Vietnamese Salad with Yellowfin Bream
Vietnamese food is often quite subtle, lacking the intense heat of some Thai dishes, and with an array of delicate flavours from herbs, vegetables and leaves that are essential at every meal. With a long coastline, seafood is also an important element in many areas.
Serves 6 as an entrée
½ cup plain flour
Salt flakes and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
700g Yellowfin Bream fillets, skin off, bones removed, cut into 6cm strips
Peanut oil, for shallow frying
Steamed rice, to serve
Vietnamese Salad
⅓ cup rice vinegar
¼ cup white sugar
2 tablespoons fish sauce
½ teaspoon freshly ground white pepper
1 small red onion, halved and sliced into thin slivers
½ Chinese cabbage, finely shredded
1 large carrot, cut into fine strips
1 stick celery, cut into fine strips
1 bunch green asparagus, chopped into 5cm pieces, blanched (see notes)
⅓ cup roughly chopped peanuts, toasted (see notes)
1 tablespoon finely shredded Vietnamese mint leaves
2 tablespoons shredded mint leaves
2 tablespoons peanut oil
Start the Vietnamese Salad: Combine rice vinegar, sugar, fish sauce and pepper. Add the onion and leave to marinate. Combine cabbage, carrot, celery, asparagus, peanuts and mint in a large bowl and set aside.
Place flour, salt and pepper in a large freezer bag, add the fish strips and shake well to coat. Place fish in a colander and shake well to remove excess flour.
Heat a large heavy-based frying pan over a medium heat, add just enough oil to cover the base of the pan. Add fish pieces in a single layer (you may need to cook in batches), turn gently after 1 minute and cook for a further 30 seconds. Remove and drain on paper towel.
Finish the Vietnamese salad: add peanut oil, onions and their marinade to the vegetable mixture and gently toss to combine.
Place salad on a platter, top with fish and serve with steamed rice.
Notes: If asparagus spears are thick and woody, snap off and discard the bottom section and use a potato peeler to peel the spears; if they are thin, you may only need to cut off the very end and not need to peel them. Blanch asparagus in well-salted boiling water for 30 seconds to 1 minute, then refresh in ice water, or cold running water, to stop the cooking. Toast peanuts in a dry frying pan for a couple of minutes, tossing gently to prevent them burning, or under a griller (but watch them closely).
Alternative Species: Other Bream species, Flathead, Ling, Snapper, Tarwhine, Threadfin Bream, Whiting.
For information on Yellowfin Bream, click here >