Recipes

Fish Head Curry

Asian · Curry · Dinner · Fish · Offal · Seafood

Fish Head Curry
Prep 30 min
Cook 30 min, plus 1-2 hr rest
Serves 4 to 6
Level Medium

Singapore’s great fish curry: a whole snapper head simmered briefly in a tamarind and coconut curry with okra, eggplant and tomato. Credited to Marian Jacob Gomez, a cook from Kerala who began selling it on Sophia Road in 1949.

Untested: I have not cooked this one yet. It is here because the Offal dive needed it, and it is adapted from the source named in the Notes.

Ingredients

Rempah (blended paste)

  • 3 red chiles, seeded
  • 5 cloves garlic
  • 5 shallots
  • 1 1/4-inch (3 cm) piece ginger
  • 1 onion

Ground spices

  • 2 tablespoons ground turmeric
  • 1 tablespoon each ground coriander, chili powder and cumin
  • 1 teaspoon black pepper
  • (or 4 tablespoons fish curry powder in place of all five)

Whole spices

  • 1 teaspoon mustard seeds
  • 1 teaspoon fenugreek seeds

The curry

  • 3 tablespoons oil
  • 3 1/2 to 4 cups (800 ml to 1 liter) water
  • 2 sprigs curry leaves
  • 1 eggplant, cut in chunks
  • 1 fish head, at least 1 pound (500 g), red snapper preferred, split and cleaned
  • 4 tomatoes, quartered
  • 15 to 20 okra
  • 7 ounces (200 ml) thick coconut milk
  • 1 tablespoon tamarind paste mixed with 3 tablespoons water
  • 1 teaspoon chicken stock powder
  • Salt

Directions

  1. Fry the paste. Blend the rempah ingredients to a paste. Heat the oil in a wide pot and fry the paste with the mustard and fenugreek seeds and the ground spices, stirring, until the oil separates from the paste.
  2. Make the gravy. Add the water and curry leaves and bring to a boil.
  3. Eggplant. Add the eggplant and simmer until half soft.
  4. Fish. Add the fish head, tomatoes and okra and simmer 5 to 10 minutes only. “Fish cooks very fast and a 10-minute simmer is more than enough.”
  5. Finish. Stir in the coconut milk, tamarind, stock powder and salt. Return to a boil, then turn off the heat.
  6. Rest. Let the curry stand 1 to 2 hours for the flavour to develop, then reheat gently and serve with rice.

Notes

Source Adapted from Guai Shu Shu, “Fish Head Curry (鱼头咖喱).”

History Singapore’s National Heritage Board credits Marian Jacob Gomez, a Malayalee immigrant from Kerala, who began selling fish head curry on Sophia Road in 1949 — at a stall or a restaurant, depending on the source. The heritage board notes that fish head “is not served in traditional Malayalee cuisine.”

The Offal dive on the Food site covers this part in depth.