White halibut with artichoke and pistachios
A light yet flavourful meal with the right combination of textures.
If you can’t get a white fish with skin, you will still want the crunchiness that the baked skin would otherwise provide. You can get that by adding some crushed croutons. These are really easy to make. Cut some old bread into 1 by 1 cm cubes, mix them with olive oil, some crushed garlic, pepper and salt. Put them on a lined baking sheet and heat them in the oven until golden and crunchy. Now crush them in a mortar and sprinkle over the dish (as a last step in serving). Happy days!
Equipment
- garlic press
Ingredients
- 4 pieces of white halibut with skin (or another white fish with skin) (bones and scales removed)
- 200 gram grilled and marinated artichoke hearts
- 200 gram mini honey tomatoes do invest in the really good ones
- 1 tbsp capers
- 2 tbsp black kalamata olives
- 1 tsp fennel seeds
- 1-2 cloves of garlic
- 1 shallot
- 2 tbsp pistachio nuts
- 3 sprigs of fresh parsley
- high quality olive oil
- olive oil to bake
- pepper & salt
Instructions
Sauce
- I'm actually not sure whether sauce is the right word for this, but in any case, start by chopping the shallot very finely. Cut the grilled and marinated artichoke hearts in nice bitesize pieces, cut both the mini tomatoes and the kalamata olives in half and chop 2 of the parsley sprigs. Peel the pistachios and cut them in half.
- Put some high quality olive oil in a frying pan on low heat and add the finley chopped shallots. When they're glassy, press one or two cloves of garlic and add those, as well as the fennel seeds.
- Fry for one minute before adding the tomatoes, kalamata olives, capers, artichoke, parsley and some pepper and salt. Let all of it simmer for about 10 minutes. You can give it a gentle stir with a wooden spoon every once in a while.
White halibut
- Put another frying pan on high heat and add some olive oil.
- When the oil is hot, put the white halibut pieces skin side down in the pan. It will depend on how thick they are how much time it will take to cook them, so keep an eye on the flesh of the fish. When it almost done, turn the heat down a bit and turn it around for the other side to be shortly downward as well.
Serving
- Serve by putting a piece of halibut on each plate, skin side up. Spoon some 'sauce' over all of them and finish with some fresh parsley and pistachios.
This wine went fabulously with this dish, although admittedly you can make bricks taste good with this one…
