Poached Fish Fillets with Tomato Vinaigrette

I love to eat seasonally and I was so eager for spring in order to eat some fresh produce and I was also craving lighter fare.  Sometimes I like to re-evaluate the way I'm doing something and see if I can better myself.  In February I signed up for my first 10km run which will be in Montreal in the end of September 2014.  I'm pretty pumped about it because I've never run 10km before and I know that this is a pretty attainable goal with some training.  It turns out that I really enjoy running and I've been doing it during the spring and fall just as a way to stay active but without a real challenge in mind.  I decided to set the bar and it should be fun!

With the warmer weather and the fact that I've now started running outside since mid April, I thought that eating lighter meals was really refreshing so I'll be sharing some of my favourites in the upcoming weeks.  Like with my physical activities, I found that if you find something that you truly enjoy, being "healthy" can be quite easy.  I consider this to be one of my favourite go-to seafood dishes.  A while back on the blog I mentioned that I would love to eat more white fish in my diet and this has been the way I've been able to do that.  And I'm loving it!!  I've made this countless times and also varied the way I've prepared the fish and which side dishes I've paired it with.  But there are two constants, white fish fillets and tomato vinaigrette.  The tomato vinaigrette is really what knocked my socks off, put that sauce on shoe leather and it'll taste good!  Sometimes I double the sauce and save it for later in the week to make the recipe again but with pan fried white fish, less healthy but one of my boyfriend's favourites.

Now I know that it may sound strange that poaching a piece of fish in olive oil is something that I consider "healthy" but it is not the same as frying fish in the same amount of oil.  Actually, the fish contains water and it repels the oil, remember that oil and water don't mix.  Thus poaching the fish in a low temperature oil actually helps the fish keep more of its juices and stay pretty moist and flaky, rather than being dry and overcooked.  Another thing that I adore with this recipe is that it uses very little oil because it is shallow poached.  Also, the leftover oil isn't wasted and is used in a vinaigrette, which is similar to make a salad dressing.

I could go on and on about what I like about this recipe but instead I decided to share different pictures of me making it!  It also may give you a few ideas about how to switch things up and make the meal to your liking.  Good eats!

If ever the oil doesn't come up high enough in the pan you can place a piece of onion to flavour the oil and raise the oil level in the pan without adding additional oil!

Here I made pan fried tilapia with tomato vinaigrette, blanched asparagus, and herb quinoa.

Here I made pan fried rock fish with tomato vinaigrette, blanched asparagus, oven sweet potato fries, and herb lemon rice pilaf.

Here I made the original recipe with blanched Chinese broccoli, and basic rice pilaf.

Poached Fish Fillets with Tomato Vinaigrette

Serves 4

NB: Fillets of meaty white fish like cod, halibut, sea bass, or snapper work best in this recipe.  Just make sure the fillets are at least 1 inch thick.  A neutral oil such as canola can be substituted for the pure olive oil.  The onion half in step 3 is used to displace the oil; a 4-ounce porcelain ramekin may be used instead.  Serve with couscous, white rice, or quinoa.

Ingredients

Fish

4 (6-ounce) skinless white fish fillets, 1 inch thick

Kosher salt

3/4 cup olive oil (don't use extra virgin)

1/2 onion, peeled

Vinaigrette

4 ounces cherry tomatoes

1/2 small shallot, peeled

4 teaspoons white wine vinegar

Kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley or chives

For the Fish:

Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 250 degrees.  Pat fish dry with paper towels and season each fillet with 1/4 teaspoon salt.  Let sit at room temperature for 20 minutes.

Add oil to 10-inch nonstick skillet and place onion half in center of pan.  Heat oil over medium heat until oil registers about 180 degrees.  Arrange fish fillets, skinned side up, around onion (oil should come roughly halfway up fillets).  Spoon a little oil over each fillet, cover skillet, transfer to middle rack, and cook for 8-15 minutes (longer cooking time for thicker fillets).

Remove skillet from oven.  Using 2 spatulas, carefully flip fillets.  Cover skillet, return to middle rack, and continue to cook fish until it registers 130 to 135 degrees, 5 to 14 minutes longer.  Gently transfer fish to serving platter, reserving 1/2 cup oil, and tent fish loosely with aluminum foil.  

For the Vinaigrette:

Process whole cherry tomatoes, shallot, vinegar, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and pepper with reserved 1/2 cup fish cooking oil in blender until smooth, 1 to 3 minutes.  Add any accumulated fish juice from platter, season with salt to taste, and blend for 10 seconds.  Strain sauce through fine-mesh strainer, pressing on solids to extract as much liquid as possible (this may not be necessary if you have a powerful blender that renders the sauce very smooth).

To serve pour vinaigrette around fish.  Garnish each fillet with parsley or chives.  Serve immediately.

Source: adapted from Cook's Illustrated

Easy Rice Pilaf

Serves 4

Ingredients

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/2 onion, minced or 1/2 cup of minced shallot

Salt

1 1/2 cups long-grain white rice, rinsed and drained 

1 cup of chicken broth 

1 1/4 cup of water

Pepper

3 tablespoons of chopped herbs (chives and/or parsley)

Juice of 1/2 lemon

Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat.  Add the onion and 1 teaspoon salt and cook until softened, about 5 minutes.  Stir in the drained rice.  Sauté until the edges of the rice begin to turn translucent, about 3 minutes.

Stir in the water and broth, then bring to a boil.  Cover and reduce the heat to low.  Cook until the rice is tender and the liquid is absorbed, about 17 minutes.  

Transfer the pot to a cold burner or trivet and let the rice stand for 10 minutes.  Fluff the rice with a fork.  Stir in herbs and lemon juice, season with salt and pepper to taste.

Source: adapted from America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook