Jun 18 2008
Meals for Week 6 and a Fish Recipe
Kara just wrote about what we got in our CSA this week, so I thought I’d list the meals we came up with to use up that produce. We’ll eat most of these two nights, or for dinner and then for lunch on a subsequent day, because the 700-750 calories we eat for dinner just aren’t that much (they may be a normal healthy amount, but this is America, darn it).
So here are our meals for the week:
- Veggie burgers with cole slaw and
colcannonwhatever replaces the colcannon - Vegetable stir-fry with rice
- Okonomiyaki with salad
- Baked fish with roasted new potatoes and collard greens
Uses from CSA: Half of the cabbage, kale/collard greens, garlic scapes
Uses from CSA: Spring onions, ludicrous amount of snow peas
Uses from CSA: Half of the cabbage, random lettuce, spring mix leftover from last week
Uses from CSA: New potatoes, collard greens (duh)
The below recipe is how I’m making fish recently. Baking fish doesn’t seem to get much respect, even though it’s easy and I think it turns out great. I’ve also seen almost nobody talk about preparing frozen fish straight out of the freezer (except for the companies that produce frozen fish) despite the fact that this produces really nice results and can bring your cost well under $1 per serving. I also appreciate that it requires no advance planning.
Fish for the Lazy
1 pound frozen lean fish fillets — tilapia, whiting, pollock, whatever’s cheap
(Don’t buy arrowtooth flounder; it has a terrible texture and the fish are ugly as sin.)
1 lemon
2 tbsp butter
Old Bay seasoning, paprika, salt, black pepper
Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease the bottom of a 9×13 pan with butter. Retrieve the fillets from the freezer and arrange them in the pan. A pound of fish fillets is about 4 fillets for most small whitefish. Cut 1 tbsp of the butter (or more if you’re not counting calories, or half a stick if you’re Paula Deen) into little chunks and arrange them on top of the frozen fish. Zest most of the lemon and sprinkle the lemon zest on the fish, then juice half of the lemon, or less if you don’t like your fish lemony, evenly onto the fish. Cover the fish evenly with a good amount of Old Bay and some paprika — I use about half a teaspoon of paprika. Sprinkle a little salt on the fish, but not too much because Old Bay is already salty. I also like a little extra black pepper.
Put the pan in the oven and forget about it for 15 minutes. While you wait, juice the other half of the lemon, muddle with a little sugar, and add ice, vodka, and tonic. Hey, at least you’ll have something to do.
After 15 minutes, the fish will be thawed and the butter will be mostly melted on top of the fish. Open the oven and give the pan a little shake to distribute the butter, then apply the other tablespoon (or whatever) of butter to the top of the fish in little chunks. If your oven doesn’t heat evenly, rotate the pan before you close the oven again.
It’ll take 8 to 20 more minutes for the fish to finish cooking, depending on the thickness of the fillets, alignment of the planets, etc. It’s done when it flakes with a fork. Yum.
A serving (4 ounces) of this fish is approximately 145 calories when prepared as directed.
I keep frozen fish around — generally purchased at Trader Joe’s — because it’s fast to make when I don’t have much time and the quality (depending on what sort of fish it is) is fine, especially if I am baking/broiling it.
I’ll be over for the okonomiyaki!
I think arrowtooth flounder are kind of cute… in an ugly sort of way.
The fish is good done this way, I think the lemon is a little overkill since the fish doesn’t have a strong flavor on its own and there’s no real balance to the acidity (no sweetness, not a whole lot of fat/oil).
I think I put too much lemon on the fish last time, too, but you and I probably have different tastes. If I get something fishy at a restaurant that comes with lemon or lime, I’ll squirt all of it on the fish.
If you’re thinking of making this recipe, keep in mind I am a lemon fiend.
so that explains all those lemon halves I find every morning between the sheets…