Panfried Trevally Fillet with Za’atar, Wilted Baby Spinach, and Potato Salad

Tags

fish, potato, spinach, trevally, za'atar

A couple weeks ago I participated in a Persian cookery workshop at Cook The Books.  In class, we made a Za’atar, a spice mix consisting of sesame seeds, dried marjoram, dried oregano, sumac, dried thyme, and sea salt.  Sumac has a citrus taste that I thought would go very well with fish.

I picked up fresh trevally fillets and a bag of baby spinach.

I made a potato salad with new season potatoes, capers, red onions, and olive oil.

The trevally fillets were rinsed with cold water and dried with kitchen paper, then seasoned with a liberal sprinkling of Za’atar.  The fillets were gently panfried in butter until just translucent (do not overcook!), removed from the pan, and kept warm.

The baby spinach was then tossed into the same pan and wilted in the seasoned butter, then plated.

Trevally Poached in Butter with Buckwheat Noodles

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buckwheat noodle, butter, fish, lewis Roar creamery, poach, soba, trevally

I picked up a fresh Trevally fillet this morning.

Poached, over a very low heat in fat, fish remains incredibly tender and moist. A while back, I ran across Melissa Clark’s recipe for fish poached in butter. She suggested serving the fish with an egg pasta.

I cut fresh Trevally fillets into cubes, seasoned with rosemary, garlic, salt & pepper and poached the cubes in 3 tablespoons each of Extra Virgin Olive Oil and good quality butter (Premium Unsalted butter from Lewis Road Creamery) over a low heat (if you hear sizzling, turn the heat down!) in a cast iron pan until translucent and just cooked through, then removed the fish from the pan and reserved. Whilst the fish poached, I cooked a measure of buckwheat noodles (Soba). When the noodles were cooked, I drained them well and added them to the pan with the poaching liquid, tossed the noodles until well coated, then plated the noodles in warm serving bowls, topped with the poached fish.

I served the poached Trevally with a 2010 Villa Maria Single Vineyard Omahu Gravels Vineyard Hawke’s Bay Viognier, a simple dinner salad and thick slices of crusty bread to sop up the aromatic poaching liquid.

A Simple Fish Curry

Tags

curry, fish, fish curry, trevally

One of my favourite go-to Indian fish curries is a “Simple Fish Curry” from Fish, Indian Style by Atul Kochhar.

I pan-fried a fresh fillet of Trevally and plated the fish with steamed basmati rice, paratha, and a nice Gisborne Pinot Gris from Matawhero.

Yes, something is missing. When I went produce shopping this afternoon, I neglected to buy fresh coriander (cilantro), so I had to plate the dish without it. I was bummed, but I poured another glass of Pinot Gris and got over it.