Kingfish Ceviche, Citrus, Finger Lime and Pickled Onion - Chef Recipe by Chris Rhoney.

Ingredients

400 g A grade kingfish (hiramasa)
1 pink grapefruit
1 small bunch chives
1 small bunch radishes
2 finger limes

Pickled onion:

1 Spanish onion
100 g red wine vinegar
50 g sugar
Pinch salt

Lime dressing:

50 g lime juice
50 g extra virgin olive oil
Pinch salt

Garnish:

Pea tendrils
Carrot top
Watercress
Red vein sorrel
Nasturtium
Marigolds
Bronze fennel

Method

Pickled onion:

Peel the onion and cut in half through the root. Put the cut side against the chopping board and remove the stem. Thinly slice the onion. Place in a container with a lid.

Put the vinegar, sugar and pinch of salt in a small pot and bring to the boil. Pour over the sliced red onion and close the lid, allow to cool.

Lime dressing:

Whisk together the lime juice and olive oil and season with salt. Put to one side or place in a squeezy bottle.

Kingfish:

Using a sharp knife, skin the kingfish (or ask a fishmonger to do this), being careful to cut as close to the skin as possible.

To skin, place fish skin side down on the board, make a cut at the tail end so you can grip the skin. Using the board as a guide keep the blade flat and gently ‘saw’ backwards and forward.

The sharper the blade is the better and less pressure and sawing action will be required. Discard the skin, turn the fish over and trim away any red flesh, this is the blood line. Once cleaned thinly slice the fish across the grain.

Portion at 60 g per person.

Peel the grapefruit with a sharp paring knife, put of the top and bottom and then following the shape of the fruit cut away the skin and pith. Carefully segment the grapefruit by cutting down the edge of each segment.

Squeeze the remains of the grapefruit and keep the juice. Cut each segment into 3 pieces.

Cut the chives into 2 cm pieces.

Thinly slice the radishes on a mandolin or by hand, if the radishes are large you can cut them into strips after cutting on mandolin.

Cut the finger limes in half and squeeze out the pearls onto your chopping board, then careful pick out the seeds (if you can’t get finger limes you could get salmon caviar for that wow factor).

To assemble:

Put the fish, pickled onion, chives, radish, grapefruit segments and 2 tablespoons grapefruit juice in a bowl.

Re-mix the lime dressing and add approximately 3 tablespoons to the fish.

Add a good pinch of flake salt.

Carefully mix everything, being careful not to damage the fish.

Check the seasoning, you should get a strong citrus flavour, if not add more grapefruit juice.

Portion into bowls and garnish with the herbs and flowers.

Finish by scattering the finger lime pearls over the top of the dish

This should be done no more than 10 minutes before serving as the fish will cure in the citrus, this is fine as traditionally this is what ceviche is.

Here at Botanica we prefer it to be super fresh and the fish to be more sashimi style.

The flavour does not change dramatically but the texture changes the longer you have the fish in the citrus.

Recipe provided by Restaurant Botanica