I zeroed in on the part of the sign at American Seafood Company in the Union Square Greenmarket today that said they had black sea bass. Now I love that fish, but at the moment I was most likely to have been thinking about the fact that I could put those fillets on our table more quickly, and with less of a fuss, than almost anything else I saw on that board.

• three sea bass fillets (a total of 11 ounces) from American Seafood Company, seasoned on both sides with salt and pepper, sautéed for 2 minutes over a fairly brisk flame with butter and a little olive oil inside a large, thick oval copper pan, skin side down, then turned and the other side cooked for about the same length of time, removed to the plates when done (covered at least a little to keep warm until the sauce was completed, or kept in a warm oven), a tablespoon or more butter added to the pan, and 4 ounces of oyster mushrooms [pleurotus ostreatus], from Bulich Mushroom Company, cut into medium-size pieces and sautéed, stirring, until lightly cooked, seasoned with salt, pepper, a couple tablespoons of chopped parsley, both from Gristede, and a tablespoon or more of the juice of a sweet local lemon from Fantastic Gardens of Long Island, the mushrooms stirred some more before they were arranged on the warm plates and the bass finished with micro dandelion from Windfall Farms

 

The accompanying vegetable was one of the two kinds of very special chicories I had taken home from Campo Rosso Farm last Friday, but I had forgotten to photograph either at the time, so the image of the Castelfranco which appears below, while their own produce, was obtained elsewhere.

• one very-thinly-sliced medium shallot from Norwich Meadows Farm heated in two tablespoons of olive oil inside a heavy, high-sided tin-lined copper pan until softened, then one roughly-chopped Radicchio Variegato di Castelfranco from Campo Rosso Farm introduced into the pan with some salt and pepper, stirring all along until the radicchio had mostly wilted, finished with barely a splash of balsamic vinegar and arranged on the plates
• the wine was a French (Loire) white, Domaine de Bellevue Touraine Sauvignon 2015
• the music was Alfred Schnittke’s ‘Concerto Grosso No. 4/Symphony No. 5’, the  Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, Neeme Järvi conducting

 

[image of Castelfranco radicchio from printrestaurant.com]