Steamed Thai-style sea bass and rice

method

This is one of those dishes that’s really exciting to eat – the flavors are really fragrant and light. Steamed fish and rice is always a winner, especially with Thai flavors. If you’ve got a good fishmonger, using other fish like red snapper, shrimp or squid to mix things up a bit is a great idea. It’s easy to put together and loads of fun to serve the tray at the table.

Preheat the oven to 400°F. In a food processor or blender, whiz up the cilantro stalks, half of the cilantro leaves, the ginger, garlic, halved chillies, sesame oil, soy sauce, lime juice and zest and the coconut milk. This will give you a lovely fragrant Thai-style paste.

Cook your rice in salted, boiling water until it’s just undercooked, then drain it in a colander. Scoop it into a high-sided roasting tray. Pour your Thai paste over the rice and mix it in well, then shake it out flat. Lay the sea bass fillets on top, scatter over the sugar snap peas, then cover the dish tightly with aluminum foil and put it in the preheated oven for around 15 minutes. Remove the foil and sprinkle over the spring onions, the sliced chilli and the other half of the cilantro leaves. Divide between your plates with a wedge of lime.

serves: 4

ingredients

• 2 large bunches of fresh cilantro, leaves picked and stalks reserved
• 2 thumb-sized pieces of fresh ginger, peeled
• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled 2 fresh red chillies, halved and deseeded
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• 6 tablespoons soy sauce juice and zest of 2 limes
• 1 x 12oz can coconut milk
• 14oz basmati rice sea salt and freshly ground
black pepper
• 4 6oz sea bass fillets,
pinboned and skin scored a handful of sugar snap
peas or snow peas
• a bunch of spring onions, outer leaves discarded, trimmed and finely sliced
• 1–2 fresh red chillies, deseeded and finely sliced 1 lime, quartered