Friday, September 26, 2014

All About That Bass

Today's recipe comes to you via Ina Garten via Wolfgang Puck.

It seemed easy enough, and in theory it was. I had help in the last few minutes of the process and I paid for it dearly with a kitchen mishap. I have no one but myself to blame, though I'll deflect that whenever I have the opportunity.

But this is why I should have run of the kitchen, though I did ask for help.  Anyway............

Sea bass wrapped in prosciutto is today's dish.

The side was supposed to be roasted root vegetables, but I am no fan of butternut squash or parsnips. So I only used the gemstone potatoes. I would have included carrots had there been any on hand.

The potatoes take about an hour to roast, so they go first.

Make sure the potatoes are roughly the same size so they cook through at the same rate, so cut if you need to. I like the gemstones because they are red, purple and gold. This pack were short on purple for sure. Toss them in olive oil and salt and pepper.

About halfway through cooking time, when I turned them, I added minced shallot and garlic. But those should really be added maybe 10 minutes before you take them out of the oven. The garlic tends to burn.

Roast potatoes (or all the root veggies, should you decide to go that way) at 375F for an hour.

For the last 10 minutes, you put in the fish......though the oven should be kicked up to 400.

Drizzle and spread olive oil over the bass (or other firm white fish - as sea bass isn't cheap). Liberally salt and pepper the filets too. 

Wrap a thinly sliced piece of prosciutto around each piece of fish, with the seam side down (which is also the side of the skin of the fish). Place on rack and bake at 400 for about 10 minutes. 

While fish is cooking, melt two tablespoons of butter and throw in two sprigs(?) of fresh rosemary. 

I'm not a huge rosemary fan either, but it works. I don't care for the smell more than I dislike the taste, but you pull out the herbs at the end. Also squeeze in about 1.5 tablespoons of lemon juice as you're finishing up melting the butter. Whisk it together. 

Drizzle butter over fish (well......and the potatoes, if you'd like. I did). 


710 says it was one of the best meals I've ever made. Even if we had Floor Potatoes....as they'll now be called. 

In 710's defense, I asked him to take the potatoes out a few minutes early, so as not to have them burn, like in the great roasting disaster of 2012 (oh yes Mike, it still stings!). And then I asked him to check the temp on the fish. 

Somehow in all that, the tray of potatoes got knocked to the floor. A clean floor, but the floor nonetheless. Oh, and in the process, that knocked over the pot of melting butter. 

I "may have" dropped the F bomb. Loudly. 

It may have been the 10 second rule (not the 5) to scoop up all the taters, as I held a very very very curious Petey from getting to them.  Then it was some clean-up and me redoing the sauce from the beginning. 

As it turns out, no matter how much you think you clean the floor after a spill like that, melted butter still makes for a slick floor. 

Honestly, the potatoes looked no worse for the wear. We dusted them off and put them back in the oven to warm. The assertion was, worse things go on in restaurant kitchens, we just don't know about it or see it. And if we had company, I just would have made a quick salad, but it was just us. 

Still, 710 raved over the dinner and said it would be in the rotation. So......I guess it will be. It's hard to ignore praise like that. 




Song by:  Meghan Trainor

3 comments:

GregM said...

This looks really good and no treble.

Bob said...

It looks really good, and the Floor-tatoes sound good too!

anne marie in philly said...

for some reason, this post reminded me of this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BQFv83QJ2Y

bwhahahahahaha!