Roasted whole snapper with jicama ceviche

I've been thinking about the concept of this one for a few days, ever since I found some Sicilian moro blood oranges at a produce store. I knew I wanted to do a blood orange martini, and then a ceviche-type side, with a good fish. I found whole lane snapper at a fish place and had the fishmonger remove the scales and gills so I could cook it in one piece.

Lane snapper are related to red snapper, and this was in great, fresh shape (if not fresh, lane snapper can get a little mushy). I was hoping for whole yellowtail, which is my favorite, but I couldn't find any, just some mangled fillets at one store. Really, though, all snapper tastes similar and I don't think there's a bad snapper out there, especially if it's fresh.

I was also thinking of doing a real fish or shellfish ceviche, but decided to carve up a jicama and use that in place of meat. Jicama is a starchy, carby root, so it wouldn't really get chemically "cooked" as fish would in a ceviche, but jicama is pretty good raw -- sort of like a moist potato taste with the texture of an apple. It probably tastes and feels closer to daikon radish than anything else, but maybe a bit sweeter. With the citrus and cilantro, I think it worked really well, even though calling it "ceviche" was a bit of a conceit on my part.



( Look inside, and the main course may look right back at you )