For a very long time I’ve been thinking of halibut as a kind of holy grail.   I think it’s because it’s so minimal and because it’s a beautiful piece of fish, either as a fillet or as a double steak.   I also know how delicious it is, and I know how easy to prepare – and how versatile – it is.   It’s also because I don’t see it in the Greenmarket (does it ever show up here?), and because it’s almost always very expensive in New York City.  There’s also that tantalizing picture I see almost every time I open my copy of the “Italian Two Easy” London River Cafe cookbook.  The image is appears on page 194, across from a very simple recipe for “Halibut on the Bone” (on the bone, because the taste of fish, just as with meat, gains from being cooked with the bone).

I wanted to serve fish last night, but I had been unable to get to the Union Square Greenmarket because we had to be ready for a photo shoot inside the apartment.  When we emerged from that stimulating experience hours later, I headed down the block to our local Whole Foods to pick up something which wouldn’t require much time or assembly.  I can usually count on finding a good piece of wild salmon there, but even before I had gotten all the way to the counter I spotted it:   a display of double steaks of halibut, looking exactly like those featured in the Gray and Rogers book, except that they still needed the attentions of a cook.  The price per pound was exactly half of what I’ve been seeing around town for months, so I didn’t hesitate a second.  Besides, the halibut was taken from waters just north of our own temperate Atlantic  shores (somewhere off eastern Canada), and had probably not been frozen, while the salmon would have had  to swim all the way from Alaska, and certainly had been frozen somewhere along the way.  The price of wild fish, including salmon and halibut especially, can fluctuate dramatically;  I try to take advantage of the best market opportunities.

It was delicious, it was easy (and that includes the very good  – and itself very versatile – salsa verde which can be finished even before heating a pan), and I’m going to keep looking for it in the Greenmarket.

• double halibut steak, cut into two servings, seasoned lightly, brushed with olive oil, grilled for a couple of minutes on each side, then finished with a squeeze of lemon and served with green salsa
• salsa verde, or green salsa, of chopped flat-leaf parsley and mint leaves covered with olive oil, combined with minced garlic, capers, anchovy fillets, dijon mustard and red wine vinegar
• eggplant based on Mario Batali’s “”Thousand Ridges Japanese Eggplant”, meaning cutting the vegetables in half, carefully scoring them and spreading a mixture of olive oil, garlic and dried oregano on the cut side, seasoning each, then placing them on a hot ribbed iron pan for a few minutes, turning over once.
• the wine was an Italian rosé, Il Conventino Rosato del Conventino 2013 Toscana

• tuna steak from Blue Moon Fish, covered with a mixture of fennel seed and crushed dried chile pepper ground together, seasoned, then pan-grilled and finished with a bit of lemon and olive oil
• small parti-colored peppers from Norwich Meadow Farms, sautéed above a high flame until slightly caramelized, the heat then turned down, torn basil and a splash of balsamic vinegar added
• radish greens from Bodhitree Farm sautéed  in a bit of oil in which a chopped scallion from John D. Madura Farms had previously been softened, finished with salt & pepper and a splash of oil
• the wine was an Austrian rosé, Markowitsch Pinot Noir Rosé Carnuntum 2013

This was an incredibly delicious meal which incorporated several much-too-under-appreciated foods, including pollock, lovage, fennel, fennel seeds – and fennel fronds!  Did I say that the Pollock was really, really good, and that it tasted nothing at all like fish fingers or fake crab meat?  In fact, with its somewhat crispy edges, even without skin, the taste and the textures reminded me of the freshwater perch I enjoyed so much decades ago in the Midwest;  so maybe it was the flour?

• a one-pound pollock fillet from PE & DD Seafood, cut into four sections, dredged in seasoned flour, sautéed in olive oil over a fairly high flame, served with a salsa fresca (assembled just before the fish was begun) of chopped plum tomatoes from Phillips Farm  and halved cherry tomatoes from Keith’s Farm, minced garlic and shallot, chopped lovage from Keith’s Farm, a tiny bit of a very hot fresh pepper, sherry vinegar, salt, and pepper [basic recipe from Mark Bittman’s “Fish Complete Guide to Buying and Cooking”];   the vegetable proper was a separated bulb of fennel from Norwich Meadow Farms sautéed over medium high heat with garlic, chiles, and fennel seeds in a large iron pan until the fennel began to color, then, with the heat lowered and the pan covered, cooked for ten minutes, a generous amount of chopped fennel fronds added at the end [recipe from “Italian Easy: Recipes from the London River Cafe”].
• the wine was a Spanish white, Shaya Rueda 2012 

 

This is pretty much the extent of our  fast food practice, except for the nights when we have a good pizza delivered.

• the makings for this and similar meals are usually already in the apartment, at least in summer and early fall.  This time it began with a package of frozen Rana spinach-and-ricotta-filled ravioli, which I only had to cook for about three minutes, once a generous amount of salted water had come to a boil.  Prior to adding the pasta to the water I had warmed slivers of garlic with some chiles in a pan, turned off the heat, waited a bit, then added some quartered slices of a sturdy, perfectly-ripe one-pound tomato from Norwich Meadow Farms.  I drained the pasta, added it to the pan, and gently shuffled all the elements with a narrow wooden spatula.  The ravioli mix was served in bowls, finished with torn basil and shaved Parmesan cheese.
• the wine was an Italian rosé, Il Conventino Rosato del Conventino 2013 Toscana

 

 

 

• cod fillet from PE & DD Seafood, slowly sautéed for a few minutes along with a minced clove of garlic which had been begun to color in the oil, then flipped, with a generous amount of chopped parsley from Keith’s Farm added to the pan, and cooked  a few more minutes until done.  The recipe is described by Mark Bittman, in “Fish”, as a ‘Basque staple’. It’s as simple as it is delicious.
• zucchini trifolati, with two kinds of cherry tomatoes and chiles, finished with basil and allowed to sit for ten minutes or so, after a recipe in “Italian Too Easy“.  The sweet teenaged zucchini were from Berried Treasures, the Sun Gold tomatoes from Tamarack Hollow Farm, the red the cherry tomatoes from Keith’s Farm, and the Gotham Greens basil from Whole Foods.
• slices of crusty Truccio Saré from Sullivan Street Bakery down the street.
• the wine was a Spanish white, Naia 2013 D.O.C. Rueda, from Verdejo old vines.