Crispy Deep Fried Grunion

Yum, we have been having quite a lot of crispy deep fried grunion in our meals. Thanks to the info from our friend about grunion run. We caught quite a lot of grunions and so far, after experimenting a lot in the kitchen with it, this recipe is the winner in my household. Have you ever heard of grunion run? It refers to the time when the grunions release their eggs. Grunion is one unique fish species, where, during the spawning season, they came out to the beach at night, the females dig out a hole in the sand and lay their eggs in the hole. Then, the males will come out to the hole and fertilizes the eggs.

Well, it’s still grunion spawning season in Southern California. Usually, the season starts from mid-March until late-August. The cool part about fishing for grunion is that, you can ‘fish’ for grunion on the beach with your own bare hand! It is really a great experience to catch grunion. If you happened to be somewhere near the beaches from Monterey, CA to all the way down in Baja, Mexico, I’d strongly suggest doing it, at least once, and please just take what you would like to consume. You can find more information about grunion from the California Department Fish and Wildlife.

After grunion run, we would separate them into small bags before putting it into freezer. It would be great if we can remove all the fish scales and gut them first, but we usually already feel so tired after catching them, hahaha… Anyhow, fresh grunion (or fresh ingredients in general) tastes the best. We use the recipe below to enjoy our catch. Normally, I fried all the parts of grunion, including the head. My toddler and I like them. Yes, since it is very crispy, you can eat the head and the tail too! However, at the request of my husband, this time we remove the head – since he helped me clean them.

Give the crispy deep fried grunion recipe below a try and let me know what you think, won’t ya?

Tip: In general, lemon juice, buttermilk or ginger will help in getting rid of the fishy smell for cooking seafood

Ingredient:

• 20 grunions
• ½ cup all purpose flour
• ¼ cup rice flour
• 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper powder
• 1 tablespoon garlic powder
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 bowl iced water
• 1 lemon
• Vegetable or Canola oil for deep frying

Direction:

• Clean the grunions really well, scale and gut them
• After cleaning, sprinkle the grunions with the squeezed lemon juice. Leave them in the fridge for about 5-10 minutes
• Except for the grunions, lemon juice and iced water, mix all the remaining ingredients
• Preheat oil in deep fryer to 325 degree Fahrenheit
• Take the grunions from the fridge, soak in iced water and coat them with the batter mixture. If you want to have thicker coating, put the coated grunions back to the iced water and coat them one more time
• After coating, fry them until it is cooked. The grunions should be ready when you see less bubble in the fryer.