Poaching Fish

I've realized that M* and I eat very little meat (besides a weekly chicken) or fish at home—and we don't eat out very often. This is a result of frugality, but lately my body is in revolt. I had M* pick-up some sea bass from the local fishmonger last weekend, and I was ready to prepare it on Monday. I decided that the organic asparagus and potatoes from our weekly delivery needed to be eaten and so they were selected as the sides (I am contemplating cancelling our weekly vegetable delivery as we never eat all the potatoes).

The potatoes and asparagus were easy: peel the potatoes, toss them with some olive oil, salt, pepper, seasonings and bake at 350 for an hour (then toss with garlic sauteed in olive oil if you have the time) and toss the asparagus with olive, a little bit of sea salt and bake at 400° for 8-15 minutes depending on size and personal taste.

I was going to bake the fish with olive oil, tomatoes, basil and onion in sealed aluminum foil, but I had no aluminum foil. After looking online I decided on poaching: cooking in a pan on the stove in a little bit of liquid. I got some ideas from "Shallow Poached Sea Bass" although the only ingredients that I had were the sea bass and stock—but it was vegetable not chicken. Instead of Old Bay, coriander, etc., I used 1 tbsp of butter, garlic, mushrooms, onion and tarragon.

Poached sea bass, potatoes and asparagus

As for the methodology—that was a rough copy as well. I used a non-stick frying pan with no lid. I took the lid from a smaller pan and had to stick a wooden spoon under the lid to keep it from smushing the fish. I also didn't have the correct thermometer for reading fish, so I guessed the timing (about eight minutes per side). Regardless of the changes, M* and I were thrilled with the result: moist, flavorful fish. I think it's now our preferred method of preparing fish.