Meen pollichathu/ Baked Fish Pollichathu

Every time I do blog hoping I feel that I should try recipes from others spaces at least once in a while, I even bookmark recipes thinking that I will try it soon, most of the time I never get enough time to try the book marked one.When I saw fish polliachathu in Nisha's Look who is cooking too I thought I will give it a go later, never thought this soon, It was not planned at all,Yesterday evening I prepared sambar and mushroom stir fry,as my hubby doesnt like sambar I thought as usual I will fry a fish for him and checked my freezer to see what I have got,it was all empty except a packet of 2 whole seabreams.Thawing one is not easy so I defrosted both.Fish was looking beautiful,so I didnt feel like cutting it,suddenly this fish pollichathu striked me,I went to her space and had a look,it didnt look very elaborate to me,so I made up my mind and kept her blog opened in kitchen and followed it almost to the dot and we were so happy with the outcome ,it tasted great and is much healthier than the shallow fried ones,even though we were tempted to eat the second one too,I reserved it for today mainly for having it for lunch all by myself and for clicking it during day time....

You can find the original recipe here.

Ingredients

For marination
Fish - 2 whole fish ( I used seabream)
Pepper powder - 1 1/2 tbs
Salt
Turmeric - 1/4 tbs
For masala
Shallots - 20 nos
Ginger garlic paste- 1tbs
Coriander powder - 1 1/2 tbs
Salt
Redchilly powder - 1tbs
Tumeric - 1/4 tsp
Fenugreek powder -1/8 tsp
Tomato paste -paste of 1/2 a tomato
Greenchillies -2
Curry leaves - few
Garlic chopped - 1 tbsp
Mustard seeds - 1/4 tsp

Preparation
Clean the fish and make gashes . Marinate the fish with salt ,pepper and turmeric and keep it aside for 1 hr or preferably longer.
Make a paste of all the masala powders with ginger garlic paste.
In a saucepan add oil and sputter mustard seeds,add chopped shallots and saute well.When is soft add chopped ginger and fry for 1 minute.Add the masala paste,curryleaves and saute till raw smell goes,finally add tomoto paste and saute till it makes a paste.
In a pan fry add some oil and shallow fry the fish for 30 seconds on both sides . Now coat the fish with the masala paste and bake in a preheated oven at 170 degree centigrade for 30 mins.

Note - The origianl recipe calls for coconut milk but I forgot to add it.