Category: Fish

Shrimp Risotto

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I made this recipe for shrimp risotto a few months ago when Fava Beans were full on in season. If you made it today I suggest perhaps substituting fresh shucked peas or maybe even fresh garbanzos . I see the fresh garbanzos in the local Latin markets all the time. If one were to tabulate the top all time carb loaded comfort foods, risotto would be right up there. The beauty of Risotto is that’s a vessel for all sorts of protein and ingredients. The possibilities are endless. With fall approaching imagine the butternut squash risottos coming along. One of my favorite risottos is one made with Barolo wine with shavings of cheese. I must make that for the blog one day. I’m getting into an Italian frame of mind as Certain Someone and I are leaving for Rome  next month. I’m literally counting the days and hours. Aside from a sleepy border town on my way driving to Lugano, I have never really been to to Italy.

A proper Risotto, which is actually Northern Italian in origin, requires a semi soft grained rice like Arborio, Carnaroli, or less common Vialone. These rice varieties are high in starch content and more glutenous. For this Risotto I used Carnaroli, which is pricier than Arborio, but preferred for risotto. The grains cooks soft , yet retain their shape and firmness throughout the process.The key to Risotto is to slowly simmer your rice and ingredients while slowly adding small batches of liquid stock, while constantly stirring.The effort yields a rich, creamy and satisfying dish. Yet its not complicated at all. I like to use leftover risotto to make a breaded fried rice ball called Arancini. Imagine a dinner al fresco with some cold crisp Prosecco to wash it all down with.

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Shrimp Risotto

  • 2 1/4 cups Carnaroli  rice
  • 3-4 cloves garlic minced
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 4 cups fish or vegetable stock *I made my own from leftover fish bones and heads after filleting.
  • 1 lb fresh , deveined, shelled shrimp  coarsely chopped
  • 3/4 cups broccoli florets
  • 1/4 cup shelled Fava beans or peas
  • Sea Salt to taste
  • White Pepper to taste
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme
  1. In a skillet, heat butter and olive oil over medium high heat until melted.
  2. Add minced garlic and soften.
  3. Add Carnaroli rice and heat for a few minutes to allow the flavors of the garlic and oils to coat to the grains. Stir while cooking.
  4. Add salt, pepper,thyme.
  5. Add about 3/4 cup of the stock as it slowly simmers while stirring. The rice will absorb the liquid.
  6. Add the raw shrimp that has been chopped coarsely, broccoli, and shelled fava beans or peas. Stir into rice mixture and add another cup of fish stock.
  7. Continue to add the remaining liquid slowly , as the rice absorbs the liquid as you stir constantly.
  8. The shrimp will lose its opaqueness and turn pink as the rice cooks slowly and takes in the liquid.
  9. Serve hot with grated Parmesan cheese

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Spring Garlic Oil Poached Tuna with Cannellini and Fava Beans

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Certain Someone and I just spent an amazing long weekend in San Francisco. My head is still reeling from all the sensational tastes, sights, and sounds of our trip. San Francisco and the whole Bay Area is truly a culinary inspiration, and no wonder so many great chefs gravitate to the region. Can you really be  a bad cook in San Francisco with all the great offerings? It’s insane. I have so much to write about this short little visit, but that will come later. One thing I was itching to do was get back to my kitchen and experiment with some of the goodies I brought back.One item being the famous heirloom cult like Rancho Gordo Beans, of which I have heard about , but have never seen. I also stuffed some fantastic bulbous Spring Garlic I purchased from the Farmers Market at the Ferry Plaza. Resembling a red onion, I have been using these babies all week, thinly sliced like scallions from the bulb to the tops.  I decided to make an oil poached tuna as a riff on Cannellini beans and tuna as a salad. Instead I decided to make a warm dish and throw in a few seasonal Fava beans for color. While at Cafe de la Presse , which my new buddy Denise from Chez Us recommended and you can see below, I noticed they made their own tuna confit for the Salade Nicoise.That little nugget of information served as even more inspiration for me.

Spring Garlic Oil Poached Tuna with Cannellini and Fava Beans
The Beans
2 cups  Dry Rancho Gordo Runner Cannellini Beans
1 Shallot sliced in half
1/2  Spring Garlic Sliced Thin
1 cup chicken stock
olive oil
sea salt
Ground Black Pepper
Bay Leaf
The Oil Poach
1/2 Spring Garlic sliced thin
2 cups Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 tsp  dried Thyme or a few sprigs of fresh
A few slices of organic lemon
2  red tuna fillets
sea salt
fresh ground black pepper
Fava Beans ( shelled and par boiled)
Soak your dried Cannellini Beans in cold water for 6 hours. Rancho Gordo says soaking isn’t always necessary but cooking time will be longer. However I was advised at purchase, not to soak overnight  or for longer periods. Place beans and water in a pot with the shallot sliced in half, spring garlic, bay leaf, and chicken stock. Simmer for a few hours until done( 2-3 hours). Season with salt and pepper towards the end of cooking.
Shell and parboil your Fava Beans, removing the second waxy casing after the par boil. Set aside.
Season your tuna steak with sea salt and pepper. Set aside and keep cool in the refrigerator.
In a small sauce pan layer the slices of spring onion, thyme , salt and pepper ,and pour in 2 cups of the olive oil. Heat up the oil to 130 F until hot. Take off heat and add the lemon slices. Allow the garlic and lemon to infuse the oil for at least 15 minutes. Gradually heat oil again and keep on a very low heat. Add the tuna steak and carefully spoon the oil over the tuna. Slowly poach for 10 minutes on a very low heat.Turn tuna over half way. Do not allow the oil to bubble on high. The tuna will be slightly pink, but more to the done side, not rare.
With a slotted spoon , dish the Cannellini Beans, and some Fava Beans onto your plate. Place  the tuna,and drizzle the infused olive oil over the tuna and the beans. Garnish with the  Spring Garlic within the poaching oil.
Serve with an additional squeeze of lemon juice
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Baked Cheesy Cauliflower and Baked Grouper Steaks in Parchment Paper…Low Calorie and Tasty Recipes

I hope everyone is settling into the New Year. This week was action packed with some of the goals I mentioned in the last post for the Ten in Ten Challenge.Staring last Sunday I have successfully maintained a 1200 a day calorie intake using My Fitness Pal as a Guide. Counting calories is a drag but this application on my phone makes its easier and I can save foods and info to use again. So it does get easier. I’m not for deprivation at all,and have incorporated going out and social functions in the mix. So yes I have a had a glass or two of wine, just knowing that goes against my calorie intake. I joined a gym and worked out 3 days in a row. Entering the workouts of course increased my calorie allotment because of what was burned. All this activity had me loosing 1 pound by Fridays weigh in. Not bad and totally in syncs with my goals.So that’s my brief week and I don’t want to bore you any more , for Ten in Ten.

I was craving a good fish, so I went to a fish wholesaler and settled on Grouper for the price and size. I love Isaacson and Stein .

Its a gritty place and any sort of fish you want is there fresh or frozen. Once you pay, they can clean it and gut it. I had mine cut up in steaks. I had him give the head and tail for stock later.Big mistake as Certain Someone is funny about bones and such. He like his fish totally filleted and devoid of skin and bones. While he liked this dish , he wasn’t a happy camper with the bones.But the big firm chunks of white fleshed Grouper are so satisfying and pretty mild in flavor. As for me, I love a good fish steak. You can make this recipe in either form. Another cool time saving fact is that you can bake them at the same time on a lipped baking sheet. They finish in about 15 minutes.
I found another site to give you an idea of how many calories are in each recipe. The information comes courtesy of Calorie Count. I have used other sites before to calculate, so its great when you want to create but also need a idea of what the nutritional value is. This whole dinner comes in at 499 calories . Not bad at all.Click on the detailed links at the end of each recipe for a complete analysis.



Baked Cheesy Cauliflower

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 124.5g



Amount Per Serving

Calories 123

Calories from Fat 68

% Daily Value*

Total Fat 7.5g

12%

Saturated Fat 4.7g 23%

Trans Fat 0.0g

Cholesterol 21mg 7%

Sodium 166mg 7%

Total Carbohydrates 6.9g 2%

Dietary Fiber 1.7g 7%

Sugars 3.3g

Protein 8.1g



Vitamin A 5%

•

Vitamin C 53%

Calcium 21%

•

Iron 2%

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

Nutritional details are an estimate and should only be used as a guide for approximation.

Serves 4

Ingredients
1 head Cauliflower
4 cloves Garlic
1/2 cup Low fat milk
1 tbsp unsalted butter
3/4 cup low moisture mozzarella cheese


salt and pepper to taste
Directions
Steam head of cauliflower and garlic cloves until soft. Drain, add milk. Mash with immersion blender. Add cheese and butter and mix until blended. Spoon in ramekins and bake at 450 F until golden.

More info here.

Baked Grouper Steaks in Parchment Paper

Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 262.3g

Amount Per Serving

Calories 376

Calories from Fat 139

% Daily Value*

Total Fat 15.4g 24%

Saturated Fat 2.4g 12%

Trans Fat 0.0g

Cholesterol 95mg 12%

Sodium 158mg 7%

Total Carbohydrates 6.2 g 2%

Dietary Fiber 1.5g 6%

Protein 1.3g

Sugars 1.1g

Vitamin A 10 %

•

Vitamin C 39%

Calcium 1%

•

Iron 4%

* Based on a 2000 calorie diet



Nutritional details are an estimate and should only be used as a guide for approximation.

Serves 2

Ingredients
2 grouper steaks
1 tomato chopped
1/3 cup chopped sun dried tomatoes
1 dried onion flakes
1 tsp balsamic
1 1/2 tbsp olive oil


salt and pepper to taste
Directions

Wash and dry Grouper steaks.Place in the middle of a piece of parchment paper. Mix chopped tomato, sun dried tomato, salt, pepper, dried onion flaked, balsamic, and some olive oil in a bowl. Spoon tomato mixture on top of fish . Drizzle remaining oil on top. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Fold and seal grouper in the parchment paper. Bake at 450 f for approx 10-15 minutes or until paper starts to brown.

More Info here.

Fried Smelts , A Meme, and A Request

Over the next months most of us will be eating out fair share of Turkeys, Geese,duckings, and other game to celebrate the holidays depending on our cultures and regions. Some people like the Italians even manage to create seafood feats around the holidays.
A fish that has always captured my attention and liking has been the lowly smelt. I’m not sure of its popularity in other areas of the world, but in the this salt water fish found at the mouths of rivers,can be found Midwest, and even east and west coasts. Tiny and and sardine like that are eaten by salmon and lake trout and are often served fried or eaten whole and live. Used as bait, they are relatively cheap and very good for you. The roe is used as a garnish for many sushi.
Michele of Big Black Dogs turned me onto a great fish fry batter from Tyler Florence for fish and chips that I wanted to try out with my bag of flash frozen smelts. Rice flour, seltzer water, baking powder,egg, salt and pepper make a crunchy light delightful batter that cant be beat. Try it. These fried smelts even tasted good the following day in a sandwhich with some sauce and squeezed lemon

My new blogger friend Jamie at Life’s A Feast( where has this sensation been hiding in my world, I’m so out of it!) awarded me The Over the Top Award. Never has that been so true. Now you all know I’m awful with sort of thing but I will answer this One Word Meme because its’ my Birthday and I’m just fooling around today.

1. Where is your cell phone? Hand
2. Your hair? Nappy
3. Your mother? Heart
4. Your father? Peace
5. Your favorite food? Asian
6. Your dream last night? None
7. Your favorite drink? Wine
8. Your dream/goal? Success
9. What room are you in? Main
10. Your hobby? Cakes
11. Your fear? Poverty
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Europe
13. Where were you last night? Home
14. Something you aren’t? Unsure
15. Muffins? Meh
16. Wish list item? Weightloss
17. Where did you grow up? D.C
18. Last thing you did? Email
19. What are you wearing? PJ’s
20. Your TV? On
21. Your pets? None
22. Friends? Many
23. Your life? Fascinating
24. Your mood? Wishful
25. Missing someone? Marc
26. Vehicle? Audi
27. Something you’re not wearing? Cosmetics
28. Your favorite store? Pete’s
29.Your favorite color? Burgundy
30. When was the last time you laughed? Night
31. Last time you cried? Friday
32. Your best friend? Mommy
33. One place you go to over and over again? Store
34. One person who e-mails you regularly? Marc
35. Favorite place to eat? Home

Now I have to choose 6 bloggers to follow suite.

Jeanne Cooksister
Louise Month of Edible Celebrations
Michele Big Black Dogs
RJ Flamingo Flamingo Musings
The Duo Dishes
Marye Baking Delights

I know a lot of the over the Top People because birds of a feather flock together, just Im not so sure many actually do Memes. So it’s hard to choose.


I’m awful at promoting myself. I guess that’s something I need to work on more this year. I created this wonderful recipe ( Chestnut Stuffed Sesame Pork Chops with PAMA Balsamic Reduction) for the PAMA contest. I need you to make this Birthday Girl happy and vote for me. Vote every day if you like, because I really want to go to Aspen for the Food and Wine Classic. I think this recipe is worthy of that. Vote Here.

How to Cook Skate Wing Two Ways…Tea Smoked and Parmesan Crusted

I fell in love with Skate wing about 7 years ago. While shopping at Fox and Obel, the fish monger showed me this fan shaped wing and told me how to cook it for a dinner I was giving.A simple coat of flour and fry it up in lots of butter. I wowed my guests with the exception of one bitchy comment , who said I cook with to much butter and should watch it. Like I always cooked like that. She was the type of person who ordered plain poached salmon wherever she went. Not a daring food adventurer at all. I digress…

Years went by and skate wing barely bliped on my radar. Then one afternoon I had a hankering for a mackerel. Certain Someone had just come back from a weekend in the Pacific Northwest and I had the most incredible pan seared mackerel at Palace Kitchen . Unfortunately not a piece of fresh mackerel was to be found, but I did go back to Fox and Obel and saw the Skate Wing o display. I purchased two wings to cook up.I made this last month and cant seem to find a my notes. However looking at the pictures I can give you these quick recipes.
Parmesan Crusted Skate Wing Mediterranean Style
I didn’t want to fry this up in tons of butter but wanted flavor. A simple dusting of Parmesan cheese and rice flour did the trick with a topping of diced heirloom tomatoes , minced, onion, balsamic, and capers.
1 part Parmesan Cheese
1 part Rice Flour
Skate Wing
Olive Oil to coat pan and fry
1Tomato
1/4 small minced onion
2 tbsp balsamic
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp capers
oregano
Dredge your skate wings in the parm/ rice flour mixture. Heat pan with olive oil. Add skate wings and brown on each side a few minutes until golden and crisp. Remove form pan.
In a glass bowl add your chopped tomato, onion, Balsamic vinegar, olive oil,capers, and oregano.Toss and serve atop skate wing.
Tea Smoked Skate Wings

I borrowed this technique from a book I reviewed a while back , 50 Great Appetizers by Pamela Sheldon Johns. Rather than use her chicken wings, I figured Skate wings would be amazing smoked with tea.

Aromatics for smoker
1/4 cup uncooked rice
1/4 cup brown sugar
Peel of 1 orange
1/4 cup black tea leaves
a few star anise pods
Sauce
1/4 cup Ponzu soy sauce
1/4 cup rice vinegar
1- 2 cloves minced garlic to taste
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp sesame oil
1/8 tsp chili oil
Line a wok type pan with heavy aluminum foil. Leave several inches of foil as a excess collar. Line foil with rice, sugar, orange peel, tea, and star anise. Take a rack or bamboo steamer that fits within wok, and place atop the wok and tea mixture with foil collar on the outside of steamer. Brush steamer or rack with oil and place skate wings. I chopped mine up into manageable pieces.. Place cover on steamer and seal the gap between wok and steamer with the foil.Foil should seal in the whole side of steamer .
Turn on heat to midway and start smoking for 15 minutes. Turn off heat and remove. Let the wok stand for another 15 minutes undisturbed. Carefully open the steamer and remove fish.
In a glass bowl mix all ingredients for dipping sauce and serve with Skate wing.