Ocean Made Chef - December - Ocean Made Seafood

Cambodian-style whole snapper with tamarind, shallots & ginger

John McLeay, Executive Chef for Red Spice Road, Red Spice QV and Burma Lane

Serves 4

John McLeay is our Ocean Made Chef for December.

This month’s recipe is Cambodian-style whole snapper with tamarind, shallots & ginger, make sure to collect your recipe card in our Collingwood retail shop.

Ingredients

2.5 kg whole snapper
3 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp minced ginger
canola or vegetable oil

Sauce
2 small cloves garlic, peeled and minced
3 shallots, peeled and finely sliced
3 cm piece ginger, peeled and cut into matchsticks
1 birds eye chilli, finely sliced (use more or less if desireed
3 tbsp palm sugar, shaved
75 ml tamarind pulp
30 ml fish sauce
75 ml water

To finish
1 large pinch coriander, picked
1 birds eye chilli, finely sliced
3 tbsp crispy shallots

Method

Using scissors remove the fins from the snapper, make 3 cuts into the snapper on each side. Rub the fish sauce and the ginger into the snapper, set aside for 30 minutes.
Line a tray with baking paper, place the fish on the tray and pour over the oil. Place the snapper into an oven pre-heated to 170C. Cook the fish for around 20 minutes or until cooked through.
For the sauce place all the ingredients into a fry pan or a small saucepan. Bring to the boil then turn down to a simmer and allow to simmer for 2 minutes.
To plate place the snapper on to a platter, spoon over the sauce and garnish with the chilli, crispy shallots and coriander.

* for the tamarind pulp soak tamarind seeds in hot water, squeeze then strain

About Chef

As executive chef at Red Spice Road, Red Spice QV and Burma Lane, John McLeay heads up three busy kitchens in Melbourne’s CBD.

At all three venues, John and his team focus on broad Asian flavours taking in the cuisines of Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, China, Burma, Laos and Japan. Seafood plays a pivotal part on each menu.

The Melbourne boy travels regularly throughout Asia to immerse himself in the various cultures and gather information and inspiration for the restaurants’ menus.

John started working with Ocean Made, “about 14 years ago, I really like dealing with them,” he says, “In our businesses we only want to deal with good people and George and John are really great people!”

Why this recipe?

The beauty of a whole fish to dress the Christmas table was one of the reasons John chose this recipe but also, “because it’s simple and really tasty,” he says, “there’s nothing better than a simply cooked fish and I love the sweet flesh of snapper. The Cambodian sauce is really simple to make and complements the fish well.”

He also adds that if you’re not into chilli, the sauce is still delicious without it. John’s been cooking this recipe for, “about ten years, sometimes I use the fillet or a whole baby snapper.” He says he gets consistently great fish from Ocean Made. “Their produce is great. They understand what we need and if there are ever any issues, they fix them straight away.”