It’s a week night and even though we like to eat at 7:30-8 on weekends, it just doesn’t work for week nights when I need a couple of hours to blog, and such! I’m always looking for tasty and quick ways to serve fish and Kristy’s delightful Baked Cod Portuguese was a sure winner, but I didn’t have the fire roasted tomatoes, nor the time to make them, so I took her recipe as inspiration. This one is quite low calorie, no butter or olive oil.
Halibut with a Rustic Tomato Sauce
Makes 3 servings (100g each fish and 200g tomato sauce and greens)
Ingredients:
- 300 g Halibut
- 300 g cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
- 90 g vidalia onion and garlic (the ratio is entirely up to you, I had about 80g onion, 10g garlic)
- 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
- salt to taste
- non-stick cooking spray
- 300 g mixed greens, including cucumber and green onions
- 3 tbsp chopped fresh flat leaf parsley
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Lightly spray a cookie sheet with non-stick cooking spray. Distribute the tomatoes, onion and garlic on the pan evenly. Salt.
- Bake for about 30 minutes. Pour the contents into your immersion blender jar and blend until smooth. Add the smoked paprika and blend again. Keep the oven on.
- Strain through a fine sieve, discard what is left in the sieve.
- In a cast iron pan, sear the fish skin side on high heat for about 4 minutes. Pour the rustic tomato sauce over the hot fish and bake in the hot oven for about 15 minutes (this depends entirely how thick your fish is).
- Meanwhile, create a fresh green salad (about 100 g each serving) with the mixed greens (we used spinach and baby arugula), cucumber and green onion.
- When the fish is cooked through, remove the skin and place 100 g onto each bed of greens. Add about one third of the sauce to each plate. Garnish with parsley.
The sauce was lovely, not too acidic (I didn’t add sugar because I am no carbing for three weeks!) but you certainly can to taste. And the garlic really added a wonderful nutty flavour of a baked clove. I will definitely make this sauce again, perhaps with chicken or left over turkey, but then I would add chili pepper flakes to heat it up.
Hola Eva, this looks so simple and delicious…….lovely dish 🙂
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Wow, Eva, this fish looks absolutely amazing! What a fantastic idea for a quick weeknight dinner. I like your substitution of oven-roasted tomatoes very much! I hope to try this recipe sometime soon!
If I can’t find halibut, what other types of fish/meat would you recommend?
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Salmon would be a good substitute too, the acidity of the tomato sauce would work well against the slightly fatty salmon. I would also serve the sauce with chicken.
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I have made similar dish before, but I love your addition of smokey paprika. Now that makes a huge difference in flavor. I can’t wait to re-make this. Placing on top of cucumbers make the dish lighter and pretty!
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I know I’d love this – better not show it to my wife though… she’s always found the idea of tomato sauce with fish wrong for some reason – can’t understand why because it’s just so delish.
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I’ve not heard of that before you mentioned it a while ago (I think I read it in your comment Kristy’s post, perhaps?). I wonder if it is the acidity she dislikes or just the cooked tomatoes? Hmmm, none the less, if you are around in the next day or so, I’m posting a wonderful red pepper coulis that may just be what your wife might enjoy with a lovely firm white fish. Have a great evening.
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I need more REAL food like this…simple, fresh and tasty!
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Thank you Angie, it was very tasty indeed!
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Isn’t it amazing what you can pull together in a short period of time ~ a delightful, healthy and wonderfully tasty meal without all the fuss… that’s my kind of cooking. Fabulous Eva!
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Thanks Kelly, it really hit the taste buds perfectly.
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No carbs for three weeks??? Wow! I wish I had your self-control… Congratulations!
I love this super light, beautiful fish dish!
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Thanks Sissi, once you get over the first day, it’s easy, there are no cravings, or even hunger between meals. It’s pretty amazing to be honest.
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This looks wonderful and I always say tomatoes are their own butter. OK, that’s the first time I said that. But I think it’s my new favorite saying.
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Very cute Greg. I’m going to quote you on that from now on.
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Wow so delicious! I love how all your instructions are so detailed too! Great job! You’ve made my mouth water! and congrats on successfully not carbing for 3 weeks! That’s super impressive!!
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Thank you kindly Sam, by cutting out carbs for three weeks, I can easily cut down calories and not feel hungry or snacky and lose a bit of weight!
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I’m so glad you liked this recipe Eva and I love what you did with it! 🙂 I’m going to have to give this version a try next time. And I’m with you – the easy the better for weeknights! Thanks for the mention too. Have a great rest of the weekend!
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Thank you kindly Kristy; I loved your version and we’ll do it again when I think ahead and make the roasted tomato. I loved the depth of flavour.
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Simple and flavorful! This sounds delish 🙂
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Thank Liz it was very tasty indeed.
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Wow no butter or oil and yet it looks fabulously tasty too! I love that!
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I try to cook without butter but sometimes you just have to; this dish has great depth of flavour so it really doesn’t need the butter or cream, unless you want to add it!
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What a beautiful dish, Eva. The colors are so pretty and enticing, and I’m sure it tastes as good as it looks. Love flavors that result from roasting veggies!
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I totally agree Betsy, oven or BBQ roasting is the only way to go, particularly if you’re short in time.
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The roasting would add so much flavor to this dish.. and I love smokey paprika as seasoning. I’m in need of lighter fare these days and will try this one!
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Thanks Barbara, we’ll definitely do it again, the sauce was sweet and thick and very tasty.
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I really enjoy using roasted cherry tomatoes as a basis for a sauce, especially in winter when flavorful “regular” tomatoes are hard to come by. This here is as good, if not better, use of them as any I’ve tried — but not for long. I need to find some halibut!
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Thank you kindly John, it really does bring out that sweetness that cooking in a pan doesn’t do unless you cook for hours and hours which is not that practical unless you want to eat at midnight. The halibut is a nice firm fish that holds up in the oven in a sauce.
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Good idea roasting the vegetables for this to get that extra flavor.
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Thanks Sharyn, oven roasting is my flavourite way to get the flavours out if those vegetables. Soon it will be time to move the roasting out to the BBQ…hopefully.
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Sounds like a wonderful summery meal! As much as I love my heavy dishes (as you’ve seen!), I also really enjoy lighter meals like this one. Thank you!
http://www.foodforays.com
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Thanks Tami, with the warm weather hopefully closing in, we’re starting our healthful eating early. Plus we’re off to the Big Apple and I need to shop in shape!
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You are so creative Eva, that sure was a low carb, delicious weeknight’s meal.
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And the best part Norma, is that you don’t feel hungry or snacky after a few hours!
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This looks like a wonderful mid-week meal Eva, so quick to prepare, so good for you and so healthy. I know how you feel re weeknights – we just need a few extra hours each day and we’ll be able to go to bed knowing we almost achieved everything! xx
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Thanks Charlie, so much to do, so little time!
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This fish dish looks stunning – I am sure it would taste wonderful for dinner which is why I am bookmarking it for my seafood loviing daddy 🙂
Thank you!
Cheers
Choc Chip Uru
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How nice of you to say, CCU. I should have pulled it out of the sauce to show how gorgeous white flakey it was, but then again we were hungry!
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