Fish Cutlet

Recently, I bought Tilapia Fish Fillet and stumbled upon this wonderful recipe provided by My Dhaba - Chef VK Narayanan. The recipe is certainly a keeper. I made Fish Cutlet along with few extra ingredients put together, elevated the spice portions to make the meat tasty, made few changes to the binding agents to hold the Cutlet.

I wanted to try a different approach in terms of cooking the fish. Chef VKN's recipe approaches the recipe with flaky cooked fish which was a wonderful discovery for me. Thanks Chef VK Narayanan! It was truly a pleasure eating bites of the Fish Cutlet. The flavour was restaurant style and I loved the specific details cited and narrated in the recipe.

An ode to a recipe which I adore + some pantry cleanup calls for my entry to Nupur's BB4 Edition.

Recipe Source: Adapted from My Dhaba - Chef VK Narayanan

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Preparation time: 30 minutes

Yield: 9-12 Cutlets

Ingredients:

Fish fillet - 3 ~ 3 cups of poached fillet: I used Tilapia skinless, boneless fillet.

Potatoes (boiled and mashed) - 3 cups

White chunks of White Bread - 1/2 cup

Onions (minced) - 1/2 cup

Ginger paste - 1 and 1/2 tablespoon

Garlic paste - 1 tablespoon

Green Chillies (chpped) - 3

Garam Masala powder - 2 teaspoon

Cumin powder - 1/3 teaspoon

Coriander powder - 1/3 teaspoon

Turmeric powder - 1/3 teaspoon

Red Chilli powder - 1/2 teaspoon

Black Pepper powder - 1/2 teaspoon

Ghee/ Oil - 2 tablespoon

Bread Crumb powder - 5-8 tablespoon

Milk - 2-3 tablespoon

Eggs - 2

Salt

Water

For Garnish:

Lemon Wedges

Sliced Onions

Method:

Boil Potatoes, mash and keep aside. Thaw the Fish fillet pieces at room temperature, wash thoroughly and pat dry with a paper towel. Poach the fish pieces with little water, salt, ginger and turmeric powder, water should be just good enough to soak the fillets. The fillet will slowly turn flaky and begin to separate. Mash gently with a wooden spatula to separate the fillet pieces. Once the fillet turns completely flaky, turn off the flame and allow to cool. Drain out water and keep the fillet aside.

Mix the mashed Potatoes and all the spice powders. Add the poached fillet pieces. Mix well, add 1 tablespoon of melted ghee, add white bread chunks, adjust salt as per taste and keep aside. In a separate pan, lightly fry onions, green chillies and ginger garlic paste. Once the onions wilt and herbs are lightly sauted turn off the flame. Add the potato-fish mix and give a gentle stir. Make palm sized oval individual portions, dip them in a mixture of egg-pepper powder and salt (all whisked together), roll them in bread crumbs. Double dip if you wish a thicker coating on the cutlet.

Pan roast them on a heated pan with oil/ghee slathered on the sides. Fish cooks very fast so keep a watchful eye and take care to fry them on low-to-medium flame.

Garnish with lime wedges and onion slices. Serve hot with ketchup or Mint Chutney. Drizzle some lime juice, chomp away some onions and take bites of this Cutlet.