done to your liking. Strain well, toss with sesame oil and roasted peanuts and season with salt flakes and black pepper. Serve.
TO SERVE
3 kg rice, steamed
1 packet chilli threads
Mould the warm cooked rice into pyramid shapes using something like a funnel and place to one side of the dinner plate (you will need to commandeer some help to get all the rice pyramids on to the plates while it is still hot). Place the vegetables on the other side of the plate and top with a fish fillet. Garnish with the sliced chillies, shallots, mint and coriander leaves.