Still working on that summer heirloom tomato thing, now heading toward mid-December.

• six beautiful 2 or 3-ounce orange/red ocean perch fillets [aka redfish, or rose fish] from Paul at the Pura Vida Seafood stand in the Union Square Greenmarket, rinsed and dried, both sides brushed with 2 tablespoons of olive oil mixed with a total of little more than one teaspoon, combined, of chopped Keith’s Farm rocambole garlic and a section of one thinly-sliced very small Willow Wisp Farm scallion, seasoned, also on both sides, with local P.E. & D.D. Seafood sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, placed inside an enameled cast iron pan and broiled, skin side up, 4 or 5 inches from the flames, or until the surface had become crisp and the fish cooked through, finished on the plates with some olive oil that had been heated inside a small antique enameled cast iron porringer over a very low flame for about 3 minutes along with 2 salted, rinsed, and filleted Sicilian anchovies from Eataly that had been rinsed and filleted, the perch sprinkled with marjoram from Willow Wisp Farm, garnished with micro red Russian kale from Windfall Farms, and served with organic California lemon halves from Whole Foods Market on the side
• a small amount of Winterbor kale from Savoie Farm that remained from a bunch prepared for an earlier meal, washed in several changes of water, chopped roughly, wilted in a little with olive oil in which one garlic clove from Chelsea’s 8th Avenue Foragers Market, flattened, then sliced in half, was allowed to heat until pungent, the greens seasoned with salt and pepper, drizzled on the plates with fresh olive oil
• one windowsill-ripened orange heirloom tomato from Eckerton Hill Farm, cut into 4 slices horizontally, sprinkled with salt and pepper, warmed over a medium flame inside a small copper skillet, sprinkled with lovage from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• the wine was an Italian (Marche/Matelica) white, Verdicchio di Matelica D.O.C., from Philippe Wines
• the music was a Boston Early Music Festival performance of Lully’s 1675 tragédie en musique, ‘Thésée’

It was our fourth seafood dinner in 9 days, but the first one to include actual fish. Until last night there had been mussels, scallops, and crabs, but nothing with fins.

• six beautiful 2 or 3-ounce orange/red ocean perch fillets from American Seafood Company’s stand at Saturday’s Chelsea’s Down to Earth Farmers Market on 23rd Street, rinsed and dried, both sides brushed with 2 tablespoons of olive oil mixed with a total of little more than one teaspoon, combined, of chopped ‘Chesnok Red’ garlic from Alewife Farm and a section of one thinly-sliced ‘red spring onion’ from Norwich Meadows Farm, seasoned, also on  both sides, with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, placed inside an enameled cast iron pan and broiled, skin side up, 4 or 5 inches from the flames, for 4 or 5 minutes, or until the skin had become crisp and the fish cooked through, finished on the plates with some olive oil that had been heated inside a small antique enameled cast iron porringer over a very low flame for about 3 minutes with 2 salted, rinsed, and filleted Sicilian anchovies from Eataly, rinsed and filleted, the perch garnished with scissored bronze fennel buds and blossoms, from RIse & Root Farm, served with organic California lemon halves from Whole Foods Market on the side
• three small Pozzano plum tomatoes from Norwich Meadows Farm, halved lengthwise, dried thoroughly, placed cut side down on a plate that had been sprinkled with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, pan-grilled, cut side down, then turned over, and finished with a dab of olive oil and a bit of balsamic vinegar, garnished with chopped marjoram from Stokes Farm
• one small fennel bulb from Lucky Dog Organic Farm, the fronds having already been removed and set aside after it had arrived at the apartment, cut into bite size pieces and sautéed inside a large high-sided tin-lined copper pan with a couple tablespoons of olive oil until beginning to caramelize, stirring in near the end one thickly-sliced garlic clove and 3 small red shishito peppers, sliced, until the garlic had softened and the mix had become pungent, finished by tossing in some of the more tender fennel fronds, chopped, the vegetables arranged on the plates with a sprinkling of more fennel fronds
• the wine was an Australian (Victoria/Rutherglen) white, Jen Pfeiffer The Rebel Sauvignon Blanc 2018, from Naked Wines
• the music was a 1658 opera by Pier Francesco Cavalli, ‘L’Ipermestra’,  Mike Fentross conducting La Sfera Armoniosa , with one particularly gorgeous tenor voice

I love this fish in so many ways. This may have been my tastiest broiled sea perch with anchovy, ever, and there have been a lot of them.

Here they are still inside the fishers’ bucket at the Union Square Greenmarket:

Unrelated: I think freshwater perch (Perca flavescens) would be even more popular than it already is if it were as red as these beauties, which even stay orange or red throughout the cooking process.

Oops, I just read that my favorite finned delicacy while I was growing up around the Great lakes, ‘the ultimate pan fish’, is now mostly farmed.  You really can never go home again.

The fillets lying on the counter at home, after being rinsed:

After being placed inside the pan, oiled, garlic-ed, and seasoned:

• four beautiful Atlantic sea perch fillets (one pound total), red, or orange-red colored, sometimes called ‘redfish’, but in New York area at least, it’s normally ‘sea perch’ or ‘ocean perch’, even though they aren’t really perch at all, but ‘rockfish’ [?], from American Seafood Company in the Union Square Greenmarket, brushed with 2 tablespoons of olive oil mixed with about a teaspoon of finely chopped garlic from our local, 8th Avenue Foragers Market, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, placed inside a large enameled cast iron pan, broiled skin side up 4 or 5 inches from the flame for about 4 or 5 minutes, at which time the edges had become a little crisp, and the fish was cooked through, removed from the broiler and sauced simply with a bit of warm anchovy in olive oil (2 salted Sicilian anchovies from Buon Italia, rinsed thoroughly, filleted and chopped, had been heated over a very low flame for about 5 minutes in 2 tablespoons of oil, by which time the anchovies had fallen apart), the fillets garnished with micro red radish from Two Guys from Woodbridge, Whole Foods Market lemon wedges served on the side
• just under a pound of very sweet small redskin potatoes from Race Farm, scrubbed, boiled unpeeled in generously-salted water until barely cooked through, drained, halved, dried in the still-warm large vintage Corning Pyrex Flameware blue-glass pot in which they had cooked, tossed with a little Trader Joe’s Italian Reserve extra virgin olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and tossed with scissored fresh chives, also from Phillips Farms, which were supposed to be served with more chives scattered over the top, but I forgot to add them
• what remained of a large bunch of broccoli rabe (aka raab, or rapini, among other names) from Migliorelli Farm after cooking most of it 2 days earlier, wilted in a little olive oil inside a medium size antique high-sided tin-lined copper pot in which 6 small garlic cloves from Foragers Market had been heated until fragrant and slightly softened, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a couple pinches of dried peperoncini Calabresi peperoncino secchia from Buon Italia in Chelsea Market, divided between the 2 plates and drizzled with a little more olive oil
• the wine was a Portuguese (Alentejo) white, Esporao Monte Velho White 2016, from Garnet Wines
• the music was a recording of the 2018 premier performance [yeah, the premier] of Donizetti’s 1839  opera semiseria, ‘L’ Ange de Nisida’, in a concert performance at the Royal Opera House in London, in association with the remarkable company, Opera Rara, conducted by Mark Elder, the title role sung by Joyce El-Khoury

A fish bake.

Although there were some obvious differences and some less than obvious even to me, after I spotted the little fillets in the fisherman’s family’s stand, I almost immediately thought of this meal as a modest salute to the Great Lakes of what are generally describe as one’s ‘formative’ years.

I brought home exactly one dozen of these fresh beauties on Monday, but no more, although they were not expensive, since I was already worried about fitting them into a single non-reactive pan.

Because of the difficulty – or at least the anxiety anticipated with the idea – of turning over that many thin fillets more or less at the same time, I decided I would bread then bake them, obviating the flipping challenge. This is when I really started sliding, mentally back into the Midwest, since this is not how I usually cook fish of any kind.

Half an hour before I expected to begin their cooking I removed the perch from the refrigerator and placed them on a plate on the counter.

Then the process began in earnest, my excitement now including that of seeing them lying inside the perfect pan, a French antique I had recently bought and had re-tinned, exactly for times like this.

• twelve small coastal white perch fillets (a total of 15 ounces) from P.E. & D.D. Seafood in the Union Square Greenmarket, submerged first in a mixture of 2 tablespoons of melted butter and 2 teaspoons of juice from a Chelsea While Foods Market organic lemon, then rolled in a mixture of roughly half a cup of homemade    breadcrumbs, sea salt, freshly ground black pepper and a large pinch of crushed dried habanada pepper [a paprika or another dried chili, or even crushed mustard seed would also work], arranged inside a very heavy antique low-sided,13″ tin-lined copper pan and set in an oven preheated to 500º, baked for roughly for a very few minutes, because of their size, or until the breading was crispy and golden brown, removed and allowed to cool for a couple minutes before serving, garnished with micro red mustard from two Guys from Woodbridge [the recipe was adapted from Livestrong.com]

• just under a pound of small sweet Natasha potatoes from Phillips Farms, scrubbed, boiled unpeeled in generously-salted water until barely cooked through, drained, halved, dried in the still-warm large vintage Corning Pyrex Flameware blue-glass pot in which they had cooked, tossed with a little Trader Joe’s Italian Reserve extra virgin olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and tossed with some home grown basil from Barry’s Artsy colleague Becca

• some super sweet flat kale from Lani’s Farm, wilted inside a large antique copper pot in which one halved garlic clove from Norwich Meadows had first been allowed to sweat in a little olive oil until pungent, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a drizzle of fresh olive oil
• the wine was a French (Loire) white, Sancerre, Sommet Doré 2017, from Astor Wines
• the music was Lully’s 1683 tragédie en musique, ‘Phaéton’, Christophe Rousset conducting Les Talens Lyriques and the Chœur de Chambre de Namur

While we really like the recipe I’ve been using for ocean perch fillets for several years, I wanted to try it without the anchovy. Last night I substituted sorrel, because at the moment, with what I had on hand at the moment, it seemed like the most promising alternative.

The result was good, but not exciting; I’m going to keep experimenting with the recipe, perhaps trying some kind of shellfish as the finish, but I also expect to also return to the anchovies, probably in smaller amounts.

I love what these red fillets look like, almost as much as I love their taste and texture.

• six red-skinned ocean perch fillets (18 ounces) from P.E. & D.D. Seafood Company, rinsed, and dried, both sides brushed with 2 tablespoons of olive oil mixed with a total of little more than a teaspoon of a combination of very small chopped rocambole garlic cloves from Keith’s Farm and a thinly-sliced bit from the white section of scallion from from Phillips Farms, the fish seasoned, also on both sides, with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, placed skin side up inside an enameled cast iron pan and broiled, 4 or 5 inches from the flames, for 4 or 5 minutes, or until the skin had become crisp and the fish was cooked through, finished on the plates by drizzling with a small amount of sauce prepared by gently heating a few leaves of baby sorrel from Two Guys from Woodbridge in a bit of olive oil over a very low flame, with fresh leaves added after the heat under the was turned off, Whole Foods Market organic lemon wedges served on the side
• slices of a buckwheat baguette from Runner & Stone Bakery, from their stand in Saturday’s Union Square Greenmarket

• a large bunch of red mustard from Lani’s Farm, wilted in a little olive oil in which several large halved cloves of John D. Madura Farms garlic had been allowed to sweat a bit, seasoned with salt and pepper and finished on the plates with a drizzle of olive oil
• the wine was a French (Loire/Touraine) white, Vouvray Sec, Brisebarre 2014, from Astor Wines
• the music was the 1934 verismo opera, ‘Juha’, by the Finnish composer Leevi Madetoja, Jussi Jalas conducting the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Finnish Radio Youth Chorus