Gone Fishing

Fish is a great way to get in some healthy eating.  Fish is a good source for lean protein, and omega-3 fatty acids.  We decided to prepare our fish en papillote. What is en papillote you may ask.  Well, it's just a fancy way to say, cooking fish in parchment (or even in aluminum foil). The fish will steam and take in the flavors of whatever is in the packet with it. This is a very easy dish, which also makes for a pretty presentation.

Asian Inspired fish en papillote.

Scallion and Ginger marinade:
1/3 cup dry sherry or vermouth
3 Tbsp. low-sodium soy sauce
2 tsp sesame oil
¼ cup finely chopped green onion
1 tsp. freshly grated ginger
1 tsp. finely chopped garlic
Optional: ½ stalk lemongrass, bruised*

Combine all ingredients, for best flavor, let sit for an hour before using.

*to bruise the lemon grass stalk, use the edge of a knife to squash it a bit… this will release the fragrance of the lemongrass and allow it to penetrate into the marinade.

For fish:
2 tilapia filets
1 carrot finely grated
2 shallots finely diced
1 small bok choy, roughly chopped or torn
½ of above marinade

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Cut 2 rectangles of parchment paper, have them laid out for easy assembly.

Place fish filets and marinade into a plastic bag, set aside. The fish should only stay in the marinade for about 10 minutes.

Spray a heated pan with cooking spray (or hit it with a bit of oil). Sautee shallots for 30 seconds, add carrot and bok choy, sautee for another 45 seconds to 1 minute. You do not want to get the carrots or the bok choy to get too soggy, these will go into the packet.

Place half of the carrot/bok choy mixture in the middle of your parchment rectangle.**

Top with marinated fish filet.

Drizzle a tsp of marinade onto fish.

Repeat with other half of mixture and second filet in the other parchment rectangle.

Fold your parchment over, crimping the sides, to make sure that all moisture stays in.
Bake at 400 for 10-15 minutes (depending on the thickness of your fish). Check on it, if it’s flaky, and opaque all the way through, it’s done.

We served our fish packet over rice noodles that were tossed with the unused marinade.

** we confess, we did not do this recipe according to direction.  We sauteed the bok choy up seperately and placed it on top of the fish... it worked out, feel free to do it as well.

Rice Noodles with scallion and ginger sauce:

While the water is boiling for the rice noodles, dump the remaining marinade into a pan (remove the lemongrass if it is still in there).

Boil for a couple of minutes (this will cook the ginger and garlic).

Prepare rice noodles according to direction (or like in our case, if you don’t speak the language that is printed on your noodles, use the following website http://www.ehow.com/how_4784876_use-asian-dried-rice-noodles.html) - prepare enough for the two filets.

When the rice noodles are done, quickly toss them over heat with the sauce.

Put them on a plate and top them with the contents of the en papillote.

Notes:

Although most of the ingredients that are called for can be found at the regular grocery store, if you can find an Asian market, you may find that you’ll pay quite a bit less for the same ingredients.

There are tons of variations for fish en papillote. The more fragrant the ingredients, the more flavor your fish will have.

If you can’t find tilapia don’t throw this recipe out. We also tried it with flounder and it came out pretty tasty. You can use any mild white fish for this particular dish.

You can serve the packeted fish directly onto the plate, letting each person open their very own fishy present.