Baked Fish
Baking refers to cooking with a
dry heat, usually in an oven or a
kettle style
barbecue. Because the heat is dry, when
baking fish it is important to keep the
fish moist. Whole
fish bake well and generally hold their shape during the cooking process. Fillets and steaks can also be
baked but depending on the type of
fish, can easily break up. Care must be taken to handle the
fish in order to prevent this.
Fish should always be gutted and scaled with head and tail left on.
Method
- Preheat the oven.
- Rinse fish and pat dry with paper towels.
- Season the fish with salt and pepper both inside the cavity and on the outside if it's a whole fish or on the topside if it's a fillet or steak.
- Place fish in a baking pan.
- Stuff the cavity if it's a whole fish, if you so desire (see recipe for basic stuffing and variations page xx) or you can place a crusting mix on fillets or steaks, if desired (see basic crusting mix and variations page xx)
- Brush the fish with the melted butter or drizzle with oil, and a squeeze of lemon juice.
- Bake for 20 minutes for steaks and 8 minutes per 500g of fillets, with 10 minutes extra for whole fish, or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork.
- Alternatively wrap the prepared fish in greased aluminium foil and add a squeeze of lemon juice and a sprinkle of salt and pepper.
- Place the fish on a baking sheet and bake for times listed above.
