This is excellent with mango and coconut rice.
It’s the Sichuan flower pepper, underpinned by the ginger, which makes this sea bass sizzle.
It’s very quick and easy – good for just two or four people
You can use stone bass instead of sea bass. Stone bass is a farmed fish which grows bigger than a sea bass so that the fillets are thicker, juicier and more luxurious. You can get stone bass from The Fish Society.
Recipe for sizzling Sichuan sea bass
Serves 2
Ingredients
- 4 sea bass fillets, about 140g/5 oz each
- 2 tbsp sesame oil
- 1”/3 cm length of fresh ginger, chopped very fine or grated
- 2 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed with smoked salt
- 1 bunch of spring onions, cut into lengths, and then cut vertically very thin – in the manner of Peking duck
- 2 tbsp rich, fermented soy sauce
- About 8 Sichuan pepper corns, crushed in a pestle and mortar – if you feel you want a little fresh red chilli for colour you could substitute that – add a very small amount when you add the garlic
Method
- Put the oil into the frying pan and get hot.
- Season the fish with the pepper, and fry skin side down for about four minutes.
- Add the garlic, spring onions and ginger, turn the fish over and fry another minute.
- You’ll find the skin comes off quite easily – ease it off with the fish slice and push it to one end of the frying pan.
- Pour over the soy sauce.
- Serve the fish, and everything else in the pan EXCEPT the skin…
- Fry up the skin until it’s good and crispy and serve as a garnish to those who like it.
David Bowie sings China Girl
