Subscribe to FeedThis fish dish is one of our family favourites - belacan, a spicy and pungently fragrant shrimp paste is stuffed into fish and slowly pan-fried to crispy perfection! For the uninitiated, the pungent smell of belacan may be hard to stomach at first but is a perennial favourite in Malaysia and other South East Asian countries. The shrimp paste was lightly toasted, then pounded by hand with shallots and dried chilli peppers. You may opt to use a blender but I prefer the texture of hand pounded belacan for a better 'bite'. Instead of stuffing the body of the fish with belacan, one can also opt to fry the belacan separately and simply ladle atop deep-fried fish. It does take some patience to slowly pan-fry the fish.
The skins of these fish are very hard and are usually removed by the fishmongers.
Ingredients:
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