quick-braised fish fillets in tomato sauce

We decided that we hadn’t had enough fish over the last seven years, so last weekend we bought a bag of frozen Atlantic salmon, and last night we made Bittman’s quick-braised fish fillets in tomato sauce. It was delicious, and we have some leftovers. We cooked with Gran Reserva Candelaria pinot noir, and then drank it with the meal, which was also very good.

One point of caution for next time: Watch the temperature of the oil! I had it a bit high (as hot as the burner would go, in fact) and one side of some of the fillets. I cut the burned part off, and it didn’t make any difference to the dish, but it was a bother.

pasta with salmon sauce

Italy, BRW, p 555

The recipe calls for canned tuna packed in oil, but we used canned wild salmon packed in water. Also, out of consideration for Juliana’s sensitive palate, we halved the both the amount of capers and the amount of red pepper flakes. It ended up being nearly too spicy, but not quite. “Just right” is what I’d call that.

It is a truly delicious meal. This is the second time we’ve made it, and I think that it (and variations) will become a staple for us.

luxurious weekend lunch

cream of tomato soup, HCE, p 130-131
salmon roasted in butter, HCE, p 583
roast asparagus, HCE, p 258-259
Jim Lahey’s no-work bread, HCE, p 833
chocolate-caramel tart, HCE, p 940 (chocolate tart crust, HCE, p 930; vanilla pastry cream flavored with chocolate, HCE, p 943; chocolate glaze, HCE, p 921; creamy caramel sauce, p 922)

• cream of tomato soup: I followed the recipe exactly. It was delicious.
• salmon roasted in butter: I followed the recipe exactly. It was delicious, though I think I like grilled salmon much more, both in texture and in flavor.
• roasted asparagus: I followed the recipe exactly. Again, it was delicious. Again, I prefer grilled asparagus to roasted asparagus.
• Jim Lahey’s no-work bread: I followed the recipe more or less exactly. (The “more or less” refers to all the travel and associated temperature fluctuations it experienced during the first rise.)
• chocolate-caramel tart: This was the most difficult. I’d never made anything like a chocolate tart before, so nearly all the steps were new. I pressed the tart crust (quite unevenly, unfortunately) into a round cake pan rather than rolling it out and placing it into a tart pan. Baking that was straightforward. Making the pastry cream was also easy, and it turned out excellent. Making the caramel was the biggest challenge, and one that I didn’t entirely overcome. I thought that I followed the recipe exactly, but clearly not. At first, the caramel wasn’t browning, even though it was nearly at the target temperature (245 F). Then, all the liquid evaporated and I was left with a grainy sugar-cream paste. Finally, the sugar melted rather suddenly and browned. When it cooled, it was hard. I’d gone past soft caramel and made a hard candy. Next time, for the caramel, I’ll heat up the sugar until it’s a light caramel, and then I’ll add the cream; hopefully, that will make a softer caramel. Finally, making the chocolate sauce went well, though I accidentally used granulated sugar instead of confectioners’ and nearly double what the recipe called for. This made for an extremely sweet and slightly runny chocolate glaze. Because it was poured on top of the tart, I think this was more a change of style from the original than an actual mistake.

miso-broiled halibut

BRW, p 210-211

We substituted 2 half-pound fillets of halibut for the scallops, as described in the “miso-broiled fish” variation and increased both the miso and onion by half. Also, we used 2 tbsp of sherry and 1 tbsp of honey in place of the mirin. Finally, we broiled it for about 4 min, right up until the miso coating was about to burn. It turned out spectacularly! We really should start taking pictures of some of the dishes, because this one looked as good as it tasted!

salmon teriyaki and stir-fry asparagus

Salmon and asparagus just seem to go together, to me. This is almost certainly because I grew up eating them. A lot. I finally made a salmon and asparagus meal (it’s probably been years since I had one, honestly), and it was as good as I remembered.

I got both recipes from Bittman. The salmon teriyaki recipe is in The Best Recipes in the World (p 255), and the stir-fry asparagus is in How to Cook Everything (p 259).

fish fillets poached in caramel sauce

Last night, I made fish fillets poached in caramel sauce (Vietnam, BRW, p 232) using two 1 lb fillets of mahimahi. I used caramelized onions instead of shallots, halved the sugar (by accident—I didn’t read the recipe closely), and used brown sugar instead of white. I doubt any of the changes were improvements, but the dish still tasted alright. One thing about it that was excellent, however, was that it was well-seasoned enough for Juliana, but I could add more of the peppery caramel sauce to give the dish (a lot) more kick.