The grilled "spade-fish" :The unique taste of the Port City

According to the traditional medicine book, spade-fish is considered as a precious medicine which can cure sonasthenia, neurasthenia, be good for women before and after giving birth. Spade-fish’s gall has the effect of relieving stress, fatigue, back pain and neck strain. Therefore, when cooking spade-fish, it’s very important to split its gall.

Because this kind of fish is strong, not everyone can treat it. It’s necessary for experienced people to do that. There are some cases that the gill, intestine and gall of spade-fish all were removed but the fish still live strongly as normally. At that time, the fish’s fin will put on the air and maybe cut our hand.

There are a lot of spade-fishes in Hai Phong so that cooking this dish is the way to assert the unique of this port land. It’s very essential to be careful when processing spade-fish because if we cannot split the gall of the fish, it will make the dish bitter. The removed gall can be used for macerating in alcohol with lemongrass bulbs. The spade-fish is grilled with galangal bulbs and me (a special condiment of Vietnam). With this method of cooking, the dish is going to have a typical taste, crispy at the outside, soft at the inside and can be eaten even small bone.

Usually, grilled spade-fish eat along with salted mangoes or salted figs. Thus, we can taste the salty, sour and acrid flavor of salted fruits and the sweet flavor of the fish at the same time. All the flavors are intertwined and not make you feel depressed.

If sitting with friends, one plate of grilled fish along with some glasses of wine will bring an unexpected interest. The most fastidious person has also to be satisfied with this dish when looking at the yellow and enjoying the typical flavor. The grilled spade-fish can split and dip in soy sauce. More sophisticated, we can roll spade-fish in vegetable, mix with a piece of cucumber, pineapple and star-fruit, it will make the dish more delicious.

If you want to enjoy this unique grilled dish, you can visit the Hong Kong Hotpot Restaurant at 372 Lach Tray, Ngo Quyen District. In the middle of the Port land, it’s really delightful to enjoy the food and watch the Chinese beautiful aquarelle pictures.