Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables
Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables is one of our favourite ways of cooking one of our favourite fish. Sweet fleshed and rosy hued red mullet is a real beaut and when paired with roast and slightly charred veggies and a zing of lemon; because honestly it’s a real winner! Here’s what we did –
Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables – Ingredients
1 red mullet, about 1kg in weight
1 red onion, peeled
1 red pepper
4 ripe tomatoes, the best flavoured ones you can get
1 courgette
1 lemon, cut into chunks
30g black olives
1/2 tbsp fennel seeds
6tbsp olive oil
Salt and pepper
Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables – Equipment
Roasting dish that will fit the red mullet
Foil in case of cooking too quickly
Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables – Method
- First of all scale and clean the red mullet if this hasn’t been done already. Rinse it with cold water and dry with kitchen paper.
- Next, halve, deseed and roughly slice the red pepper. Roughly chop the onion, the tomatoes and the courgette.
- Mix together all the veggies with the lemon, olives and fennel seeds. Stir in 4tbsp of the olive oil and season well with salt and pepper.
- Turn the veggie mix into the roasting tin and cook for 6-7 minutes until they are starting to soften.
- Drizzle the rest of the oil over the fish and season well. We used umami seasalt from Cornish Seasalt to add a bit more oomph.
- Put the fish on top of the veggies and put the roasting tin back in the oven.
- Finally cook the whole thing for 15 minutes depending on the size of the fish and turning the dish from time to time to get even cooking, wearing your gauntlets to do so.
- When the fish is cooked (the flesh will flake easily) and veggies are tender, serve whilst still hot with a green salad, some lemon wedges to squeeze over the fish and some good bread.
Woodfired Red Mullet with Mediterranean Vegetables – Alternatives
- Smaller portion sized red mullet about 300g each
- Whole sea bass
- Whole sea bream
- Salmon steaks
- Hake fillets
- Whole John Dory, trimmed
Fish cooked in the woodfired oven is a revelation – if you haven’t cooked any yet, please do so. The high temperatures kind of steams the fish from the inside whilst grilling and slightly charring the outside and consequently keeping the flesh fabulously moist. Do try it and let us know how you get on.
Catch up next week
Holly and David