Fried Fish in Miso Sauce

An Asian fusion dish of fish in a savoury Miso sauce, with the bright notes of lime juice, ginger and chillies. A healthy and inexpensive dinner dish for 2-3 people, when served with freshly cooked rice.

From top, clockwise: Japanese leek, Miso paste (in packaging and in small bowl), calamansi lime, Thai chilli, turmeric powder, salt, Pangasius fish chunks, oil, ginger, garlic, small onions, white pepper.

INGREDIENTS: (serves 2-3 people, as accompaniment to rice)

500g Pangasius fish cubes
1 tsp turmeric powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp white pepper
1 cup + 2 tbsp cooking oil
2 small onions (or 1 large onion) — sliced thinly
3 small Thai chillies
3 cm piece of ginger — cut into long, thin strips
1 Japanese leek — cut into 1 cm rounds.
2 tbsp white Miso paste
5 calamansi limes — squeeze out the juice

METHOD:

In a bowl, add fish cubes, turmeric powder, salt and white pepper. Mix thoroughly to coat the fish. Leave aside for a few minutes to marinate.
Heat 1 cup of oil in a pan and fry fish chunks till golden brown and cooked through, or until crispy if you like. Drain off excess oil and put aside.
Heat 2 tbsp of oil to medium high and saute onion, garlic, chillies and ginger slices until fragrant. Add the leek and continue frying until the vegetables soften and onions turn brown.
Turn down the heat. In a small bowl, add 2 tbsp of water to the Miso paste to thin it out. Add this mixture to the pan and mix thoroughly. Check for seasoning. Add more salt if necessary.
Add in the fish and stir gently to coat the fish with the sauce.
Dish out and serve with cooked rice.
Serves 2-3 persons as a main dish with rice.

NOTES:

Pangasius fish is sometimes called sutchi catfish. You an also use Dory or cod fish instead.
Before adding Miso, it is best to turn down the heat and avoid boiling the paste. Miso contains active beneficial bacteria and too much heat can kill it.
Miso is already quite salty. But if for some reason the dish is not salty enough, do season to your taste.
The fish can also be fried till crispy, before adding the sauce.
Thai chilli is also known as capsicum annuum or capsicum frutescens, depending on which website you are looking at. It is hotter than your regular chilli pepper of the Nahuatl chilli variety (Wikipedia). If in doubt about the level of heat and spiciness, use chillies of the variety you are more familiar with. The chillies I pictured above, I plucked from this plant in my balcony garden.
When cooking this dish, I left the chillies whole. To maximise the heat, you can also cut the chillies into smaller pieces.
Good to know: Most of the heat in chillies come from the whitish pith or placenta of the fruit. This is where most of the capsaicin can be found. So leaving chillies whole will just add a subtle spiciness, whereas slicing them will maximise the pungent heat.