Fish recipes are fun to prepare because you get the chance to experiment with your preferred spices, herbs and seasoning without the fear of getting it wrong.
Tilapia fish is flat and it is many people’s favourite.
The skin has this moderate firmness that ensures that the fish will be cooked quickly and the fish will not disintegrate on you.
Ingredients
Tilapia Fish
For the marinade:
These are some spices and herbs for fish. You can try these or add your favourites that are not listed.
- Stock cubes
- Cloves garlic
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- ½ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 habanero pepper
- Parsley leaves
- Salt (to taste)
- 2 very sweet oranges
- 1 big onion
- Barbecue sauce
Before you grill the fish:
Prepare the ingredients
Peel the garlic cloves and pick the parsley.
Pound the garlic cloves with the habanero pepper and parsley using a mortar and pestle or any other kitchen tool without adding water.
Crush the stock cubes.
Cut the oranges into wedges.
Cut the onion into thin slices.
Scale the fish and remove the intestines and gills by gently opening the opercle (gill cover) and removing everything from there. Do not cut open the side of the fish to remove these.
When done, rinse the fish very well with clean water and set aside.
Prepare the marinade
Pour the vegetable oil into a bowl.
Add the ground garlic, parsley and habanero pepper. Add the crushed stock cubes, black pepper and salt. Mix very well and set aside.
Marinate and Refrigerate
Dry the water from the fish using a kitchen paper towel.
Make deep slant cuts on both sides (the flat sides) of the fish.
Stuff about 3 orange wedges into the gill space.
Scoop the marinade into the cuts made in step 2 making sure to get as much marinade into the cuts as possible. Put some into the gill pockets too.
Transfer the fish to a wide enough aluminum foil sheet.
Squeeze some orange juice (from the wedges) on the fish and add the remaining orange wedges and the sliced onions onto the fish.
Place another sheet of aluminum foil on the fish and fold the 2 sheets around the fish to make an envelope.
Place the envelope in the fridge for about 1 hour to marinate.
Grill and Enjoy!
After 1 hour, set your oven to 200°C / 400F to preheat for 10 minutes.
Put the fish envelope on the oven rack and bake for 20 minutes.
Remove the top foil sheets and rub the barbecue sauce on the fish.
Set the oven to grill (broil) and grill for 10 minutes.
If you will serve the fish with fruit skewers, put them in the oven to heat up and char for a bit.
It is ready and you can serve with any rice recipe, fruit skewers or just a chilled drink.
