Veracruz

The Cen-Tex Smoker

This is one of our staples. We have it almost every week. Traditional fish would be red snapper but we usually use cod. We grill the fish then nestle it in the sauce. Serve with brown rice and cilantro. 

I’ll try to pry the sauce recipe from TFJ- I just grill the fish for this one. I know it’s tomato, onion, green olive, capers simmered down in chicken stock. I also know it’s delicious. 

I dry brine the fish for 15-30 minutes (until it dries out in the fridge). I slather the fish with mayo and spray that with olive oil. Sprinkle a little black pepper on that. I use grill grates and cook around 425. Once the grill grates are heated, give them a good spray with oil and place the fish on. It cooks about 4 minutes a side and I pull it when the fish is around 130. The mayo does not add any flavor to the fish, it just helps it not stick. It all melts off during the cook so you can’t tell it was ever on there at all. 

kl8ton

Very nice!

Stormbringer

Another great cook, looking forward to the recipe.  

bluebird66

That looks great!

lousubcap

Spectacular once again.  

lkapigian

Bombdiggity!

fishlessman

i love this dish.  i use it for fish sub sandwiches which helps sop up the juices.  i think the recipe i have came from beli off the forum 15 to 20 years back. looks darn close to yours but with some jalapenos added. i use the local cod or haddock as red snapper or grouper would be harder to find up here. yours looks great, maybe this weekend, its been a while

JohnnyTarheel

Man that sounds and looks so good!!

Foghorn

That's awesome.  Do you get the cod from HEB - or do you have a different source in the "burg"?

? parking lot venison for fish swap?

FrostyEgg

Recipe please? Looks like a nice change of pace from anything i've cooked lately!

Legume

Posts with a recipe that won't be shared, sounds like secret pizza dough to me.

Add me to the chorus hoping for the recipe, looks delicious.

johnmitchell

Wow!!!!

StillH2OEgger

That looks tremendous!

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Foghorn said:

That's awesome.  Do you get the cod from HEB - or do you have a different source in the "burg"?

? parking lot venison for fish swap?

Just boring ol’ H-E-B for the cod. No shady parking lot meat dealers anymore since I moved. Have to go the traditional route in the air conditioned well-lit seafood counter of the grocery store. 

It’s way more fun rummaging through a not-so-clean Yeti 250 quart cooler in the back of a dirty f250 on a side street or parking lot somewhere. 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

I left out a few ingredients but I’m definitely getting the whole recipe to share. The sauce clearly has a good amount of garlic in it. She fries slivers in butter and stirs that into the sauce. It also has pickled Fresno chiles. You could use fresh and jalapeño is pretty standard but we pickle our own Fresnos so in they go. I’ll post the whole thing as soon as I can get her to slow down enough to coherently share it. Right now she just walks by every few hours and shouts “garlic”! Or “don’t forget the Fresnos”! Even though we haven’t spoken about it in 2 days. 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

FrostyEgg said:

Recipe please? Looks like a nice change of pace from anything i've cooked lately!

I’ll post it. Hopefully tonight. The sauce is really good. 

alaskanassasin

Lets Go!

caliking

Marvelous! I've loved this, the few times I've had it.

The cod at HEB is quite good. They have one in the seafood case, that's about the same price as their SRF wagyu tritip.

kl8ton

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

I left out a few ingredients but I’m definitely getting the whole recipe to share. The sauce clearly does not have enough garlic in it. She fries slivers in butter and stirs that into the sauce. It also has pickled Fresno chiles. You could use fresh and jalapeño is pretty standard but we pickle our own Fresnos so in they go. I’ll post the whole thing as soon as I can get her to slow down enough to coherently share it. Right now she just walks by every few hours and shouts “garlic”! Or “don’t forget the Fresnos”! Even though we haven’t spoken about it in 2 days. 

@caliking I FTFY

The Cen-Tex Smoker

• Grilled Fish Veracruz 

20 - 24 oz light, flaky fish (4 servings)

6 cloves garlic, sliced

2 Tbsp EVOO

-In large skillet, low simmer with a tiny pinch of salt until slightly crisp *don’t over brown*

⁃ remove garlic from oil and reserve

⁃ caramelize 1 diced yellow onion 

⁃ add 15 oz chopped fresh tomato and simmer until completely broken down

⁃ Deglaze with a bit of white wine

⁃ To Skillet, Add:

⁃ 1 chopped pickled Fresno or banana pepper

⁃ 12 pitted, quartered Castelvetrano olives (any good green olive will work here)

⁃ 10 capers

⁃ Reserved Garlic

⁃ 1 1/2 tsp dried Mexican oregano 

⁃ 1 quart low sodium chicken broth

Simmer and reduce until there is more veg than liquid. 

Add salt as needed.

Add 1/4 cup sherry and reduce slightly 

Turn off heat and stir in 1 tsp butter 

• Cilantro Lime Rice 

2 cups steamed rice 

Zest 1 lime

Juice 1 lime

1/2 bunch chopped cilantro 

Salt to taste

For the fish:

salt and place on wire rack in the fridge until the filets are dry (20-30 min). Don’t go crazy on the salt but make sure you cover the entire filet with light salt

once dried out, slather in mayo. Don’t be shy here. This is only to keep the fish from sticking to the grill- it does not flavor the fish in any way. Then spray that with your oil of choice (I use spray grape seed as it has a higher smoke point). I add a light dusting of pepper at this point. Bring your grill up to 400-425, Spray your grill grates generously with oil as well (cod is notoriously flaky and can come apart very easily if it sticks at all). I use grill grates on my BGE and that makes this so much easier. It’s the only thing I use them for but worth it since we eat this almost every week. 

I grill for about 4 minutes a side. I spray the fish and grill grates with oil again before the flip. I try to pull them around 130 but sometimes they go over. With the dry brine, they are still very juicy into the 150’s but they really fall apart after 130 (it still tastes great and happens to me all the time)- the dry brine also helps firm up the flesh and hold it together better than using no brine 

once you pull the fish, get a scoop of the cilantro lime rice and place on half your dish, then sauce the other half and place the fish on top of the sauce. Roughly chop some cilantro and sprinkle over the top and enjoy

the traditional way to make this is to simmer (usually) red snapper in the sauce to cook. I prefer it grilled and cod is half the cost of snapper here so we do that. 

Hope you guys enjoy. This is one of our faves. Glad to have it documented.

Legume

Thanks - can't wait to try it 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

kl8ton said:

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

I left out a few ingredients but I’m definitely getting the whole recipe to share. The sauce clearly does not have enough garlic in it. She fries slivers in butter and stirs that into the sauce. It also has pickled Fresno chiles. You could use fresh and jalapeño is pretty standard but we pickle our own Fresnos so in they go. I’ll post the whole thing as soon as I can get her to slow down enough to coherently share it. Right now she just walks by every few hours and shouts “garlic”! Or “don’t forget the Fresnos”! Even though we haven’t spoken about it in 2 days. 

@caliking I FTFY

This is correct haha. 

Stormbringer

Thanks! 

Canugghead

Looks and sounds amazing. Also thanks for not mikeeing with us.

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Canugghead said:

Looks and sounds amazing. Also thanks for not mikeeing with us.

Didn’t realize that was a verb until this very moment. Well played sir. 

EGGjlmh

Boy I sure do like fish.