Late one afternoon, having earlier been unable to find a fish monger at the Greenmarket, I decided that I should start thinking about what I would prepare for dinner.  Fish has more and more become my first choice, and with familiarity with my sources and experience in cooking it I’ve become pretty fussy about where I buy it.  We both happen to love salmon, probably as much as any other fish, or shellfish (oysters definitely come first, but I don’t cook them).   Because of the availability throughout the week, normally, of six or so local fishermen at the Greenmarket, if I buy fish at the Whole Foods down the block, which I normally patronize only for staples, it’s always wild salmon from the Northwest, and almost always when it’s on sale.  I assume it’s been frozen at some time since leaving the water, but, even knowing what it tastes like in Oregon and Washington, I don’t think it’s lost anything in the process.

I bought salmon.  This was one of the best servings we’ve ever had at home, and it’s absurdly easy to prepare.

A word on the sweet potatoes (by the way, they would seem to be a natural as an accompaniment to salmon):  I found these particular small samples hanging in a darkened closet in a paper bag.  That is how I usually store sweet potatoes, but I had no memory or record in my trusty digital food log of their being there, or at least not still being there.  I think they had to be at least a year old. They had darkened and were so dessicated they now weighed almost nothing.  I was going to throw them out, but decided to give them a try.  They were phenomenal.  Note to self and all survivalists: I it ever becomes necessary to horde fresh, uncooked food in an emergency, without refrigeration and for an extended period of time, you could do a lot worse than choosing sweet potatoes.

• Coho salmon fillet from Whole Foods, roasted in a shallow enameled cast-iron pan in butter (for 1 pound of salmon, use 2 tablespoons of butter), seasoned, then finished with parsley from Norwich Meadows Farm
• small Japanese sweet potatoes, from [I-don’t-remember-because-it-was-so-very-long-ago-but-they-were-incredibly-delicious], tossed with olive oil, salt, and pepper, placed in an unglazed ceramic pan with some thickly-sliced garlic from Berried Treasures placed on top of the pieces (to avoid the garlic burning), and finished with chopped rosemary from Queens County Farm
• Brussels sprouts from Central Valley Farm, tossed with olive oil, freshly-ground black pepper, and a generous amount of salt, then roasted
• the wine was a California red, Santa Barbara Winery Pinot Noir 2012

This meal, or variations of it, is one of our favorites, visited originally after I saw the Mark Bittman recipe in the Times 15 years ago (By the way, I’ve learned to use only about two thirds of the suggested amount of olive oil;  any more than that and you’ll probably find the potatoes swimming in it at the end).  We never tire of the dish, and only partly because it can be prepared with so many different kinds of fish, basically any white fish.  In Bittman’s list, “Monkfish works very well . . . . But other fillets will give similar results, including red snapper, sea bass, pollock, wolffish, even catfish.”

This time it seemed even more delicious than usual.   The fish has to be absolutely fresh, and it helps when the olives are right, and when the potatoes end up slightly crisp on the edges (I almost never peel potatoes anyway, and certainly not for this recipe).

I served Brussels sprouts along with the entrée.  They roasted in the oven for the same total time as the fish and potatoes.

It’s a meal which is really quite simple, and super super.

• the hake fillet was from Pura Vida, the olives were Gaeta, from Whole Foods, the two tubers were Reba potatoes from Garden of Spices Farm, and the seven fresh bay leaves were from the Westside Market
• the Brussels sprouts, from Central Valley Farm, tossed with olive oil, freshly-ground black pepper, and a generous amount of salt, then roasted
• the wine was a French white, Val de Loire, Chateau de la Presle, Touraine 2013

Our cold larder (okay, our refrigerator) had accumulated excellent leftovers from meals of the days before as well, and we had some fresh vegetables waiting to be put together for one or more dinners to come.  I took advantage of the bounty by combining all with two sausages from a package I had just purchased the day before;  it was not to be a mélange, but it turned out to be a homey treat on a chilly evening, its ethnicity indeterminate.   Also, I guess we could call it a warm picnic.

• cooked polenta from this tomato and sausage bake, topped with drops of chipotle Tabasco
• a roasted mix of celeriac from Norwich Meadows Farm, carrots from Whole Foods, shallots from Keith’s Farm, celery from Whole Foods, fennel fronds from Phillips Farm, one bay leaf from Westside Market, garlic from S.S.&O. Farm, rosemary from Queens County Farm, the dish topped in the end with chopped fennel fronds
• toothsome collards from this earlier meal of fried eggs over collards and polenta
• cranberry ginger chutney from our Thanksgiving meal
• spicy chorizo links (delicious, and so unexpected) from the Amish of Millport Dairy
• the wine was an Argentinian red, Argentine Revolution El Libre Malbec Mendoza 2012

 

Although extremely tasty in the end, the seafood ingredients of this entrée were cobbled together somewhat from necessity:  When I arrived at the Greenmarket stall, the monkfish tails were all the same size, each a bit too small to be able to feed two, but too large to add a second.  I made the quick decision of buying four scallops in addition, thinking I would make them into a first course, or treat them quite separately before adding them to the plate of monkfish.

By the way, the total cost was still very reasonable, thanks to the moderate price the monkfish still commands.

When I finally got around to preparing the meal, fairly late in the evening, I panicked a bit, having forgotten until then the rough plan I had made earlier.  With little time to be very creative, and no time, really, for a meal which would stretch into two courses, I decided I could prepare both fish/shellfish varieties as one, using a simple, fast recipe, more or less that of Mark Bittman, which I had enjoyed in the past when I cooked each of them on their own.

• one monkfish tail and four scallops from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, the fish cut into medallions roughly the size of the shellfish, the latter left whole, both slit horizontally most of the way through, sprinkled with salt and pepper and stuffed with a basil leaf, then very briefly sautéed in oil with a smashed clove of garlic from S. & S.O. Farm, removed to two plates, followed by a bit of lemon juice added to the pan and there stirred briefly, the combined juices drizzled over the seafood
• cavalo nero from Phillips Farm, braised with olive oil and split cloves of garlic, from Berried Treasures, which had been barely colored in the oil
• 14 very small, very sweet boiling potatoes from Berried Treasures, boiled, dried, tossed with olive oil, and sprinkled with parsley from Norwich Meadows Farm
• the wine was a Spanish white, Viñedos Real Rubio Blanco Rioja 2013