What the fish

Mark really likes fish so I thought I would surprise him by frying a pomfret for him for lunch. I mean, how hard could it be? Just buy a fish from the store, wash it, and throw it in a pan, right?

WRONG. Preparing fish for a meal was like war.

You see, I never knew that fish had guts and they needed to be clean before you can eat them. I thought ALL fish (at least in America) looked like this:

Just kidding. I'm not that bad lah. I actually went to the Asian store to get frozen yellow pomfret ok. And then I went home, pleased with my purchase, thinking that lunch will be ready in no time. All I have to do is to throw the fish in hot oil and let it swim for a few minutes. But as I was washing the fish, something felt amiss. "Where are the scales ah? Don't I have to remove them?" I was taught in primary school that fish had scales so I went to google and check if that fact has changed.

Good news was that pomfrets DON'T HAVE SCALES - which was literally news to me. That meant that I didn't have to painstakingly pluck them off. Through the search, however, I found out that all fish have guts and we have to take them out prior to cooking them.

Ah. Crap. My fish might have guts that I have no idea how to deal with. So just to be sure that I wouldn't go about digging for guts that have already been removed, I called the Asian store to enquire. Unfortunately, they said that the fish was not clean and I had to gut the fish on my own. And that was when war (with the pomfret of course) was declared.

I googled how to gut a fish and followed the instructions super closely, reading it multiple times before I made any incision on the pomfret. It looked so easy on the accompanying video but the gut of my fish seemed to be superglued to the flesh! After more googling, I realised that pomfrets have a slightly different anatomy from other fishes, which meant that I had been following the wrong video all along. Sigh.

To save all other noobcake-unseasoned-gutters from that mistake, here is the video that promfret gutters should use:

It took me much longer than I expected (3hrs haha). I had to text Mark that I was struggling with his lunch just to manage expectations. He came back only to find me still messing around with the fish.

In the end, after fighting the fish and battling with splattering oil, we had pomfret for dinner.

Made with sweat, blood and tears. The pomfret suffered greater losses than me, as you can see. (I know, the head is gone. I gave up trying to clean it from its gills and guts, I just behaded it.)

There. My first attempt at cooking fish. I hate the guts out of it but I guess I will probably do it again since Mark ate this meal with the widest smile I've ever seen.

Love,

Belle