Smoked Fish with Five-Spice Brine
Gut and clean the smelt, then deep-fry before immersing in a prepared spiced brine and smoking to infuse rich flavor.
Ingredients
whole fish
750 g
finely chopped scallion and ginger
10 g
cooking oil (200 g used)
1.5 kg
cooking wine
25 g
sugar
75 g
soy sauce
50 g
star anise
2
cassia bark
10 g
five-spice powder
2.5 g
Instructions
1
Step 1
Scrape all the scales from the fish. Remove the head and innards, rinse the fish thoroughly, and drain it well.
2
Step 2
Place a wok over the heat and add 100 g of water, soy sauce, sugar, chopped scallion and ginger, cooking wine, star anise, and cassia bark. Bring the mixture to a boil over high heat to make a brine, then reduce the heat to low. Remove the scallion, ginger, star anise, and cassia bark, keeping the brine at a gentle simmer.
3
Step 3
Heat the oil in a separate wok. Once it reaches about 70% heat, carefully add the fish and deep-fry it.
