pan seared tilapia with chile lime butter

I found this great recipe for chile lime butter on Epicurious. Not counting the time it takes for the butter to soften on the counter, the entire meal is ready in 20 minutes. This is definitely going in the weekly rotation. I saved the leftover butter and was able to use it later for some steamed corn on the cob - what a great treat.

Grocery list: 1 lime, butter (1 T for each serving of fish), 1 chile pepper, 1 shallot, enough tilapia per person (I made 4 fillets, 3 T butter total, this seemed like 3 normal size servings).



Let the butter soften, then mash in the juice of half a lime, a T of lime zest, 1 minced shallot, and about 1 tsp of minced chile pepper (add more if you like heat).



Heat some oil in a non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Sear the tilapia for about 3 minutes per side, until it is flaky and opaque in the center. Serve with a dollop of the chile lime butter. On the side I had sweet potato fries (covered here), and goat cheese broccolini...

walnut-crusted tilapia with lemon cream sauce

This is a new recipe for me, and although there are a few technicalities I'll address next time I make it (not chopping the walnuts as fine, for one), it was absolutely delicious. Tilapia is my new favorite fish -- only $9 a pound, from WF, where they promise it is farmed in an eco-friendly and sustainable way, plus tender and incredibly mild and full of protein... So any dish I run across these days that calls for a mild white fish is getting swapped out for tilapia. The lemon cream sauce adds a tangy richness to the salty crispy fish; it's just perfect.

Grocery list: 4 tilapia filets, 1 cup walnuts, 1 cup breadcrumbs, parsley, 1 sprig rosemary, butter, 1.5 cups half-and-half, sour cream, 2 lemons.



First, make the lemon cream sauce. A little note about zesting lemons: if you don't have a microplane grater, you are missing out (about $12, one of the best kitchen tools ever). I went years thinking I had one but didn't -- turns out it was a paddle grater -- and zesting a lemon used to take about 20 minutes and a lot of swearing. Now it takes less than 1 minute. Anyway, continuing with the sauce: bring the half-and-half to a boil, turn down to a simmer, and reduce by about half. Add the zest of 2 lemons, and the juice of one of them, plus a few T of sour cream. Stir well, and remove from heat. Stir every now and then while cooking the fish.



Next, toast the walnuts over medium heat in a frying pan. When they start to glisten and make a tiny hissing sound, it's time to turn off the heat. Stir them several times; let them cool.



Making the crust in the food processor was very easy, but I'm going to describe it in the order I'll follow next time, not the order I went in last night. Last night, the crust ended up being too finely chopped, since I started with the walnuts and every time I added other ingredients they kept getting pulverized. Chop a handful of parsley leaves and the leaves of the rosemary (remove the stem). Add the walnuts. Remove the blade from the processor, then stir in salt, pepper, and 1 cup of breadcrumbs.



To prepare the fish, preheat the oven to 450 degrees and line a baking sheet with foil. Melt half a stick of butter. Coat each filet with butter, then press the walnut crumb mixture onto the outside. Don't shake off the excess -- in fact, do the opposite. Press as much of the walnut mix as you can onto the fish.



When all 4 filets are on the baking sheet, take any remaining walnut mix and press a little extra onto the tops of each. If there's any remaining melted butter, you can drizzle that on top as well.



Bake for 12 minutes, until the tilapia is flaky and white inside. Serve with a few spoonfuls of the lemon cream sauce. I also served this with the watercress apple salad and sweet potato fries.

tilapia po boys

I tried a recipe tonight from the Moosewood Restaurant cookbook (a great recommendation from my friend Lydia -- even though it's a vegetarian cookbook, it's not at all limited to veggies). It was super easy, just shake a few fillets of fish in a ziploc bag with 1/4 c cornmeal and 3 T Old Bay. This made for almost-spicy fish, so if you don't like spicy, cut back on the OB. I used tilapia because it's about 1/4th the cost of other mild white fish. The tartar sauce, also a recipe from MW, was just 1/2 c mayo + 1/4 c dill relish + juice of 1 lemon.

On the side -- sweet potato fries. Except they were out of sweet potatoes so I had to use yams. Thanks to the produce guy, I now know that the more red the skin of the yam, the sweeter (and thus more like sweet potatoes) they are.

Anyway, to make these, you just slice a couple of potatoes in french fry shape, put them in a big bowl, drizzle with olive oil, then a generous dose of salt, pepper & garlic powder. Toss all this in the bowl till everything is evenly coated, then spread into a big roasting pan (I line the pan with foil for a lot easier clean-up). 20-25 minutes at 450 degrees, flipping the fries every 10 minutes. I think they get crispier and cook better when you cook them on the bottom rack.