Whole Roasted Flounder
It is my humble opinion that the lowly Flounder is underrated. I grew up catching flounder and fluke in Boston and Long Island. My brother and I would tie double rigs and bring them up two at a time. Here in South Carolina, flounder is usually the by-catch when you are out fishing for reds or trout. To me, catching a flounder is a treat. Usually they tend to hang together, when you catch one, you need to hold your spot, get everyone on the boat to fish the bottom slow and see how many you can put in the cooler. While catching the big ones are great (they call them door mats down here) I like a small to mid-sized flounder. You can roast a big ass flounder and serve it family style, but I like to have an individual fish for each person. We have cast iron fajita dishes (like the ones from the Mexican restaurant). These dishes are perfect for flounder as they cook in their serving dish and have perfect space and depth to carry the fish and the butter sauce. There are restaurants from New York to Savannah that serve this same dish for 30-40 dollars per plate. There is no reason you can’t cook it the same way. Again, whole fish can freak some people out, but serve some wine first and walk them through it. This is a keeper recipe, after cooking flounder this way I just don’t buy flounder filets anymore. Good luck!
- Gut and scale as many flounder as you want to cook .
- If you are unsure how to gut a flounder, they are not “regularly” shaped so take a minute and learn the right way. Your local fish store will gut and scale for you in most cases, if you are new to this that is surely the way to go (Click here for a short You Tube tutorial).
- Pre-heat oven or your grill to about 350.
- Salt and pepper both sides and place cleaned and scaled flounder on your fajita pans or any oven ready baking dish. Don’t forget to spray some olive oil cooking spray before setting them down.
- If you are cooking the flounder in a dish that is not its serving dish, make sure you get a pan that will not be difficult to remove the fish when done. Give yourself enough room to get a large (or two regular) spatulas in there and keep the fish from falling apart.
- I like to score the flounder in about 3 lines in both diagonal directions, remember the dark side of the fish should be facing up.
- In a separate bowl I melt ¼ to ½ cup of butter.
- Add to butter:
- Juice of ½ lemon
- 1 tbsp. Wocestershire
- About 2-3 cloves of fresh minced garlic
- Salt and pepper to taste
- Put the fish in the oven or grill and turn from bake to broil. The heat in the oven will start cooking the fish from the bottom. The broiler will heat up and get the top of the flounder super crispy.
- You can add halved cherry\grape tomatoes, diced onions, or peppers at this time if you like.
- Baste the fish every few minutes with the butter mixture.
- Flounder cook FAST. They are thin and the broiler will get that thing going. The rule is to poke the fish with a tooth pick (at the thickest part) touch the tooth pick to your lips or mouth, if the tooth pick is warm, you are done. Remember, the pan is hot, your fish will continue to cook after you take it out. Be ready to eat when these are ready, pour more butter mixture over the flounder, serve with lemon wedges.
- Eat one side (the side facing up). Be mindful of bones, you will quickly see how to pull the meat off the fish and how to leave the bones. When you are done with one side, flip that fish over and you have another side ready. The texture is different on both sides. You may think this is gross, but the tail is awesome. After roasting, it will be super crispy and salty, just like a slightly burnt potato chip…try it.