Potato crusted snapper with yellow pepper salsa

One thing I don’t talk about much on this blog is my grocery shopping preferences. I try to buy locally grown food as much as possible. My grocery store labels the origin of all its meat and produce, which makes it easier. I buy very little processed food, and I try to avoid farmed shrimp and fish. Instead, I typically go for wild caught, sustainable seafood.

We eat a lot of what my store calls "pacific red snapper", which is really just a fancy name for rockfish – it’s sustainable and fished locally. It also happens to be relatively inexpensive.

This recipe takes snapper to a whole new level with a potato crust and yellow pepper salsa. A mixture of shredded potato, herbs and parmesan cheese is pressed onto the top of snapper fillets. The fish goes into a hot pan, potato side down to cook, then is flipped to finish the other side.

The salsa consists of roasted yellow bell peppers, tomato, herbs, capers and onion. I used red onion because the flavor is tamer than yellow or white onion. I also chopped up the capers so that they’d incorporate better into the salsa.

What you end up with is a delicious dish that’s easy enough for a weeknight meal, but also fancy enough for a dinner party.

Sole with preserved lemon and butter sauce

Nearly a year ago, I bought a jar of preserved lemons for this recipe. There were two lemons in the jar, and the second lemon has been sitting in my fridge all this time. Good thing they last forever! I put the lemon to use by making a preserved lemon and butter sauce to top some sole fillets. This recipe is from Twist of the Wrist by Nancy Silverton. The sauce is a mixture of shallots, garlic, white wine, chicken stock, chives, capers, preserved lemon, and, of course, butter. The preserved lemon is a pretty intense flavor, so a little bit goes a long way. The sauce was quite good, and I think it would work well with most types of white fish, or even chicken.

I served the sole with some french green lentils that I cooked with shallots, carrots, celery, olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt, pepper, parsley and chives.

Salmon nicoise salad

This salad was loosely based off this recipe from Tyler Florence. Obviously, one major discrepancy is that Tyler's recipe calls for tuna, and I used salmon. My grocery store had fresh wild copper river salmon, which looked much better than the tuna steaks, so I went with that instead. Also, I added a bed of arugula, which I tossed with the vinaigrette before I layered the rest of the ingredients over the top. I also omitted the anchovies, and went with yukon gold potatoes to add more color.

So while I made quite a few changes to the original recipe, I stuck with a very similar vinaigrette - the only thing I did differently was reduce the amount of olive oil and add a touch of honey. The fresh tarragon really makes a difference in this salad. People had fun picking the different items off the platter to put onto their plate. I cooked the eggs, blanched the green beans and pitted the olives in advance.

Mahi mahi with cabbage, serrano ham and almonds

This is my version of a recipe from Vegetable Harvest. The recipe called for monkfish tails, but my grocery store didn't have any today, so I went with mahi mahi. This is a layered dish. The first component of the dish is a combination of shredded savoy cabbage, slivered garlic and serrano ham which is sauteed with grey salt and white pepper until the cabbage is tender. The fish is dredged in a mixture of flour, grey salt, ground ginger and espelette pepper and sauteed in olive oil until cooked through. The fish is served on a bed of the cabbage and topped with toasted almonds and fleur de sel. The combination of flavors worked really well together and the outside of the fish was crispy from the seasoned crust. On the side, I served toasted israeli couscous tossed with butter, grey salt and chopped parsley.

Springtime dinner

My grandmother is in town from Los Angeles - she doesn't get to sample my cooking very often, so I put together a meal for her that showcases some of spring's best ingredients.

For an appetizer, we started with savory coeur a la creme (Martha Stewart Living) with lavash crackers (Bread Baker's Apprentice).

The main course was butterfish with a puree of celery root and ramps, served with sauteed morels and fiddleheads. The garnish was flowering chives.

Dessert was baked alaska with chocolate cake (Gale Gand), banana ice cream (Alton Brown), brown sugar meringue (Mustards Napa Valley cookbook) and chocolate sauce (Everyday Food).

There are two extra baked alaskas in the freezer - I wonder if they'll still be there in the morning!

Penne with salmon and peas

Yet another recipe from my favorite cookbook of the moment, Everyday Food. The recipe actually calls for farfalle, but I already had penne in the house so I used that instead. Cooked salmon is combined with pasta, peas, lemon juice, lemon zest, butter and mint. The lemon zest really adds a lot of flavor. I used wild sockeye salmon and roasted it instead of the steaming method suggested in the recipe. Don't chop the mint until the last second, it discolors very quickly.

Seafood stew

I wanted to do something a little different for dinner. I hadn't cooked shellfish before, and mussels were on sale, so I decided to do a seafood stew. You can use a different combination of seafood or add fish to this recipe. I served it with homemade bread that had just come out of the oven.

Seafood stew
Serves 2
1/2 lb mussels, scrubbed and debearded
1/2 lb squid, bodies cut into rings
6-8 large shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/4 lb scallops (I used small bay scallops)
1 medium shallot, minced
2 teaspoons olive oil
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 cup tomato sauce
2 tablespoons parsley, chopped
1/2 of a lemon
pinch of red pepper flakes
salt and pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat, add shallot and red pepper flakes and saute for 2-3 minutes. Add the wine and tomato sauce to the skillet. Add the mussels, cover and cook for 3 minutes. Add the rest of the seafood, season with salt and peper and cover and cook for about 5 minutes, or until shrimp is opaque. Stir in parsley and squeeze the lemon over the seafood. If needed, season to taste with more salt and pepper.

Mustards Grill - grilled tuna with moroccan pepper salad and grilled potatoes

This recipe is from the Mustards Napa Valley Grill cookbook. Given that it's been too cold out to grill, I used a grill pan for the tuna and roasted the potatoes in the oven.

The tuna is topped with a salad of roasted red bell peppers, poblano chiles, red onion, cumin, lemon juice and olive oil. The grilled potatoes recipe calls for making a foil packet of potatoes with olive oil, salt, pepper and herbs. I chose to use sage:

Instead of grilling the foil packet, I put it in the oven at 375 degrees for about 35 minutes. I had never cooked potatoes this way before - the sage really infused the potatoes with flavor.

Here's the plated dish:

Hawaiian ono with pineapple cilantro sauce

I wanted to make a sauce with some tropical elements to go with this Hawaiian ono. Here's what I came up with:

Ono with pineapple cilantro sauce

For two people, I had a fillet of ono that was about 2/3 lb. For the sauce, combine the following ingredients and blend in the food processor until they're pureed:

1 cup pineapple

1 cup cilantro leaves

1 tablespoon honey

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon ancho chile powder

pinch of salt

If you can't find ono, use tuna, swordfish or halibut.

Swordfish with tomato and leek sauce

Tonight we had swordfish in a tomato and leek sauce. I sauteed some chopped leeks in a little olive oil, salt and pepper. After the leeks had softened, I added about a tablespoon of turkey stock (you could use chicken stock), diced romanita tomatoes and chopped kalamata olives. I put salt and pepper on the swordfish steaks and seared them in olive oil. I spooned the leek and tomato sauce over the fish and added chopped parsley and a squeeze of lemon juice.