Name: Thai baked fish
Yield: Serves 4
Cuisine: Thai
Ingredients: 1 tbsp finely chopped lemon grass; 1 small mild chilli, deseeded and roughly chopped; 1 small red chilli, deseeded and finely chopped; 1 banana leaf, about 1 metre in size; 4 fish fillets, each about 200 g, with skin, scaled and any residual bones removed; 1 tbsp sesame oil; 20 g Thai basil; 8 lime leaves; 10 g coriander leaves; 225 g basmati rice, rinsed well in cold water; salt; 2 garlic cloves, crushed; 20 g galangal or root ginger, peeled and roughly chopped; 1 lemon grass stalk, peeled and the bulbous end roughly chopped; ½ tsp ground cumin; 1 tbsp finely chopped galangal or root ginger; 4 lime leaves, roughly chopped; 2 lemon grass stalks, bulbous ends crushed; 3 tbsp soy sauce; 2 lime leaves; 1 garlic clove, crushed; 1 tbsp light (not toasted) sesame oil

Preparation info

Serves
4

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Fish etc.

By Mark Hix

Published 2004

About

The sudden boom in Thai cooking has led to a lot of Asian shops- and even supermarket chains - stocking banana leaves. If you can’t find them, then foil or greaseproof paper will do the job. Asian herbs are also becoming easier to find in supermarkets; some even sell prepared packets of Thai herb and spice mix.

Fish like sea bass, grouper and snapper are good fish to pitch against Thai flavours, but you can really use most luxury fish - or even humble fish like grey mullet - for thi