Salt-Baked Sea Bass

This is a grand, expensive and expansive dish, requiring a whole wild sea bass and a shedload of salt. Don’t waste your Maldon on this one – use the cheapest sea salt you can buy. The salt solidifies in the heat and the fish arrives at the table entombed in a hard white mound. But inside its sodium chloride prison, the fish will have steamed in its own juices, untouched by the salt. A few cracks, a careful peel and you have the most splendidly succulent fish.