The good news is that I've crossed something off my bucket list that's been on there for three years: prepare, cook, and eat my very own Bonairean lionfish!
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| Those spines are venomous! Fortunately you can cut them off with scissors. |
Now to be fair, I didn't catch this lionfish myself. Only long-term residents of the island are allowed to take the lionfish hunting class and get a speargun for fishing them. Lionfish are an invasive species; they have no natural predators, can eat everything, and multiply like crazy. To help curb the lionfish problem, they can be hunted by divers with spring-loaded spearguns called ELFs, which is an acronym for 'eradicate lion fish.' Lionfish are the only animals you can go spearfishing for.
Now, on Monday I finally caved to the cold and bought a 5mm wetsuit, and I was very excited to try it out. I went on a dive last night intending to be a lionfish spotter, but the new wetsuit was too tight around my neck and was making me dizzy, so I had to end the dive after a few minutes. Fortunately we were a team of three, so my two buddies, one of whom is a legal lionfish hunter, kept going, and came back with the beautiful specimen pictured above.
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| My buddies exiting the water. The guy in front has a PVC container for holding the lionfish. You don't want to stick yourself with their venomous spines! They can still stick you when they're dead. |
Being a kind and generous soul, (and also because I asked very nicely,) he bequeathed the lionfish unto me. I was so excited that for my entire bike ride home, I sang a little song about my pretty new lionfish and how tasty he was going to be.
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| It's a big one! |
Once home, I realized that we didn't have any knives sharp enough to filet my fish. My dive knife was perhaps not the perfect choice, but it got the job done.
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| Isn't my dive knife pretty? I love that thing. |
Lionfish are an easy fish to filet--if you've got the proper knife. You make a cut behind the gills, along the backbone, and along the belly, then peel back the skin and cut along the bones. Hopefully next time I'll remember to scrape off the scales first. I admit that I definitely need more practice!
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| First cuts made, and skin peeled back to the tail. |
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| Can't believe I forgot about the scales. What a mess. |
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| Two good-sized filets! |
As far as fish go, lionfish are a very non-fishy fish. Once I threw away the carcass, there was no smell of fish left in the house. They look fatty and good for sushi (and I've heard that the sushi restaurants here serve it a lot) but I didn't have the stuff to make sushi. I did, however, remember seeing cilantro, limes, roma tomatoes, onions, and jalapenos in the three grocery stores on the island--all the makings of pico de gallo. I went out and got my ingredients, but came down suddenly with flu symptoms when I got home. So sadly, my lionfish filets went into the fridge.
Today was better but I'm still obviously sick, so I got sent home from work. After a five-hour nap, I finally felt well enough to hold a knife.
Because I'm just one person and I had two good-sized filets, I decided to try two different ideas--because who needs recipes, right? The first idea was a combination of ceviche and pico de gallo.
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| Ceviche de gallo! Pico de lionfish! |
Wow! It's incredibly delicious! I honestly didn't expect it to be so good. Plus it's very simple and easy to make. I give myself a 10 out of 10 on this one.
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| If I didn't have the flu, I'd have eaten it all already. |
My other 'idea' was to just take every spice on the shelf and throw it on. I rubbed a mixture of garlic salt, oregano, black pepper, and paprika on the filet, then pan-fried it in butter.
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| Oh my goooooodness it's so good! |
Tender, moist, juicy, flavorful, melt-in-your-mouth--this thing was perfect. And it took less than five minutes to season and fry it. The only fly in the ointment was that it had a few little bones in it, but it certainly made the house smell amazing.
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| Mmmmm. This recipe gets a 10 out of 10 too! |
Lionfish is really healthy too; it's got lots of omega 3 fatty acids and protein. Yum! I can't wait to try lionfish sushi!
Here's hoping I get better and can help hunt for more lionfish soon! :)
Cheers,
Ashton
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