Today we shall be breaking down an enormous American crimson snapper I had introduced up from the Gulf of Mexico. This fish weighs about 16 kilos gutted, so bit greater than the typical you’ll run into. But massive or small the method of breaking the snapper down is about the identical. I’ll begin off and say we shall be consuming this fish with the pores and skin nonetheless on the fillets. If you wish to prepare dinner the crimson snapper with the pores and skin off or wish to do a crimson snapper on the half-shell recipe, you’ll be able to simply skip over the scaling steps of breaking the crimson snapper down. Just ensure to wash off the scales from the skinless fillets earlier than serving, getting a scale within the mouth if you take a chew of fish isn’t nice.
With prepping the crimson snapper very first thing we love to do is trim off the dorsal fins with a set of heavy kitchen shears, the fin spines are actually sharp and harm like hell if you unintentionally run your hand into them. Better to clip them off now earlier than scaling the fish to be sure you don’t get pricked later.
Once the dorsal fin is trimmed off we take the fish right into a deep sink to start out scaling it. If you don’t have a sink like this at house I like to recommend finishing this step outdoors or on the dock. The scales are going to fly in all places when you do that in your kitchen sink, but when you need to have the water working over the fish when you scale to assist preserve the scales from flying out as far.
Once the crimson snapper has been scaled, the subsequent step is to take the pinnacle and collars off the fish. You wish to reduce at an angle up from beneath the pelvic fins to the again of the pinnacle. Once you narrow either side like that you could bend the pinnacle again to pop the backbone and take the pinnacle off. While some individuals fillet fish with their heads and collars nonetheless connected we prefer to take away them as a result of the fish will lay flatter with out the pinnacle.
Make positive to maintain the collars/throats of the fish, they’re nice fried, smoked, or grilled. The head will be saved and changed into soup or inventory, a lot of good collagen in these massive snapper heads.
Now the pinnacle and scales are gone you can begin taking the fillets off the body. Using a pointy knife make the primary reduce alongside the again of the fish, ensuring to maintain the angle of the knife angle barely down.
First, begin with a reduce on the tail to have an endpoint on your fillet, then you definitely wish to journey the bones of the fish with out unintentionally slicing via the backbones and into the other fillet.
As you make your cuts alongside the spine gently carry up the fillet off the bones to be sure you don’t unintentionally reduce the fillet.
When you attain the rib bones I identical to forcing the knife via them after which trim them out at a later step. You can select to chop across the ribs and go away them connected to the body to, it’s a private desire factor.
Avoid sawing motions when attempting to take the fillets off the body, they tear the meat as a substitute of providing you with good fillets. Repeat for the second facet of the fish. You can see within the footage now with the pinnacle taken off the facet that’s already been filleted lays good and flat.
Breaking It Down: Filleting a Red Snapper
Now you’ve simply the crimson snapper fillets, you can begin trimming off the rib cage from the fillet. Carefully observe alongside the curve of the rib bones making easy cuts. Once the rib cage is eliminated, perform a little trimming and now you’ve an virtually boneless fillet.
At this stage you’ll be able to take the pores and skin off the fillets with what most individuals name a fillet knife, however they’re greatest used for simply skinning the fillets. I like to recommend not scaling a fish if you wish to take away the pores and skin, the scales make it simpler to pores and skin, they act as a form of backing to the pores and skin and retains the knife from pushing via the pores and skin as simply. Keep the skinning knife as flat as doable to the slicing board, with a slight angle down. You wish to barely pull again on the pores and skin as you’re pushing the knife ahead in a single easy movement.
Now with a fillet this massive, you wish to break up it into two items alongside the midline of the fillet for higher portion sizes. While splitting the fillet we additionally reduce out the pin bones, the final bones left within the fillet.
Then you’ll be able to reduce up the boneless fillet into equal parts that you could prepare dinner up instantly or wrap up and freeze for later.
