Fish, and Cooking It Without Cleaning

Everything, it is said, is covered in Islam — nothing is left out. Fish is not, in fact, regarded by the ʿulamāʾ as meat at all; fish is fish, and "meat" refers to red meat. On the question of cooking fish without cleaning it — some cultures have dishes in which the fish is not gutted, its insides not removed, but simply wrapped, in banana leaves or aluminium foil, and cooked whole over coals or in an oven. The ʿulamāʾ, again according to the Aḥnāf, hold that where the fish is no larger than one and a half times the length of the middle finger — a little bigger than sardine size — it is permissible to cook and eat it this way, uncleaned, as it is; a larger fish must be opened and cleaned first. The same applies to prawns: a small prawn may be treated the same way, but a large one needs to be split and the poisonous part removed.