Jan 28

Jan 28 Baked Cod St. Nicholas

When I was a kid, Friday night suppers were the worst (just like for Lorelai!). Raised Catholic, Friday meant there was no meat to be eaten, which I could have gladly tolerated — but unfortunately 'no meat' usually meant... fish. While fish sticks were bearable (and offered as part of the hot lunch at the Racebrook Elementary School on Fridays, which was alas! quite outside the financial means of the Glovers and an indication of how pervasive religion was in those days).

My mother, overworked and uninterested, would take a freezer-burned brick of haddock, set it in the broiler pan (the same broiler pan my brother Keith later admitted he used to cook squirrels in while the rest of us were at Church) and top it with a mixture of mayo and green relish. Needless to say, I got very good at pretending to chew and hiding offending mouthfuls in a) my napkin, b) the heating vent my chair was strategically placed next to, c) my seat cushion, or option d) under the table where the dog was waiting. These Friday night dinners put me off fish well into my 20s, when I happily decided to reclaim it. Now I am a big fan, Fridays or any day.

Besides his extracurricular activities in December, St. Nicholas' day job is being the patron saint of sailors. So when I decided to include this recipe in my boy Nick's birthday present, a compendium of family recipes, I retitled it. Not only is this easy and very adaptable, it is also super healthy. You do need parchment and kitchen twine on hand — but without sounding too preachy, you should anyway! A good quality mandolin (think slicer, not Soggy Bottom Boys) is also very helpful here, but not essential. Your favorite, sharpest knife will do.

The basic idea is that you are layering all the ingredients onto an oversized piece of parchment, tying it all up with string and flash baking it. It's worth the minimal fuss, all the ingredients come together beautifully and clean-up is a breeze! You can use fresh cod fillets or even frozen ones from Costco, just follow the instructions for thawing, this is the best way to ensure the texture remains intact. Everything steams in the parchment and creates a light, lovely broth.

Baked Cod St. Nicholas

Serves 2

4 or 5 Small New Potatoes or Fingerlings, clean but not peeled, sliced very thin

2 - 3 Tbs of Olive Oil

2 4 oz. pieces of Cod, thawed

8 - 10 Asparagus Spears, woody ends removed

1 Lemon, sliced very thin

2 cloves of Garlic, sliced very thin

10 - 12 pitted whole Kalamata Olives

10 - 12 whole Grape or Cherry Tomatoes

1/2 cup chopped fresh Parsley

Scallions, Red Onion, Shallots - optional

Salt & Pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 400°

Cover 2 standard cookie sheets each with a piece of parchment paper.

Using a mandolin slicer, slice the potatoes very thin, 1/8" if possible, and place in the center of each of the parchments, (you are making two separate packets, not one big one), slightly overlapping to create a rectangle-shaped foundation to build on. Your little raft of potatoes should measure about 3" X 6". Sprinkle with a little salt & pepper, and drizzle with a little olive oil. Place the fish on top of the potatoes. Again, sprinkle with a little salt and pepper and drizzle with a wee bit of olive oil.

Layer the asparagus on top of the fish, then the sliced lemon, then thinly sliced garlic. Top with the olives and tomatoes and onions (if you are using) and finish with the parsley, a little more salt and pepper and one last drizzle of olive oil.

Now that you have all your ingredients stacked neatly in a (roughly!) 3" by 6" stack in the middle of the parchment, gather the parchment by folding over the short ends two or three times, into a neat little parcel, and then tuck the ends under without lifting it off the sheet too much or disturbing the ingredients. This sounds much harder than it is, I swear on a stack of Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

Cut a length a kitchen twine, the length of your arm and tie up the parcel to secure. The goal here is to make it as air tight as possible, because the steam creates the broth inside the parchment and keeps everything moist and delicious.

Bake at 400° for 12 - 15 minutes. Let sit a minute or two Unwrap carefully and enjoy!