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I reviewed all methods in detail in the Meat chapter under Cooking methods. Here I will
only add cooking suggestions that only apply to seafood.
Dry cooking
Choose a firm-fleshed fish if you have to move the pieces during cooking, whether stir-
frying or stirring in a pan or grilling over hot coals. But you can also use dry-heat cooking on a
delicate, fragile fish like sole if you first wrap it in a sturdy green leaf, such as cabbage, romaine
lettuce or Swiss chard and secure it with a toothpick. A quick 15-second blanching of the greens
makes wrapping easier. The fish cooks so quickly that the leaf doesn't even burn. It chars but
holds the fish together. Aim for an internal temperature of 140°F (60°C) for the most tender and
juicy seafood.
When cooking thin pieces, temperature is not easy to measure with a thermometer and
here you need to guess. Here is a guide for grilling or broiling fish over high heat:
¨
¨
¨
1-inch (2½-cm) thick
1½-inch (4-cm) thick
2-inch (5-cm) thick
5 minutes/side
7½ minutes/side
10 minutes/side
When you are dealing with many smaller pieces like scallops or shrimp, put them on
skewers to grill or broil. Keep heavy work gloves near the grill to turn skewered seafood.
The U.S. Bureau of Fisheries in 1934 developed a high-heat baking methods that works
magnificently on seafood, and with very little effort on your part. Set your oven to the highest
possible temperature, 500°F (262°C) or higher. Place breaded seafood on a lightly oiled baking
sheet and drizzle it with a small amount of vegetable oil to help browning. Bake it in the oven
until golden, about 10 minutes. The result is delicious—tender and juicy inside, caramel-colored
and crisp outside.
Moist cooking
Steaming is one cooking method that fails with meat and poultry but works with seafood.
It retains all its natural flavor, and you may also add some flavorings. For steaming, the seafood
must be very fresh. Steam cooks food at modest speed, slower than dry heat cooking, faster than
baking. You can wrap flavoring ingredients with the fish in either plastic wrap or foil. In this
case the steam heats the packet but the moisture within the fish is what cooks it. You can steam
foil-wrapped seafood in the oven, too (when wrapped this way, the method is no longer baking).
The temperature of your seafood doesn't go higher than the boiling temperature of water in any
of these methods and you don’t get the benefit of the browning reaction—the flavor will remain
subtle.
Poaching in a barely-simmering flavored liquid (like the French court bouillon), enough
to cover a large piece or a whole fish is an excellent method with flavorful, fatty fish, such as
salmon. It is not an easy cooking method, but the result is most spectacular to serve. A whole,
freshly poached, tastefully garnished fish is a culinary masterpiece, a stunning visual success,
and it tastes delicious. Prepare both the fish and the poaching liquid, then watch the progress
with a thermometer to catch the fish before it dries out. You can poach either on top of the stove
or in moderately hot oven. A fish poacher is ideal, though not many of us own one, however, you
can use any other large, shallow cooking pot or pan big enough to accommodate the fish (for
example, a deep roasting pan). Before preparing the poaching liquid, place the fish in the pan and
play © erdosh 110
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