The skate is an excellent fish, and not unfamiliar to most people interested in eating fish, but this recipe is nothing like the one with which most are familiar (you folks know the one I mean). I’m crazy about the treatment I’ve now used a number of times: It’sdelicious, I can easily vary it, and it looks more complicated than it actually is. There’s also that thing I wrote about it 2 years back: “Dredging this extremely tender fish with polenta, rather than flour, gives it real presence while protecting its delicacy. It wasn’t my invention, but rather Mila‘s.”

The very fresh vegetables were even more simple, and as delicious as they were colorful.

• two 7-ounce skate wings from Blue Moon Fish, coated all over with a coarse polenta seasoned with salt and pepper, sautéed in olive oil (and a bit of butter) for 3 or so minutes on each side in a heavy round copper skillet (the only difficult part of this recipe is turning them over without breaking them up, and it helps if they don’t quite fill the pan use use), removed, about 1 1/2 tablespoons of butter, one small shallot from John D. Madura Farm, 2 thin scallions from Race Farm, and 2 small cloves of garlic from Willow Wisp Farm, all sliced or chopped, introduced into it and stirred over a now-lowered flame, followed by the addition of a little more butter, the juice from half of a lemon and some chopped lovage from Keith’s Farm, and stirring for a bit, finishing on the plates with a scattering of micro purple radish greens from Two Guys From Woodbridge
• a large handful of ‘The Best Cherry Tomatoes’ from Stokes Farm, halved, mixed with a bit of an excellent olive oil (D.O.P. Penisola Sorrentina ‘Syrenum), salt, pepper, chopped tarragon form Stokes Farm, torn basil from Campo Rosso Farm, and a dash of white balsamic vinegar
• small okra from Kernan Farms, sautéed over a high flame in a large cast iron pan with a little olive oil and a good part of one small red Calabrian pepper from Campo Rosso Farm, seasoned with sea salt
• the wine was a California (Sonoma) white, Scott Peterson Rumpus California Sauvignon Blanc 2015, from Naked Wines
• the music was from an extraordinary recording of wonderful music played magnificently, ‘The Sons of Bach’, performed, variously, by the Freiburg Bach Orchestra, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra Consort, and the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra; two pieces in particular stood out as incredibly exciting, music far more vital than I had thought the early classical era could produce: Wilhelm Friedemann Bach‘s ‘Concerto for Harpsichord in E Minor, F 43, from 1767; and Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach‘s Sinfonia in E minor, Wq 178/H 653, from 1756

Very simple.

Once the scallops, 2 vegetables, and 2 herbs had been washed and dried, the tomatoes and oregano chopped, and the basil torn, this meal came together in about 10 minutes, and pumping a minimum of heat into the kitchen.

 

• fourteen medium scallops from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, washed, drained and very thoroughly dried on paper towels (twice), generously seasoned with salt and pepper, pan grilled for about 90 seconds on each side, finished with a squeeze of a small sweet lemon from Trader Joe’s, a scattering of budding oregano from Stokes Farm, most of it chopped, and a drizzle of good olive oil poured on top

• small okra from Lani’s Farm, sautéed over a high flame in a large cast iron pan with a little olive oil and some crushed dried Itria-Sirissi chili (peperoncino di Sardegna intero), stirring, seasoned with sea salt
• one chopped heirloom tomato from Eckerton Hill Farm and 2 quartered Backyard Farms Maine ‘cocktail tomatoes’ from Whole Foods, dressed with a Campania olive oil, Maldon salt, Tellicherry pepper, a little balsamic vinegar, and tossed with some torn basil leaves from Sycamore Farms
• the wine was a New York (North Fork) rosé, Bridge Lane Rosé 2015
• the music was Johann Adolf Hasse’s 1725 opera, ‘Marc’ Antonio e Cleopatra’, in a performance by le Musiche Nove, Claudio Osele conducting

Once again, a great fish, and a superb recipe, this pan-grilled mackerel manages to taste a little different each time I prepare it, and this one may have been the most delicious ever. The only substantive difference I brought to it was the late addition of milkweed buds.

 

I think the tomatoes really were ‘The Best Cherry Tomatoes’, at least among the crops available in the season so far.

 

The small early okra were also delicious, but, probably for the first time, without the slight crispiness that makes them really sing, since I had to crowd the pods in a pan a little smaller than ideal. The exigency of the 2-burner grill pan I used for the fish meant I didn’t have enough space for the 13″+ cast iron pan I would usually have used.

 

• five Spanish mackerel filets (totaling 13 or 14 ounces) from Blue Moon Fish Company, washed, dried, brushed with olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, pan grilled over high heat for a total of about 6 minutes, skin side down first, then turning once, transferred to plates, topped with a salsa of halved cherry tomatoes from Stokes Farm which had been tossed with olive oil, wild capers in brine which had been rinsed and drained, some organic lemon juice, salt, and pepper, some milkweed buds from Down Home Acres (in Unadilla, N.Y.) scattered on and around the fish and the salsa
• about half a pound of okra from Kernan Farms, sautéed in olive oil along with crushed dried chiles in a long oval copper pan over a high flame, then seasoned with salt
• the wine was a California (Lodi) white, S + A Verdelho Calveras County 2014 [the link is to the 2014 vintage]
• the music was a beautiful performance of early eighteenth-century concerti, the album, ‘Concerts & Follies In Pergolesi’s Time‘

It was to be four of us for dinner. There would be the same number of courses, but only one of them required any real cooking, and very little cooking at that.  The kitchen therefore never had the chance to heat up (although, since we ate in the dining room/gallery, I suppose it wouldn’t have mattered much anyway).  Also, while normally I have difficulty interacting with guests as I would like to while cooking, I really knew my way around each of these four plates, so I was able to invite everyone into the kitchen area while I was still working on them.  Yay!

I really recommend these ‘recipes’ to anyone who might have the same entertaining parameters.

Also, the meal was delicious; the main course featured two of my favorite things, they were both incredibly fresh (probably caught and picked the day before), and they were prepared in just about the simplest way possible.

The tuna, which followed a serving of Speck and greens, was prepared using Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers‘s simple recipe; the very basic treatment of the okra was a suggestion I had come across somewhere long ago; and the intentionally un-spicy cherry tomato salsa was another simple treatment, my own invention.

• three tuna steaks from P.E. & D.D. Seafood (they totaled about 28 ounces, to feed four), small sections of each removed to make up a fourth serving, tops and bottoms of the steaks rubbed with a mixture of fennel seed and crushed dried peperoncino peppers which had been ground together, seasoned with salt, and pepper, then pan-grilled for only a minute or so on each side, and finished with a good squeeze of lemon and a drizzle of olive oil
• a combination of small green and purple okra (about a pound) from Ryder Farm, sautéed in olive oil with additional crushed dried pepperoncini in an iron pan over a high flame, then seasoned with salt (the purple ends up more or less a darker green when cooked)
• really tiny red cherry tomatoes from Berried Treasures (Franca could not remember at the moment I asked her exactly what they were called), which I sliced most of the way through so they wouldn’t explode when picked up with a fork, tossed with good olive oil, salt, pepper, Thai basil from a friend’s garden in Garrison, New York, and some garlic chive flowers from Paffenroth Farms, then left to sit for about an hour before being served in bowls to the side of the dinner plates

Speck has become one of our favorite antipasti.  For some reason it always makes me feel it’s part of a festive occasion, and this time it genuinely was, since we were sharing it with good friends, and they had thoughtfully brought along a bottle of an excellent Austrian sparkling wine (this is probably not the right time for me to bring up the historical connection between the Südtiroler Speck and the country in which the Grüner Veltlinger Sekt was produced).  I served the salumi with a very good bread and a bit of arugula (as it turned out, too small of a bit, so I added some celery leaves I had on hand).

• thinly-sliced Alto Adige Speck from Eataly, each piece rolled around a fork’s tines and put on a plate where it was drizzled with some very good olive oil, and accompanied by arugula from Keith’s Farm which I had mixed with a smaller amount of roughly-chopped celery leaves from Whole Foods, the greens seasoned and dressed with the same good oil and drops of lemon
• the antipasto was accompanied by slices of a loaf of ‘rustic classic’ from Eataly

After the tuna, there were three regional cheeses (‘Manchester’ and a special late-season ‘Danby’, both goat cheeses from Consider Bardwell Farm; and ‘Brebis Blanche’, a sheep cheese with a coating of ground mixed pepper, from 3-Corner Field Farm), served with thinly-sliced ‘Rustic Classic’ from Eataly, toasted.

The dessert was some of Berried Treasures’s celebrated strawberries (the breed a mix of domestic and wild), topped with a scoop of Madagascar Vanilla Ciao Bello gelato, with a sauce composed of a few of the berries which had been macerated a bit with Toschi Orzata Orgeat syrup spread over the ice cream and garnished with chopped hazelnuts.

• the wine with the Speck was an Austrian sparkling white, Szigeti Grüner Veltliner Brut from Gols, on the Neusiedler See, in Burgenland
• the wine with the tuna was a New York Cabernet Franc rosé, Schneider & Bieler Rosé “le breton” 2014 from the Fingerlakes
• the name of the wine with the cheese course has faded from my memory
• The after-dinner drink was Varnelli L’Anice Secco Speciale Mistra Liqueur, from the Marche.
• the music was our own conversation

I’m getting used to incorporating mushrooms into meals, and I no longer fear taking on the responsibility.  I love them, they can alter any dish with a minimum of fuss, are close to foolproof, can often be prepared at least slightly in advance of joining other food ingredients, and most varieties will be easy on your wallet.  With the help of supplies from our local farmers and foragers at the Greenmarket, I’m learning to have fun with them.

The preparation of this meal with cod involved some Golden Oyster mushrooms; it was based, roughly, on a recipe from “I’ll Have Seconds!“.  The most significant change was my introduction of some ramp fruit (the seed blossoms of the woodland ramp) to the olive oil just after it had heated, and just before adding the mushrooms.  Also, and pretty noteworthy, the mushrooms I had weighed less than a fourth of the amount specified in the recipe, but these Goldens still did themselves proud (and the flavor of the cod remained undiminished).

The dish was delicious. I’m certain to revisit the formula, probably using more mushrooms, but next time I’m also going to be more careful about the amount of salt I bring to the dish.  It was only late the next morning that I realized the reason for the saltiness was my reduction of a cup of stock made from an excellent prepared vegetable base, but one which appears not to have been low-sodium (just found out they now have both ‘reduced sodium’ and ‘organic’ versions).  Without intending to, I had boiled it down too far while I had been escaping from a hot kitchen.

That would also explain why the picture at the top of this post shows a bowl with a sauce rather than the broth which appears in the image on Emily’s blog.

The okra can (almost) be spotted inside a black bowl on the upper left.

• the cod came from P.E. & D.D. Seafood, the ramp fruits from Berried treasures, and the Golden Oyster mushrooms from Blue Oyster Cultivation; for the herbs I used a combination of chopped parsley from Lani’s Farm and tarragon from Stokes Farm
• purple okra from Lani’s Farm, sautéed in olive oil with crushed dried chiles in an iron pan over a high flame, then seasoned with salt
• the wine was a California white, Scott McCleod Chardonnay 2014 Russian River Valley Sonoma County
• the music was a number of works being streamed on Q2 Music WQXR