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Grilled Fish Lettuce Wraps
Pompano Lettuce Wraps
Thai lettuce wraps are a great party food because the act of reaching across the table and sharing. The presentation is also beautiful when you have a huge spread of ingredients. We went to a friend's house here in the Houston area several months ago for this dish. See below the presentation.
The fish can actually be any fish that you can pull apart with a fork. The benefit of using Pompano is that the meat is distributed evenly on both sides which makes for even cooking. It is also a sustainable fish and there are aqua-cultures which grow them to meet demand. It is always a good idea though to check the Monterrey Bay Aquarium's website to make sure it is still a good choice. Things change quickly. At the time of this writing the type that is cultured a good choice.
The prep time can actually be really fast, 10 minutes, if you did what we did by making the whole thing a social event with everyone bringing food and cooking together. On the printable card I put the time for an individual doing it all which is not typical for Thai socials.
Our prep team
- 2-4 Pompano Fish, any sustainable variety
- 1 head of lettuce
- 2 bundles of cilantro with the stems cut off
- 2 green bananas sliced into small semi-circles
- 5 small limes cut into small pyramids
- 2 small tomatoes cut into dime sized pieces
- 1 piece of ginger cut into small strips
- 4 Thai eggplant cut into small wedges
- 3-4 shallots cut into small slices
- 2 packages or one large bowl of a whole grain noodles cooked
- Reduced calorie Thai sweet chili sauce
- Prep all the fruits and vegetables, place on a plate and chill
- Cook the noodles, drain and place in a bowl, they can be cold when served
- Grill the pompano whole, just slit the sides with a knife to help the heat penetrate
- Place everything on the middle a table with lots of napkins
- Using a fork, pull apart a little of the fish and place on a piece of lettuce with a little of each of the other ingredients, roll and eat.
You might notice that some of the ingredients are generic and yours may not look exactly like the picture. That is the thing that is kind of cool about this recipe. It doesn't really matter exactly what fish or tomatoes Thai sauce etc you use. The more options the better and more fun people seem to have.
Grilled Pompano
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