A few months ago, Cleveland Foodie posted on how to Cook Like Ellis Cooley (of Amp 150). The first time I thought of making his walleye recipe, I didn’t have beets but happened to have a red bell pepper. While I very much enjoyed the dish at Amp 150, I might have liked my version even better:
The picture above is turbot (I forgot the camera the first time w/walleye) but I think any variety of firm-fleshed fish would work well with this preparation.
Pan Roasted Fish w/ Crème Fraiche, Red Pepper, Dill
(serves 3–4)
2 tsp fresh chopped dill 2 tsp butter Juice of 1 lemon scant TB. olive oil
Thoroughly dry fish and season with salt and pepper. Heat heavy frying pan (preferably non-stick or cast iron) to screaming hot. You should be able to feel the heat with the back of your hand about eight inches above the surface. Quickly drizzle in oil (it should smoke), swirl around pan, and drop in fish, skin side down (if it has skin). Reduce the heat to medium and leave alone. When the skin is crispy (or fillet is deep brown and carmelized) turn the fish over and turn heat off. The fish should continue cooking, become firm, and reach an internal temperature of 110 degrees or so within five minutes. If it doesn’t, reheat pan for a minute or two, turn off, and wait until it’s done.
Meanwhile, in a separate small saucepan combine red pepper, crème fraiche and butter and slowly bring to a boil. When mixture boils, add lemon juice and dill. Serve with sauce over fish.
The high pan temperature and reduced quantity of oil both strike me as useful changes from the original recipe. Both create a great fish-to-metal carmelization reminiscent of the original dish at Amp 150 (the first time I made the recipe this didn’t occur).
We served this with Amateur Gourmet’s oven-roasted broccoli and rustic bread.
For dessert we had David Lebovitz’s carrot cake ice cream:
The resemblance to frosted carrot cake was uncanny. I didn’t quite cook down the candied carrots enough initially, though, and drained a lot of the of the syrup. The result wasn’t sweet enough (yes, the whole 1.5 cups of sugar is necessary to make up for the lack of flour), so I added some additional sugar after tasting it.
Everyone enjoyed the dinner. Jonathan even at the fish and especially liked the ice cream.
Looks great, so happy you tried it.
Michelle,
Thanks for posting the recipe so we could make it. I still have to try it with the baby beets from the original. We just found out that there’s supposedly good late fall walleye fishing in Cleveland, so with some luck we’ll catch one for the next time we make this!
–Ben