This is a great summer main course that’s very easy but seems fancy and special at the same time. And even if it is easy, it’s also special since a thick, high quality piece of tuna like this is a real splurge. Every now and then, though, it’s totally worth it.

You want to use the thickest piece of tuna you can find, and high quality since it’s only going to be barely seared. At our local fish market, we were able to get a piece that was 2″ thick, which was perfect.

The only other trick is to get the grill very hot. You only want to be able to hold your hand up to the fire for about 1-2 seconds; that’s how you know it’s hot enough. Other than that, all this needs is a couple summer vegetables (we served it with simply prepared squash and zucchini, a recipe I’ll share soon) and some friends to share it with.

Seared Tuna
This rub is a variation on our favorite rub for steak, with the addition of lemon zest.

2 cloves of garlic
zest of 1 lemon
rosemary or basil, finely chopped
salt
freshly ground black pepper
high quality tuna steak(s), at least 1″ thick and preferably thicker

Make a paste of garlic, lemon zest, and equal parts (same as the garlic) herbs, salt, and pepper. (It’ll be about a half a tablespoon or so of each, but we just eyeball it.) Two cloves of garlic and the zest of one lemon, with equal parts of the other ingredients, meant we had about the right amount of rub for our 2″ thick steak, so if you’re making more, you can just scale everything up. Rub this on all sides of the tuna.

Let sit at room temperature while you prepare the grill. We like to use a charcoal grill for the flavor, though gas would be fine too. Once the grill is very hot, sear the tuna for a minute and a half per side. If it’s thick, you may need to do the edges for another thirty seconds or so each. Remove from the heat and let rest for a few minutes.

Slice thinly against the grain and serve.

Like the Artichoke Spinach Lasagne, this recipe comes from Jessica’s friend Carrie. I’ve tried several recipes for fish tacos in the past (this one we’ve posted before is also pretty good), but I think these are my favorites. Though it has a lot of components to assemble, the actual cooking time is pretty quick. We’ve adapted them a bit from Carrie’s original recipe, and they allow a lot of room for modification.

And a tip for using the extra chipotles in adobo you’ll have leftover: chop some and combine with drained greek yogurt, garlic, and salt for a fiery but delicious dip for multi-grain chips. (This one comes from my friend Oliver, and I’ll try to share a more formal “recipe” at some point.)

Carrie Geddie’s Fish Tacos
Carrie says, “Everything tastes better after the flavors have had a chance to meld, so plan on leftovers.”

Honey-Lime Slaw
1/3 c fresh lime juice
2 T honey
1 T vegetable oil
1 t ground cumin
2 c three-color coleslaw blend
1/4 c cilantro

Chipotle Mayo
1/2 c mayonnaise or sour cream
2 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce
1 T adobo sauce from chipotle peppers
1/4 t salt

Fish
4 tilapia filets (or other white fish such as mahi, grouper, etc. Carrie also says that frozen breaded tilapia works well)

about 8 small corn of flour tortillas
mango, cut into chunks (optional)

For Honey Lime Slaw: whisk together lime juice, honey, vegetable oil, and ground cumin in a small bowl. Pour over coleslaw and cilantro. Mix thoroughly.  Do this first and allow to sit in the refrigerator for a bit for all the flavors to meld.

For the Chipotle Mayo: Place all mayonnaise ingredients together in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until smooth. Cover, and refrigerate until needed.

For the fish: if using fresh tilapia, sprinkle with cumin, a small amount of cayenne pepper, and salt. Heat a small amount of olive oil in a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Cook the fish about 3-4 minutes per side, until it flakes easily with a fork. Remove from the pan and flake it into bite-sized pieces. (If using other kinds of fish, cook according to your preferences, or the package instructions if using frozen fish.)

Assembly: Heat the tortillas, one or two per taco in a skillet until warm. Add some fish, slaw, chipotle mayo, and mango, if using, to each taco. Carrie suggests serving with Spanish rice and beans, though you can see we went the lazy, unhealthy route and just served it with tortilla chips!

I originally found this in an old Cooking Light magazine, and it’s become one of our go-to, easy meals, perfect for spring or summer.  It’s super fast and simple, but it’s delicious and elegant enough for company.  We most recently served it for an early birthday celebration for my mom.  You can easily substitute out the cilantro for whatever is in season or on hand, and I’m just thinking lime zest instead of lemon would be a tasty substitution as well; you could also use any mild fish instead of the tilapia.  It went great with the fresh peas we found at the farmer’s market.  Delicious, fresh, simple, and with tilapia, usually pretty inexpensive, too!

(more…)

My mom has cooked salmon this way for a long time, and I think she originally got the recipes from Stirring Performances, a cookbook from the Winston-Salem, NC Junior League.  It’s just so darn good that I really hardly ever cook salmon any other way.  Even better, it’s dead simple — rub with a little garlic and salt, squeeze some lime over, let it sit a bit, and throw it on the grill!  Or, if like us, you get ready to fire up the grill and find you’re out of charcoal, and stick it under the broiler instead.  (I think this is even easy enough to go in the Just for John category, at least if you can find the salmon on sale!)  We find it’s a little easier with salmon steaks (they hold up a bit better on the grill) but fillets work fine, too.

Tonight, we served it over the Sweet Potato Mash with Mint from Simply Recipes — delicious!  This was a really unusual combination of flavors — sweet potatoes, mint, cilantro, raw onion, and a touch of vanilla.  I know it sounds a bit odd, but I thought the vanilla especially really gave it a nice depth.  It was definitely on the sweet side — I added a touch of cayenne to balance it out, and next time, I think I’ll add a little more.  But the sharp flavors of the garlic and lime played nicely against the sweetness of the potatoes, and it ended up as a really good combination.  Could use another color to balance out the orange though!

(more…)

For this week’s Whisk Wednesdays post, it’s the last in our series on frying and sauteing, and it forced me to finally conquer my fear of deep frying. I almost backed out on this one. I’ve never tried deep frying, as I don’t have a fryer or a splatter screen or anything, and I’ve been sure I would splash hot oil all over myself and get a terrible burn. So I’m pretty proud of myself for trying this one — and pretty pleased with how it turned out. These were really delicious, and definitely worth making again!

We made these on a weeknight, so I wasn’t able to take my usual mise-en-place pictures. But here’s a summary of what we did. The shrimp were first marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, parsley, and salt and pepper. This definitely gave them more flavor than they would’ve if they were directly battered and fried. While the shrimp marinated, I made the batter. It included equal parts all purpose and potato flour (1 1/4 c each) and 1 T baking powder, combined with 3 T olive oil, salt, and 1 c cold water. These were combined, drizzled with oil to keep a crust from forming, and let rest for a while as the shrimp continued to marinate.

Right before getting ready to fry, I folded 3 beaten egg whites into the batter (which was more like dough until adding the egg whites). I think these helped to really lighten up the coating on the shrimp. The shrimp were then dipped in the batter and deep fried in 350 F oil.

I don’t know if it was the lightened batter, or the marinade, or what, but these came out deliciously crispy but not too greasy, despite all that oil. It reminded me a little bit of a tempura batter, especially since it seemed to kind of puff up as the shrimp cooked. In fact, since we had a bunch of extra batter, I ended up frying everything I could think of — some potato slices left over from the delicious potato pizza we had made again, and some mushrooms. The vegetables were almost as good as the shrimp. Overall, I’m really glad I decided to tackle deep frying — this cookbook curriculum is really teaching me new and useful skills, and getting me outside my comfort zone, in a good way!

Be sure to check out how the rest of the Whisk Wednesdays group fared — on the blogroll on the right. (Note: I’m a couple weeks behind, so if you check them out, they’re probably making something other than these shrimp.)