Fried Golden Pomfret Steaks
Fried Golden Pomfret Steaks
I have seen these fish, Golden Pomfret, at Tesco in town a few times, did some recipe research and bought two of them yesterday and prepared them for dinner. This was a new type of fish I and my wife have not had before. The recipes I read were everything from simple to more seasonings than you could shake a stick at. I kept it simple. You will learn some fish anatomy with this guide as well. This is an excellent tasting fish but on the costlier side per serving. Link to the Shortcut is listed in the Recipe Notes section.
Ingredients
- 2 whole Golden Pomfret
- lemon pepper, as desired
- tempura flour, as needed
- lard, or cooking oil, for frying, Shortcut
Instructions
- From the store, these were frozen and on display. Two Golden Pomfret, these are ocean fish. First thing we need to do is clean them, and this is easy as they have tiny scales. You can do this in the kitchen sink under running water without making a mess. Rinse the fish off, then take a spoon and scrape from the tail to the head, the skin will be smooth where there is no scales, this takes just a minute or two per fish. After they are scaled, rinse them off one more time.
- Now we are going to cut each fish into steaks, fishmongers worth their weight in salt will know this as a troncon cut. A troncon cut is a fancy way of saying steak cut or steak fillet cut. First thing, cut off the dorsal fin, the long part of the fin on the back, then cut off the pointy fin on the bottom, the anal fin. Now cut just behind the pectoral fin, the fin on the side, right behind the head, cut straight through at a bit of angle, as shown. Continue to make cuts, about 3/4 inch wide and you should have 5 pieces of 'steaks'. Discard the head and tail. Now remove the innards from the first 2 or pieces, then cut the belly flap straight through. For the 2-3 pieces with the innards, remove the liver from the backbone, for this fish, this is actually easy and it comes out cleanly, discard that. I thought this photo was humorous.
- Here is what I have from 2 pomfret. This is destined more as a sampler to see what these fish taste like.
- To cook, all I did was sprinkle lemon pepper on all sides and rub that it.
- Next was to roll in tempura flour until fully coated.
- Heat lard or cooking oil, about ¼ to ½ inch in a large pan. When it is hot but not smoking, add some flour coated fish, work in batches. For the last 'steak', lay that on its side and cook that way. When the bottom is nicely browned, use tongs and turn each piece over.
- When the other sided is browned remove to paper towels to drain.
- Serve with sides of your choice. Three pieces with sides makes a nice meal for one person, if making these like for a fish fry, think about 1-2 fish per person.
Notes
Fair value per serving. Each fish is 65 Baht, $1.96, each fish weighs 300 to 400 grams (11 to 14 oz). For 3 servings, this is about $1.32 per serving, which is excellent for visiting family that may not be familiar with this type of fish. This will be a once in a while fish for us now.
Shortcut: Lard.
I made these on 30 Nov 2018, these are not big fish, but the taste is excellent. Fair cost per serving but worth it for visiting friends and family for sure. I kept the seasoning minimal, lemon pepper and tempura flour, nothing short of perfect fish.