Whole Baked Fish – Herb-stuffed with Garlic & Dill Butter Sauce

1. Fish – I’ve used snapper here but this recipe is suitable for many types of fish.

For this recipe I would recommend mostly sticking round fish. These are fish that are shaped like the snapper pictured in this post. They are roughly cylindrical in the centre of their bodies, and swim upright (as contrasted with say flat fish like flounder, turbot, sole etc that swim lying flat). Round fish fillets tend to be thicker, making them easier to cook.

I would also recommend fish with large and flat fillets such as the snapper pictured. This is for ease of stuffing, for better flesh yield, easier cooking and also for serving. Torpedo-shaped fish like flathead, gurnard / latchet and catfish, or fish with very large heads like rock cod, will be a slightly more challenging.

Avoid:fish that tend to dry out easily as kingfish, tuna, mackerel, or bonito.

Suggested fish that are suitably sized and shaped for cooking whole:

Snapper (pictured) Bream / dorade Barramundi Blue cod / blue eye trevalla Jewfish / mulloway Trout (river) Salmon (small ones) Cod Haddock Bass / sea bass / branzino Pollock Tilapia

2. Cavity of fish – This is the empty belly area where the guts were.

3. Tying fish – This step is recommended but not essential. It holds the fish together so the flavour from the herbs etc infuses into the flesh better, and holds the fish in shape (stops the belly flaps from curling outwards). Do not worry about doing fancy butcher-style tying with a single piece of string. Just get three string lengths, and tie them around the fish at intervals! It does the same job.

4. Cooking time for whole fish – 20 minutes is for 800g individual fish (any number). Larger fish will take longer to cook, and different shaped fish can take slightly different cooking times. It is not an exact science, so start checking your fish at the 15 minute mark and every few minutes from there.