Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa (video)

These fish tacos with mango salsa are one of my favorite taco recipes ever! This delicious dish is made with Cajun-spiced fish, mango salsa, red cabbage carrot slaw, and mango sauce. You will be thrilled how flavorful but also light and refreshing they are!

Recipe inspiration

I was at first skeptical about fish tacos. I ate them with chicken (like these sheet pan chicken fajitas tacos) and beef but fish sounded somehow not that great. How wrong was I.

This recipe was inspired by many fish tacos that we ate on our vacation in Florida. Mango salsa was the most popular topping and we ate them with fish and shrimp. The most popular seasoning was either cajun or blackened seasoning. Most fish or shrimp in these tacos were deep-fried, but really, with so many toppings and sauces you can’t really taste the difference and pan-fried fish is much more healthy.

I’m so happy that I could recreate a part of my dream vacation at home! Our favorite tacos were in Bonefish Grill Restaurant in Orlando (everything was amazing there!) and Key West Fish & Chips food truck in Key West.

If you’re looking for other delicious Tex-Mex dishes try my chicken quesadillas!

Ingredients + substitutions

• Fish – it’s best to use firm white fish fillets. I like cod or halibut. It also depends on what kind of fish is available in the region you live in. These tacos are inspired by the tacos that I ate in Florida so in this region Grouper, Mahi Mahi, and Snapper are most often used. Don’t use salmon or tuna, their bold flavor won’t work well here. Instead of fish, you can use shrimp! They will taste just as good as with fish. Avoid very delicate fish like sole.
• Fish seasoning – I used Cajun seasoning, but you can also use blackened seasoning or jerk seasoning (or generally any fish and seafood seasoning you have on hand, like Old-Bay seasoning). You can also use this seasoning to make Cajun shrimp alfredo.
• Clarified butter – this is my favorite fat to pan-fry fish with. It has an amazing flavor but won’t get burnt so quickly like regular butter. If you don’t have it on hand just use frying oil.
• The best mango salsa recipe for fish tacos – feel free to add more chili flakes or maybe a jalapeno pepper for more heat. For us, the heat from the cajun seasoning was enough. You can also add finely chopped red onion instead of chili flakes.
• Instead of mango sauce, you can just make a simple lime crema.
• Red cabbage slaw – you can omit the carrot and swap the red cabbage for white cabbage if you wish.
• Tortillas – use small, wheat, or corn tortillas.
• Other toppings that would also be delicious: avocado, guacamole, diced tomatoes, shredded lettuce, coleslaw.

How to cook the fish:

The most important thing – don’t overcook the fish! Overcooked fish is dry and rubbery. The fish needs to be cooked really quickly over high heat until cooked through in the middle. If you’re not sure, you can measure the internal temperature with a thermometer, it should be 145°F/ 63°C (on this website you can find a safe minimum cooking temperature chart to print out).

How to avoid sticking to the pan: This can be caused by low-quality fish. Make sure your fish is thawed, pat-dry and your pan is really nicely hot.

How to cook fish on the stovetop – I like to cook it over high heat on one side until it’s browned, and then just very quickly on the other side until it’s cooked through.

Alternatively, you can cook it on the grill or in the oven.

How to bake fish in the oven – it’s maybe a better idea if you want to scale up the recipe. Pan-frying a larger amount of fish on the stove can be too labor-intensive. Rub the fish with seasoning (flour is not necessary) and place small pieces of butter over each fish fillet. Baking time at 375°F/180°C would be 10-20 minutes, depending on the thickness of the fish.

Some recipes call for marinating the fish. It sure does add more flavor, but I think here it’s not necessary. There are so many flavorful toppings here. The most important is good seasoning and that the fish is nice, tender, and flaky (not gummy, tough, and overcooked). There’s also one more problem with marinating, I just often forget to plan ahead and marinate the fish.

What I like to do is pat dry the fish, rub with seasoning, then with flour and set aside while I’m preparing all the other ingredients. After this time, fish releases some water which absorbs the flour. Now I rub the fish with the flour for the second time. This way you can add more flour, the coating is thicker and will form a nice crispy shell on the fish without making a batter or deep-frying the fish. If you add more flour at once it will just fall off the fish right away.

How to make these fish tacos step by step:

STEP 1: Start with red cabbage carrot slaw: Cut 3.5 oz (100g) red cabbage into very thin strips (the more thinly the better) – you should have about 1 cup shredded cabbage. Grate 1 small carrot on the small holes of a box grater. Add 1/2 Tbsp of olive oil and 1 Tbsp of lime juice, season with salt and pepper to taste, toss until combined. Set aside. It’s good to make this slaw ahead and let it stand for 1-2 hours to let the cabbage soften.

STEP 2: Make mango salsa: Cut 1 mango into small cubes, toss with 1 ts of chopped cilantro, 1 Tbsp of olive oil, 1 Tbsp of lime juice. and 1/4 ts of chili flakes (if using). Season with salt and pepper to taste and optionally with more lime juice if your mango is very sweet.

How to cut a mango: Mango has one long and flat seed in the center of the fruit. With a sharp knife, cut away the sides of the fruit from the pit. You will have two large oval pieces of fruit. Cut off two smaller sides of the flesh around the pit. Take the big oval piece in one hand and score the flesh in a criss-cross pattern (don’t cut through the skin). Now you can scoop out the flesh with a spoon or invert the piece of mango and cut away the cubes from the peel.

STEP 3: Make the mango sauce: blend all the sauce ingredients (1/2 mango, 1 Tbsp ketchup, 1 Tbsp sour cream, 1 Tbsp lime juice, 1/2 Tbsp olive oil, 1 ts chopped cilantro) in a food processor, season to taste with salt and pepper.

This avocado sauce would also be great with these tacos!

STEP 4: Prepare the fish (it’s best to do it about 10-15 minutes before cooking the fish!): pat dry 3 medium fish fillets (14 oz / 400g) with paper towels, then rub with 2 ts of cajun seasoning (you can add a little more if you like hot food). My cajun seasoning already contains salt, so I haven’t added any. Sprinkle the fish with 1-2 Tbsp of flour, then rub the flour on all sides of the fish fillets. Set aside.

STEP 5: Pan-fry fish fillets: Heat 2 Tbsp of clarified butter (or frying oil) over high heat in a frying pan. Coat fish fillets once again in flour (after rubbing the fish with spices it will release some water and absorb the first portion of flour so now we can add more flour. Thank’s to that, the flour coating with be thicker and more crispy). Once the pan is hot add fish fillets. Cook on one side until browned then flip over and cook until cooked through.

How to check if the fish is cooked through: the color will turn from opaque to white and the fish can be easily flaked with a fork. To be sure it’s best to measure the internal temperature of the fish with a thermometer. Stick the thermometer into the thickest part of the fish, the temperature should be 145°F/ 63°C.

STEP 6: Assemble the tacos: Place some slaw over the tortillas (you’ll need 6 small tortillas), top with mango salsa, and cut into smaller pieces fish. Pour over the sauce. You can sprinkle the tacos with additional lime juice and cilantro.

Enjoy!

Storing tips/how to make it ahead:

You can make the sauce and the slaw the day before and store it in the fridge. Pan-fry the fish and make the mango sauce just before serving.

Did you make this recipe? RATE THE RECIPE or tell me in the COMMENTS how you liked it! You can also add a photo of your dish. It would make me very happy and will help other readers. Thank you!!