This is a spectacular but incredibly easy feast for New Year. I try to save fish for high days and holidays: there’s no better excuse than New Year’s Eve for this quick-to-cook and suitably celebratory sea bass. I like to give it an Asian treatment, especially after all the rich flavours of Christmas. Try to find a local, Asian supermarket, because they often sell coriander with the root still attached (it has a sweet, heady taste). Then smash those Thai ingredients in a mortar and let the nuances of flavour captivate everyone at the table.
Whole baked sea bass with lemongrass and nam jim
The aromatic, garlicky and spicy dressing is utterly delicious with this simply baked fish – it’s so good, I use it to dress the beansprout salad, too.
Prep 1 hr
Cook 25 min
Serves 4-6
1 large wild sea bass (about 800g)
Peanut or vegetable oil Salt and pepper
2 lemongrass stalks
3 makrut lime leaves
For the nam jim
1 lemongrass stalks
2 bird’s eye chillies, de-stalked and roughly chopped
2 fat garlic cloves, peeled
2 large bunches coriander (preferably with the roots still attached)
2 tsp palm or demerara sugar, to taste
2 tsp fish sauce
Juice of 4 limes
2 tbsp rice-wine vinegar
For the salad
½ Chinese leaf, shredded
4 handfuls beansprouts
2 handful coriander leaves
2 carrots, peeled and shredded
1 big handful mint leaves
To serve
Jasmine or coconut rice
Heat the oven to 230C (210C fan)/gas 8. Lay the fish on an oiled piece of baking paper on a large baking tray. Rub the skin with more oil and season generously with salt. Bash and flatten the lemongrass stalks, combine with the lime leaves, and stuff into the cavity of the fish. Roast for 20-25 minutes.
Steam some jasmine or coconut rice; you can do this a few hours before your guests arrive, if you prefer. Keep somewhere warm, sealed with butter wrappers or buttery greaseproof paper and dressed with a drizzle of oil.
For the nam jim, peel the lemongrass stalk and slice the tender, inner core. Add to a large mortar (a small one won’t work here, so use a food processor if you don’t have a large one) with the chilli, garlic, coriander and a large pinch of salt, and smash to a rough paste. Add the palm sugar, work in for another 30 seconds, then add the fish sauce. This can be done an hour or two in advance. When you are ready to eat, add the lime juice, taste and adjust for sweetness, heat, salt and sourness.
Transfer half the nam jim to a large salad bowl with the rice-wine vinegar. Add the salad ingredients and some seasoning, and combine with your hands until everything is nicely coated. Serve with the fish, rice and the rest of the nam jim.
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