Light and Tasty Seafood Recipes

As I get older, I enjoy the taste of meat less and less.  I eat beef only a couple times a year, and pork only a little bit more often than that.  Recently, I've gotten to the point where even the blasé, unoffensive texture of chicken makes me nauseous.  Based on the trend, I see a lot of fish and eggs in my future.

I've also noticed a skill in myself that I'd never thought to have - that of cooking.  It seems that my honed ability to multitask has given me an edge, and the inventions I concoct, simple and complex, are usually surprisingly delicious.  I wanted to share a couple of really delicious and light seafood recipes that I've had success with in the past week.

Green Onion and Lemon Tilapia

Tilapia is great.  It's nutritious, inexpensive, ubiquitous, and it takes about 15 minutes to bake.  It has no fishy smell (even though I looove fishy fish).  When cooked properly, it delicately assumes the flavors of spices and sauces, and it pairs perfectly with my beloved dry white wine.

2 tilapia fillets
1 lemon (can sub lemon juice)
2 T butter, almost melted
1 T parsley (fresh or dried)
salt and cracked black pepper
3 T green onions, finely chopped

Zest lemon and squeeze out juice while the oven is preheating to 400 degrees F.  Mix the almost-melted butter with the parsley, lemon zest, lemon juice, salt, pepper and onions.  You should have a paste-like glob of buttery, herby goodness.

Brush some butter in your glass or ceramic baking dish so the fish doesn't stick, and then arrange it artfully, tucking in the really thin sides (so they don't overcook).  Slather your butter paste all over them and bake for 15 minutes.

Light and Spicy Seafood Pasta

This worked really well with spinach pasta, but I'm sure it works well with almost anything.  I recommend buying frozen uncooked shrimp; buying thawed shrimp is much riskier, because you have no idea how long they have been thawing.  Frozen shrimp was likely frozen just after it was caught and deveined.  Anyway.  My 2 cents on shrimp.

For this recipe, I didn't measure anything, so I will approximate.  I am a big fan of swooping through the kitchen like a mad scientist, mwahahah-ing over a steaming, sizzling pan and tossing ingredients in left and right.  You may also want to experience this dubious pleasure, but for those measuring types, here you go.

2 servings pasta
2 servings worth of shrimp (c'mon, guesstimate!)
2 T olive oil
2 dashes of chili powder
2 dashes cracked red pepper
2 cups broccoli (or other delicious veggie of your choosing)
1 big, fat clove of garlic (or two normal ones)
uhhh 3 splashes of dry white wine?  1 cup?
3 T water from cooking pasta
1 T unsalted butter
1 T lemon juice
2 dashes of basil (not required)
salt and pepper to taste

I added more chili powder at the end of the cooking process, which gave it a pleasant heat.  Who knew lemon would go so well with chili pepper?

Cook pasta and set aside, saving some of the water from the pot.  Take a saucepan over medium heat and add olive oil, spices and garlic.  Let them cook for a bit to develop their flavor, and then add your shrimp and veggies.  Stir for about a minute, then remove veggies and shrimp and set aside; they should not be fully cooked at this point.

Add your 3 or 4 generous splashes of wine to the saucepan and reduce.  When you think your sauce looks delightful (after a few minutes), add in your veggies and shrimp again, and stir in your pasta water.  Cook until shrimp is done, veggies should still be tender and almost crunchy (don't overcook your broccoli like I did).  Remove your pan from heat and stir in your butter, lemon juice and basil.  You might want to add more salt and pepper at this point - I added more chili powder.

Toss with pasta and NOM!  This is a very light sauce, but it should have a lot of complex flavor.