I have a friend who is a wonderful artist. As a matter of fact, she introduced me to a watercolor class for seniors a number of years ago where I learned skills that I still use in my paintings.
She recently lost her husband to a long illness and so Sweetie and I went over a few nights ago and had a BBQ with her. Part of the fun was having Sweetie show her the way that he barbeques steelhead fish. She is getting reacquainted with using a gas grill.
Friends of her husband have also recently helped her revive a beautiful lath summer house, putting in a new floor and making sure that the structure is sound. Now that it is in good shape, she has moved in some lawn furniture, including a table and chairs, so we ate our BBQ there, with shade from the ivy and a light breeze chasing the heat away.
No actual recipe, but I'm going to describe Sweetie's way with grilling fish.
To begin with, he lays the fillets on a tray and coats them lightly with olive oil, then a light dusting of ground pepper. He prefers the tail end since it is often a more even thickness than the head end. That makes grilling easier so that the thick part isn't undercooked when the thinner part is cooked. He likes steelhead, a kind of red trout that tastes like salmon (I think), better than salmon. Use whatever fish fillets you like, but get them with skin still on.
You can season the skin-on fillets however you please. I'm trying to cut back on sodium a bit, so we're skipping the garlic salt, but that used to be a standard, along with the pepper.
Preheat your grill. You want it to be medium-hot. I believe that with the gas grill Sweetie likes to get the gauge to 400.
Because the skin is oiled, you don't need to oil the grill grids. Place the fish on the preheated grill grids, close the cover, and cook until the fish is just beginning to firm up...you can push down on thickest part with a finger to see how solid it feels. A very solid fish is a very cooked fish. We like our fish still a bit less than solid...sort of like medium-rare steak. Don't turn the fillet over. Once it's cooked to your liking, slide a spatula under, loosening any skin that may have adhered to the grill grids, and then use the spatula to transfer it to either a serving plate or the actual dinner plate. Garnish with lemon if desired.
Because Sweetie usually get a good sized tail piece for the two of us to share (about 3/4 to a pound), he cuts it in half along indentation left by the backbone, so we each get a long, skinny piece. When you do that, you can see at the cut edge if it's cooked as much as you like, or needs to spend another minute or two on the grill.
That's it, except for cleaning the grill grids. Sweetie like to use a wire brush to scrape them down while they are still hot.
We had fresh corn on the cob and a colorful, delicious salad to go with the steelhead.
Here are some photos of my friend's lath summer house and it gives you a good idea of how pleasant it was to share a meal there.
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