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Knowing how to grill fish will ensure that you are always on track with your meals. Since the entire cooking process from start to finish takes under 30 minutes, you can get an entire meal ready in less than half an hour. And unlike curries, there is no way to mess up a grilled fish dish if you know the basics of how to grill fish. And as we’ve mentioned when we talked about chicken, you use less oil and since the fish cooks very quickly, you retain the natural juices and the natural flavour of the fish making for a quick and healthy meal.

How to Grill Fish Step 1: Picking What to Grill

1. Unlike meat and chicken, there are no cuts and pieces. You grill the whole fish.
2. You can grill just about any kind of fish. We recommend Pomfret and Basa.

How to Grill Fish Step 2:  The Marinate

1. Simply put, what you put into the marinate is what the fish will taste like.
2. The safest and everyon’es favourite easy marinate is garlic+olive oil+lemon juice+salt+pepper.
3. You can add parsley, thyme or oregano or a combination of these to the basic marinate mentioned in point 2. These are light flavours are you should use them on a fish like Basa that has a very rich flavour of its own and therefore goes well with a lightr marinate.
4. Indian marinates like tandoori or mint-coriander  are heavy on flavour so don’t use it with a fish like Basa. Make sure not to overdo it or you will completely miss the taste of the fish.
5. Do not use butter instead of oil.

How to Grill Fish Step 3: Applying the Marinate:

1. The idea is the flavour is got to go inside the fish. Fortunately though, coating the outside is good enough.
2. Marinate time:  Obviously the longer the better. Look at a minimum of 30 minutes.
3. Do not recycle the marinate. Throw away anything that’s left after grilling.

How to Grill Fish Step 4: Cooking

1. Fire up the barbecue or switch on the oven
2. If you’re grilling on the stove top, you’ll need a grill pan or a regular pan and something to press the fish down (a fork or a masher will work)
3. Cook on both side evenly till the juices run clear i.e. keep cooking till there clear juices run out when you poke it with a toothpick or a fork.
4. The best way to know if it’s done is to dry cutting it with a fork. It’s done if the fork goes through easily. No harm in taking a little taste either. Better eat while cooking than serve up raw food right?
5. Cook Times: It’s a lot easier to pan grill or barbecue because you can monitor the food. For stovetop or oven grilling, use 4 minutes on each side as a guideline.

And there you go… Congratulations! You have just made your first grilled dish. As we mentioned in the beginning, it’s not just a single dish that you have now made. You have increased your menu options exponentially by learning how to grill chicken or fish. Here are some grilled chicken or grilled fish meal ideas…

1. Coconut-Mint Grilled Pomfret
2. Grilled Basa
3. Grilled Basa with Prawn Ceviche (Low Fat Meal)

Grilled Basa with Prawn Ceviche (Low Fat Meal)