Steamed Tapah Fish

Although I am the eldest in the family and suppose to be the most "taiko" among my siblings, I sebenarnya selalu kena buli jadi chief cook at home (termasuklah by my extended families). And my dad, mum, Joan, Jason and Jayne taste in food kadang2 menggerunkan. Sometimes it's very challenging to cook "some food items" which I categorised as Unidentified Frying Objects (UFO) ...

Eversince Joan got transfered to Sibu and followed later by Jason to Kanowit, they normally brought home local produce like wild vegetables (i never saw most of it) or freshwater fishes or shrimps. Last Gawai, they brought home a big ikan tapah and few kilos of freshwater prawns.

I thought I could get away from the task by telling them that I might "keluar ngabang" (visiting) with Emel, Agnes and Jethro.

Then Jason put on his most pitiful face and said " U know sis, I have been waiting all this while for you to come back so that I could taste your cooking."

Then Joan added, " Ya lah, memang we purposely don't want to cook this fish sebab there is no one layak untuk masak this fish other than you ... kan jason kan".

My mum pun didn't want to be left out," Old people like us need to rest and leave the cooking to the children".

Of course hati kakak mana yang tidak akan tersentuh mendengar ayat2 itu. But it is not that I didn't know that they were playing psychological warfare with me. Aiyo, I know them since birth lah and their "solid waste" when they were little pun I yang basuh.

With a heavy heart, I started to disect and clean the scary looking fish as shown below.

This is how the fish look like after steaming it with soy sauce and Chinese wine. Ambik mana-mana angle pun it is hard to make this fish look appetising. Suprisingly the flesh is tender and sweet.

Note: I was told that this fish can fetch high price in restaurants. Betul ke?