Eatwell Farmhouse Kitchen
Wow, it’s Friday night already, again! Tomorrow the alarm goes off at 3:30 for the Farmers Market. I can tell you Friday is not my favorite night to cook, but I remembered enjoying a dish similar to this one years ago at Rose Pistola and the mood struck. So here I am trying to create something kind of similar at 8 o’clock on a Friday night. This is quick and simple and of course, delicious!
1 lb. of your favorite fish I am using wild True Cod
1 Fennel bulb, fronds and all, cut off tough stalks
1 Spring Garlic Bulb, top trimmed
1 Red Onion Salt
1 Lemon Good Olive Oil
A well-seasoned cast iron skillet or any pan you can preheat to scorching hot in the oven
Preheat your oven to 475F. Put a small glug of olive oil in the pan and wipe it all around, put the pan into the oven. Slice the garlic, onion and fennel as thinly as you possibly can. Put them all into a mixing bowl and squeeze the juice from lemon over them, then a good healthy glug of olive oil and about 1 1/2 tsp good salt*, I used Eatwell Farm Lemon Salt. Mix all the ingredients well in the bowl and let them sit to marinate for about 5 minutes. In the meantime you pan should be heating up quite nicely. After the 5 minutes and the pan is screaming, pull it carefully from the oven and put the onion, garlic, fennel bulb, olive oil and lemon juice in to the pan. It will sizzle and smell really delicious. Gently lay your fish right in there and cover it with the fennel fronds. Top with another good glug of olive oil, yes this dish uses a goodly amount of it, but trust me it is worth it. Bake at 475 for a good 10 minutes. Pull it out and let cool slightly and dig in.
Since you have the oven on high for a while with this dish, particularly while you are heating your pan, take advantage of that and roast some potatoes and maybe a few wedges of the wakefield cabbage. These will make delicious accompaniments to this dish.