Fish Tacos

My husband really likes Tilapia so I've been looking for recipes that I think he might enjoy. I came across this recipe in Parade Magazine back in late 2009. It looked easy enough to make so I've finally decided to give it a try. I decided to use regular tortillas instead of the whole grain tortillas we always use. I diced up roma tomatoes, fresh cilantro and red onion. I mixed the salsa and sour cream to make a zesty sauce and I completed the meal by brushing the fish with a little EVOO and S&P and tossing it in the pan. Wow! It's really just that easy. After the fish came out of the pan, I drizzled fresh lime juice on it, then let it rest for a few minutes before flaking. Does fish even have to rest?

The result, as reviewed by my husband, was fantastic...minus one thing...it wasn't very hot. I have found an issue with blogging. I plate up dinner and then spend time photographing it, then I serve it. Oops! After putting effort into making a nice tasting, visually appealing meal, the effort is practically wasted if it's not served at the ideal temperature. I won't make that mistake again! Thankfully it was good enough that he ate everything that I prepared. I even made a couple with no fish (being a vegetarian and all) and it was so good! Everything was fresh and the flavors worked so well together. I'll make it again and skip the camera work.

Ingredients:
8 - 6" flour tortillas
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup salsa
S&P
3 - 8oz fish fillets (tilapia, haddock, flounder)
2 tbs EVOO
Juice of 2 fresh limes
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
2 ripe roma plum or beefsteak tomatoes, diced
2 cups red cabbage, finely shredded (optional)
fresh cilantro leaves

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 300F. Stack the tortillas on top of each other and wrap in foil. Place in oven while you prepare the fish.
2. Whisk together sour cream and salsa in a small bowl; season with S&P. Cover and refrigerate.
3. Heat a grill pan or nonstick pan over medium-high heat. Brush the fish on both sides with oil and season with S&P. Cook the fish until golden brown on both sides, about 4 minutes per side. Remove to a plate; drizzle with lime juice. Let rest for 5 minutes. Using a fork, flake the fish into large pieces.
4. To serve: Put some fish in the center of the tortilla and top with onion, tomatoes, and cabbage, then drizzle with sou-cream sauce and cilantro leaves.

Caribbean Nut-Crusted Fish

I have hundreds of recipes that I've got saved on my computer. If I'm up late at night and can't sleep, I'll browse through food blogs and recipe web sites. If I see something that I'd like to prepare someday, I'll save it. Sometimes I get adventurous and try a recipe and other times I fall into a rut and make the same dishes over and over and over again.

This month I decided to take a blank calendar and come up with a plan for dinner for every night of the month. I've tried doing this a week at a time, but I'm really inconsistent about doing it and then I lose my coordination between the menu, my grocery list and the execution.

So, this month I took about 45 minutes and filled out the calendar with meals, including nights for left-overs and a night out (or 3). During this time I also put a week-by-week shopping list together. I took an extra minute to plan how not to waste some items, like cilantro. Using 2 tablespoons in a recipe and having the rest of the bunch left over usually means it'll go bad - at least at my house. So, I grouped certain recipes based on ingredients I knew I'd need to use before they went bad.

Now it's February15th. I've had to make quite a few adjustments to my dinner calendar. I didn't account for the Super Bowl and that menu. Then we went bowling one night so I moved that night's dinner to another night. And one night, even after so much careful planning, I forgot an essential ingredient and it was getting too late to go to the grocery store. I learned a lesson though...ALWAYS have a frozen back-up on hand! This came in handy for this occasion and it'll come in handy for the night that I really am not up for cooking.

On with the Caribbean Nut-Crusted Fish. This recipe comes from my ever faithful Kraft website. I know it's good to eat fish - for those that eat fish. So, to follow my dinner calendar I've got one fish meal a week.

After mixing together the chopped nuts, fresh cilantro, minced garlic, peanut oil and lime zest I was almost ready to eat the topping! It looked and smelled terrific. The recipe called for covering the fish (I used tilapia) in lime juice and then coating with the topping. Then, it called for baking it for 10-12 minutes at 350F. On the packaging for the fish however, the cooking instructions call for baking it at 400F for 30-35 minutes. My husband suggested I follow the packaging. I decided to jump online and read the recipe reviews. Out of 20 reviews, no one said that it needed more time or that it was undercooked. So, following the recipe I go, I go.

After 12 minutes I attempted to see if the fish was flaky by ever so slightly taking a fork to it. I was trying to be so careful so that testing it wouldn't mess up the subject of my photo..I mean, my husband's dinner. It looked good to go so I plated it and spent about 10-ish minutes trying to photograph it with my new camera. My house has such crappy lighting that I find the task frustrating. But I took a suitable photo and determined that the food was probably almost cold by then. I popped the whole thing back in the oven for about 5 minutes on low heat.

After all was said and done, my husband really liked it! He likes having saucy dishes and this one wasn't saucy, but he really enjoyed it and said he'd enjoy having it again. Success!

http://www.kraftrecipes.com/recipes/caribbean-nut-crusted-fish-90666.aspx