Cooking on board a boat is a delight, and can create some warm memories. Preparing meals aboard does not need to be canned tuna and sandwiches. Let me show you how to prepare a gourmet fish meal that will impress your guests aboard your yacht. Planked grilled fish fillets on board our trawler, the Patricia Ann; it is the talk of the town these days.
Planked grilled fish or simply cooking on a wooden board is a great experience; if you like the taste and smell of smoked fish, this method is for you. This technique is great as it affords you real smoke for flavor. This is especially good if you are broiling salmon fillets, which are my favorite. As a matter of fact, legend has it that this method to cooking on a grill was discovered as a result of chef experimentation. But I suppose you could cook almost anything this way. I like to call this method planked grilled fish. Salmon and Mahi prepared on cedar are my favorites. You can get the recipes for each of the fish fillets at our recipe page at Award Winning Boat Recipes.
So how do you go about it? To begin you will need to find some clean cedar lumber, Lowes and Home Depot have it in their lumber departments. But you’ll have to cut it into the correct sizes to use. Or you can also buy it prepacked for use at many national grocery chains or you may order online.
Usually I use cedar, but many other woods like alder and cherry are available. Using a clean, untreated piece of wood about one half inch thick and big enough to support the fish fillets pieces, pre-soak the wood in freah water for a few hours before use. I like to use a piece about 6 x 6 for the 2 of us. Although any wood can be used, just make sure that there are no chemicals on the lumber.
When ready, get the grill going, gas preferably. I use a Magma Catalina model gas grill on my boat so this article is written using that method. To keep your fish fillets from sticking to the lumber, spray the lumber with olive oil. You’ll do no flipping or turning when plank fish fillets cooking. The fish is cooked indirectly from the bottom up. Season the fish fillets as you like, again check out my recipe page.
We all know that lumber burns. We are going to place the wood plank with the fish on the lower grill surface and set the control to high. If the board catches fire while you are cooking, not to worry, it’s the way we want the plank with fish to cook. Spray it down with water to help extinguish the fire. Go ahead and let it ignite a little around the edges; the burning of the blackened plank is what produces the smoke that flavors the fish fillets.
I always appropriate about fifty percent more food planning time versus normal grilling when I am plank cooking. During the grilling time you can baste the fish with seasonings if desired.
When the fish fillet is done I transfer the fish fillets from the charred board with a spatula or you can just glide the fish fillets off onto a plate with a fork. Be sure to turn off your grill and let the burned plank sit until the next day to permit it to cool before disposal.
Plank grilling is really is a fantastic way to cook fish fillets. The smoking adds to the flavors and smells of any recipe so feel free to try other ideas.
Mike Dickens, the author, is a liveaboard boat owner and owner/Broker of Paradise Yachts in Florida USA.
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