If you love miso aubergines, but wish you could scale them up into a filling dinner, this is a dish for you. Perfect for a celebratory summer dinner for two and easy to scale up to cater for more guests – just use a really big tray for the vegetables and a second one for as many trout fillets as you need. And if you’d like to veganise the dish, just use big triangles of firm tofu instead of the trout, and cook everything together for half an hour.
Miso trout with aubergine, pak choi and peanuts
Prep 15 min
Cook 30 min
Serves 2
1 large aubergine, halved lengthways, then cut into 1cm-thick slices
2 tbsp sesame oil
5 tsp miso paste (red or white) – a gluten-free one, if need be
2 sustainably-sourced trout fillets
2 heaped tbsp salted peanuts, chopped
2 pak choi, quartered
Juice of 1 lime
Flaky sea salt, to taste
1 red chilli, stalk discarded, flesh finely chopped (discard the pith and seeds if you prefer less heat)
2 spring onions, trimmed and finely sliced
Heat the oven to 200C (180C fan)/390F/gas 6. Tip the aubergine slices into a roasting tin large enough to hold them all in a single layer, then add the sesame oil and three teaspoons of the miso paste. Using your hands, mix well to coat the slices, then roast for 20 minutes.
Meanwhile, spread each trout fillet with a teaspoon of the remaining miso paste, then scatter the chopped peanuts on top. Once the aubergines have had 20 minutes, add the pak choi to the tin and gently stir through the aubergines to pick up the flavoured oil; add a little more sesame oil, if need be. Make some space in the mix for the fish, lay in the fillets, then return to the oven for 10 minutes, until the fish is just cooked through (trout fillets tend to be so thin that they cook to my liking in 10 minutes, but if yours are thicker, go for 12-15 minutes).
Once out of the oven, dress the vegetables with the lime juice and a little sea salt, if needed, scatter over the sliced chilli and spring onions, and serve hot.