What’s cooking today: Fried kingklip with caper butter sauce

My lifelong favourite fish, kingklip, flakes beautifully and, if cooked with care to be slightly underdone, can be a minor masterpiece of good eating. Kingklip well deserves being treated with respect, and a caper butter sauce is a splendid match for it.

(Serves 2)

Ingredients

2 handsome kingklip portions from the middle of the fish

3 Tbsp butter

1 Tbsp olive oil

For the caper butter sauce:

3 Tbsp butter

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

2 Tbsp capers

Juice of 1 lemon

salt and ground black pepper to taste 

1 teaspoon thyme leaves

Method

Make the sauce first.

Melt ½ teaspoon butter in a frying pan on a moderately high heat. When it foams, add the capers and sauté, stirring, until the capers crisp; just a couple of minutes. Add the lemon juice, thyme and garlic and cook on a low heat for 2 minutes, being watchful. Season with salt and pepper. Remove from the heat while you cook the fish.

Fry the kingklip in butter and a splash of olive oil, turning once, until cooked but slightly underdone in the middle. Any more than this and the fish risks becoming too dry. Serve with the sauce spooned on top. DM

Tony Jackman is Galliova Food Writer 2023, jointly with TGIFood columnist Anna Trapido.

Follow Tony Jackman on Instagram @tony_jackman_cooks.

This dish is photographed plate by Mervyn Gers Ceramics.