Sankara Meen Kuzhambhu | Red Snapper Fish Curry

Red Snapper Fish Curry | Sankara Meen Kuzhambhu – Red Snapper fish cooked with spices in country style.

Hip Hip Hurray! Celebration Mode on! It’s going to be a week of dhamaka, celebrations and happiness. Yes, karthiskitchenstudio is turning 1 by April 20. Do you need any reason to celebrate? I am so glad that it happened. And can’t thank enough to let you guys know as how much this means to me. When everything else fails in life, start something you are passionate about and you never know its journey and how it colors your life. When I desperately wanted a push in life, blogging happened. It was consistent pressure from my friend SAN to put my cooking skill to good use as it will be a creative outlet for me and keeps me occupied. Thanks a ton, SAN. He designed the site and Karthiskitchenstudio went live in a span of two weeks. The journey has been awesome so far and a great learning curve. Let me reserve thank you post for the D-day.

I have been preparing in mind about this celebration and thinking to post my favorite recipes in the celebration week. Today is one such favorite recipe of mine – red snapper fish curry.

Red Snapper is one of favorite fish back home and is widely available in Chennai, my second home town. Red Snapper is available in Asian shop in strip district in the burgh. When I saw fresh ones, I knew I will buy them for preparing this delicious fish curry. When I worked in Chennai, my one and only past time were a visit to the beach with my friends. Chennai is blessed with beaches but bessy is a soothing spot for me. I and my friends had the habit of spending the entire Saturday evening on bessy beach. We never remembered the count of fish we ate while chit-chatting and gossiping. The chill breeze from the sea, the sound of waves kissing the shore, lovely friends and crisp fried fishes – Life has been wonderful and the only major heartbreak was a promotion loss. And Promotion loss is a hair loss in IT industry. Wish I visit the magical mesmerizing bessy again with SJ and San, spend the entire evening discussing as how Chennai has changed over the years while gobbling the fried fishes. Since I tasted fish fry, I am addicted to it but then, I never found those varieties here. Recently, I came across red snapper in an Asian store and I bought an entire fish to experiment fish fry and fish curry. I should say fish curry tasted out of the world than fish fry. Now, to the recipe.

Ingredients:

1 Red Snapper Fish/Sankara meen, cut into pieces
1 Cup Shallots
1 large Tomato, cubed
1 Lemon-sized Kokum Tamarind (Kodum puli)
3 tablespoon Gingelly Oil
¼ teaspoon Mustard Seeds
1 Black Stone Flower/kalpaasi
¼ teaspoon Fennel Seeds
½ teaspoon Cumin Seeds
1 teaspoon Ginger Garlic paste
¼ teaspoon Turmeric Powder
2 teaspoon Red Chili Powder
1 teaspoon Coriander Powder
Salt to taste

Method:

Wash and clean the fish pieces twice or thrice. Soak fish pieces in water with turmeric for about 30 minutes.
In a non-stick kadai/wok, add oil. Once the oil is hot, add mustard seeds and kalpaasi. Let it splutter.
Add shallots and cook until they become translucent.
Add ginger garlic paste and saute until the raw smell goes off.
Slide in the chopped tomatoes and cook until they become mushy.
Now, add all spice powders and saute them until raw smell goes off.
Soak KoKum tamarind in hot water for about an hour and extract juice. It’s hard to extract juice from kodum puli. I soaked tamarind water for about an hour, grounded them into a fine paste and added them into the wok.
Add tamarind juice and a cup of water. Cook with the lid covered.
Season it with the required amount of salt.
Once the curry starts boiling, add fish pieces and cook over low flame until the fish pieces are cooked well and oil separates from the curry.
Serve fish curry with hot steam rice.