Okinawa Style Coral Trout is one of the simplest ways of cooking fish. The flavouring is the simplest and the cooking method is the simplest. The fish is cooked in salted water with Okinawan sake and a few slices of ginger. It brings out the original flavour of the ingredient, i.e. fish.
Don't forget to see the section 'MEAL IDEAS' below the recipe card! It gives you a list of dishes that I have already posted and this recipe that can make up a complete meal. I hope it is of help to you.
- 2 coral trout fillets (about 150g/5.3oz each, note 1)
- 130-150g/4.6-5.3oz firm tofu (momen tofu) cut into 4 cubes
- 45g/1.6oz carrot diagonally sliced to 5mm/3⁄16" thick pieces
- 45g/1.6oz green onion cut into 5cm/2" long pieces
- 250ml/8.5fl oz water
- 15g/0.5oz ginger thinly sliced
- 2 tbsp awamori (note 3)
- 1 tsp salt
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If you are cooking side fillet as a whole rather than sliced fillet, make a couple of incisions diagonally on the skin side of the fillets, where the flesh is the thickest (note 4). If you are using fillet pieces like mine, you needn’t to do it.
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Add the Broth ingredients in a wide and shallow pot or a deep frying pan that can comfortably fit the fillets in. Mix well to partially dilute the salt.
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Put the fish fillets into the pot, without overlapping. Then place the carrots, tofu pieces, and green onions next to the fillets.
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Bring the pot to a boil. Place a lid on and reduce the heat to medium.
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Cook for 5 minutes, then turn the heat off.
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Transfer the fish fillet to a serving plate, with the vegetables on the side. Pour a few tablespoons of the broth over the fish and vegetables.
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Sprinkle aonori, if using, in the middle on the fish, drawing a band of green flakes (note 5).
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Serve immediately.
1. My coral trout was large. So, I sliced a side fillet diagonally making two fillets. If your fish is small, you can use the entire side fillet per serving.
Instead of coral trout, you can user any white meat fish with firm texture of the flesh such as ocean perch, cod, and snapper.
2. You don’t have to have all the vegetables, but they add colours and extra nutrition. Tofu is a must.
Amount of each vegetable can vary, and you can even add a bit more without adjusting the flavour.
3. Awamori is Okinawan sake, which is distilled alcohol. Please see the post for more details about awamori.
Unlike Japanese sake, awamori may not be readily available where you live. If you can’t get awamori, you can use shōchū, which is perhaps the closest Japanese alcohol to awamori. You can also use sake or cooking sake if you can’t get shōchū either.
4. This prevents the fish from curling.
5. Instead of aonori, you could put a small amount of harishōga on top of the fish. See the sample photo in the post.
You could also add wakame seaweed as an alternative. Pop in a small amount of chopped wakame seaweed at the very end of cooking the fish.
6. Nutrition per serving assuming that 50% of the broth is consumed. But in reality, consumption of the soup is minimal, therefore salt intake should come down a bit.
serving: 344g calories: 312kcal fat: 14g (18%) saturated fat: 2.4g (12%) trans fat: 0.0g polyunsaturated fat: 4.2g monounsaturated fat: 5.8g cholesterol: 87mg (29%) sodium: 685mg (30%) carbohydrates: 6.3g (2%) dietary fibre: 2.1g (8%) sugar: 2.2g protein: 39g vitamin D: 6mcg (30%) calcium: mg (22%) iron: 4.1mg (23%) potassium: 800mg (17%)