Thread: Kahawai favorite uses

Slice fresh caught same day filleted Kahawai thumb thick at an angle across the fillet. Place slices in a large bowl, stainless or glass. Drizzle generously with fresh squeezed lime ( not lemon) and a couple of tablespoons or three of good olive oil or more to suit. Season lightly with salt and fresh ground black pepper. Stir gently with fork. Add a few splashes of Tabasco to taste and 1 or 2 sprinkles of Wuster sauce. If you can taste the Wuster it's too much. Beat an egg separately until it is uniform with a bit of air in it. After not more than 20 min in the marinade, dip the slices a few at a time into the beaten egg then drop them into a plastic bag of seasoned plain white flour and shake until uniformly coated. Drop into a pan with 1/4 inch of sizzling olive oil and a knob of salted butter. Until just cooked. Slices should hold together not fall apart. Flour coating should be golden brown not white and soggy, or blackened. Plate as it comes out of the pan and serve immediately- no pissing around. If you have half a doz people or more you will be lucky to have enough fish - they keep coming back for more. Have some sliced lemon on the side of serving plate.

Can sub breadcrumbs for flour.

Sounds pretty yum
I think kahawai is quite an underrated eating fish if it's bled and looked after well. I'm never sad I caught one when I go fishing

Aways back, had a Nana that used to make fish cakes out of them and they weren't half bad, all I can remember was mashed potatoe & onion, salt and pepper & lighty floured then well fried in a frypan. Sorry to offend, but always came served with home grown Vegs. Then a rubarb pudding.

Originally Posted by tac a1

Smoked kahawai pie for me is the top use of them.

... salt and brown sugar. ..
Smoke slowly over ti tree. ..

Worth trying sweet Thai chilli sauce instead of brown sugar. Gives your pies a little lift.

Originally Posted by Chur Bay

..Just cut the dark meat off.

Yep I always discard the red meat after smoking. Maybe that's what MB notices.

My cats love it…. Must be the high blood content as they also like trevs….
I don’t know what it is but it’s got a distinctive smell and taste that’s not for me… kind or reminds me of a zinc/tin lid taste
But each to their own and quite often I give it to friends if the cats catered for. Lots of people rave about it smoked but it’s not me.

Originally Posted by 6x47

Worth trying sweet Thai chilli sauce instead of brown sugar. Gives your pies a little lift.

Sweet chilli works well. Coke syrup and some hot sauce also does a good trick.

As for uses, if you have it fresh, as sashimi, its great. Not so good cooked as a fillet, same as any game fish. Treat it like you would tuna. Hard to go past it for smoking though.

If smoked, either smoked fish pie or as a dip. Flake it out, add it to some lite cream cheese (full fat cream cheese will overpower the flavour of the kawahai) salt pepper and some freshly chopped chives and/or mint. Superb on crackers.

Originally Posted by Cigar

Our whole extended family loves fresh kahawai, usually just fried with a flour coating. Sometimes we use the stuffing mix from the supermarket to coat it, it gives a bit more flavour than plain breadcrumbs. we find it doesn't like being overcooked and doesn't freeze well.

Yes.

My 10¢ - disclaimer, I am a Cordon Bleu Chef.

Yes they need bleeding. I cut them through the under-body about 1/2 an inch behind where the gill plates meet. This cuts the front of the heart off. Then put them on a stringer in a rock pool or over the side of the boat, this pumps the blood out and replaces it with salt water, as they expire.

Scale and gut them on the rocks or out at sea, much easier when just caught. Keep them chilled.

When filleted, I like skin on (but no need if you don't), lightly dusted with flour and fried in a mix of oil and butter. Butter for the flavour and the oil stops the butter burning.

Seasoning- people don't know, but chefs use of salt and (in this case) white pepper is crucial.

A pinch or two of salt over the frying pan whilst cooking (not too much as there's salt in the butter) and make sure each fillet gets a sprinkle of pepper.

Cook until each piece is only just cooked in the middle, then serve.

As mentioned above, over cooked will be stringy and sour. Properly just cooked it will fall apart on the fork. Lemon wedges on the side.

Bon appétit.

SMOKES IS GREAT,pan fried is ok...crumbed is good...our son did some in air fryer with a light coating on it...yip was every bit as good as the snapper with it...

Originally Posted by veitnamcam

What is poke?
I like the top loin as sashimi, chill to almost frozen and slice thinly, soy and wasabi dipping.
Otherwise I smoke it and freeze then use for fish pies.
Not a huge fan of it pan fried.

https://youtu.be/VGqoMTER7Jw
This is what peaked my interest
Hawaiians way of eating raw tuna
It’s great with salmon and pretty good with kahawai/kingfish and other sashimi type filet
I use it as a loose idea and just use what’s on hand


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Originally Posted by MarkN

Yes.

My 10¢ - disclaimer, I am a Cordon Bleu Chef.

Same... get the cordon bleu out of the freezer, and chuck it in the oven. 180deg for 30-40 mins, allow the thermonuclear fake cheese to cool, and ready to eat! Just don't ask why the chicken has air bubbles in it...



In all seriousness... that sounds bloody good! Top tip on bleeding them too, thanks!

many many many years ago when I was just a wee nipper @erniec and Bob M taught me how to treat trout destined for the table,cut throat,break neck,remove gills and gut,and then take out ALL the black kidney line along back of gut cavity...and by all,I mean all... the sharp end of teaspoon works well,point of knife might be needed for the bit closest to tail..... kawahai like the same treatment for same reasons.... the sooner you do this the better,leave it in and you understand the term mudfish...... its not fault of fish that it was left to start decomposing in sun.....

Originally Posted by omark

My cats love it…. Must be the high blood content as they also like trevs….
I don’t know what it is but it’s got a distinctive smell and taste that’s not for me… kind or reminds me of a zinc/tin lid taste
But each to their own and quite often I give it to friends if the cats catered for. Lots of people rave about it smoked but it’s not me.

my cats nuts about it too, far more than snapper
very persistant for her share and dosent stop eating it even when shes obviously had enough
I think you are right about the distinctive smell bieng the driver

Originally Posted by hotbarrels

Kahwai is a stunning eating fish. I will take Kahwai over snapper any day - more flavor!

One favorite in our house is to cube it into bite size pieces, roll it in flour, egg and spiced bread crumbs and pan fry with butter. Best fish bites you will ever get.

this is all I could think about when getting home

didnt have any of the coatings but tried the bite size pieces as thats what we do with other strong tasting things to make them more mild
works a treat even without the coating about reducing the intensity of the kahawai
great idea I think im gunna do more fish bites in the future as they are convenient way to eat fish

Kahawai for me is game fish, not much for eating. When I was in Akl, I caught lot Kahawai from west coast, tried smoke but not very good. Wet aged, and them smoke, not good as well. When I moved to new place with a high power oven, I found out that roast it was better.


The second way to cook it, I mixed Kahawai meat with pig lard and chives, making dumplings.