A Moment of Weakness

 We were in the grocery store, visiting the lobsters (do you ever visit the grocery store with small children and not stop to visit the lobsters?), when Choclo began wandering down the fish counter.  Look!  He was beside himself. They have FISH!

Fish, as I'm sure you know, comes in neat boneless fillets and steaks.  FISH!, comes with its eyeballs.

The last several times Choclo had asked, I had told him we might try it when I wasn't morning sick.  Well, I didn't have that excuse.

I looked at the red snapper skeptically.  The fish looked back, equally skeptical (seriously, look at that first picture, he clearly thinks this is not going to end well!).

I caved.

We bought the fish as a home school project.  It was too expensive to be just food!  We were quite interested in his lung-like gills.  I asked the fishmonger for some extra scales to look at under the microscope.

We examined him carefully, inside and out, rubbed garlic paste and salt on the inside, then stuffed him with lemon and basil and tossed him on the barby.  If only I had a Barbie... you know I can't resist a visual pun!

I must admit, he looked pretty tasty coming off the grill!

He tasted pretty good, but not $8 a pound spectacular.  It's hard for me not to compare it with an $8 a pound rib eye steak!  But it was more educational...

I think if I had to do it over, I would have marinated him and cooked him longer at a lower temp so as to get more "grilled" flavor.

Any whole fish cooking tips out there?