BBQ Redfish

Redfish on the half shell is one of the easiest fish preparations there is. The one pictured is from Parrains on Perkins, but just about every seafood joint offers one. We started cooking them at Mike Anderson’s on Lee Drive way back when in the midst of the Prudhomme induced redfish craze. Before Chef Paul came out with his blackened redfish, it was considered a trash fish. After, we cooked almost all the redfish in the gulf in three years so they aren’t available commercially any more. Now it is most often red or black drum served, but the technique remains the same. Take a skin on scale on filet and throw it on the grill skin side down, cover it, and cook it through all on that one side, never flipping it. Then add a sauce, garlic butter, your favorite barbecue sauce, a combo of barbecue and Tiger sauce, or just about any other glaze you can think of. You can even treat them like chargrilled oysters and hit it with a little Italian cheese blend of pecorino romano and parmesan. You can buy drum now at Rouse’s and Whole Foods and Fresh Market for sure. And if you happen to catch actual redfish on your own, make sure to leave the skin and scale on the redfish. Go ahead and filet the speckled trout because you really need to fry them.