Hello everyone, I am sorry I didn’t blog much towards christmas. I want to say Merry Belated Christmas and also Happy New Year to all. I was kind of all out of sorts and having low energy wasn’t helping at all but now I am feeling a lot better.
I had used pomfret for this occation but it can be used for other types of fish as well as long as they are whole. You would need about 10 or more butter fish, 4 mackerals or milkfish, 1 to 2 tilapias or pomfrets depending on how big they are and how many people that need to be fed.
It can be lb or 1 kilo of either fresh sardines or smelts. There are many other types of edible fish so go with the flow. Turn the oven on to 375F or 190C. Clean the fish if it was a frozen whole one by taking the front end of a spoon and slowly work from tail to head to take all of the scales off. Remove the head from most of them.
With fresh sardines and butterfish you can keep the head in tact and rip the gills out with ease then reach in the head to take the insides out of the fish. With the bigger fish you remove the head and cut the belly on the underside of the fish to remove the insides.
Take kitchen shears and remove the fins from the tail the sides and the back of the fish as well. Wash the fish and set it aside. Take the scales heads insides and fins and tie it up in a plastic bag and throw it out because it is really smelly.
Wash the fish again in in cold water to get the remaining of the blood out. make sure water turns clear. Take 1 piece of alminum foil and place this on a cookie sheet, spray with cooking spray.
Place the fish on the foil lined cookie sheet and add 1 oz of lemon juice and make sure it goes all over the fish and inside the fish cavities. Put 1 pinch of uziza seeds in a mortar and pestle then grind in to a coarse powder. Add this to the fish with 3 dashes of maggi or knorr aroma, 4 cloves of garlic that has been crushed in a mortar and pestle, 1 pinch of red chili powder, either 1 bullion cube or 1 pinch of bullion powder. Make sure these too are all over the fish and inside the fish cavities if you are making more then one. It depends on how many people are eating with you though.
Bake for 20 minutes on one side and flip and cook for 10 minutes for bigger fish. Smaller fish takes about 10 minutes to cook.
Enjoy with beans and rice dish.
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