There is nothing better than freshly caught Louisiana Redfish. The term Half-Shell refers to a redfish that when cleaned you leave the skin on what I refer to as a slab of meat. Most people seem to take the scales off to make a cleaner presentation. The fish is cooked on a BBQ Pit with the skin down, which takes the brunt of the heat and any flame ups from the coals. We use and are huge fans of The Big Green Egg and for this application used pecan wood chips.
Ingredients: 3-4 red fish, seafood rub, 1 stick butter, 1 cup pecans, a grill!
The process is as follows;
Soak your wood chips for an hour. We used pecan, but BBQ aficionados tend to prefer fruit woods for fish, such as apple. Academy, Big Box, or hardware stores carry a good selection.
I get my grill up to 250-300 degrees for a good while then place the soaked wood chips to get a good smoke going.
The fish preparation prior to this is as follows;
Season the fish with your favorite seafood rub (We use Paul Prudhomme’s). Go easy here. Less is more. There is no need to overpower the fish, especially if you use smoke. You could just use some kosher sea salt and pepper.
In a small sauce pan, melt a stick or MORE of grass fed butter, then add a cup of sliced pecans, and a squeeze of lemon. After about five minutes spoon the mixture over the fish. (Fresh chopped garlic is awesome in this recipe as well). Save a little of the butter to add during the cooking process.
Put the redfish slabs, skin down on your pit. The smoke will be rolling at this point. The cooking time will depend upon the thickness and size of your slabs! Remember to add remaining butter halfway through. What you are looking for is the separation of the meat to determine when it is done. With experience, you will recognize what this looks like. These slabs took about 20 minutes on 250 degrees. Use a large handled spatula to remove on a plate. Hit with an additional squeeze of lemon at the end.
Enjoy!!!
Note: pair any of our vegetables with this recipe! I personally love the kale salad with it.
Mike LeCompte says
I can definitely say this is the best way to prepare redfish or black drum. I have found it is not necessary to remove the scales but make sure when you clean the fish you remove the belly bones and any dark red meat as this is the blood line and will give the fish a very strong taste.
Joe says
Hey..I love this Redfish recipe! Just want to say my fiance and I are making this tonight and picked up the ingredients. We love our we found and will definitely include this new redfish recipe to this site. Thanks again!