Mark Bittman's Quick and Easy Recipes from the New York Times (13 page)

• Sausage, (especially chorizo), cut into bits

• Peas and/or other vegetables, cut up if necessary

• Scallops, treated exactly like the shrimp

• Boneless pork or chicken, cut into ½-inch or smaller cubes

• Tofu, stirred into the rice during the last 5 minutes of baking

• Clams and/or mussels, well scrubbed, placed on top of the rice when you put the pan in the oven

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 40 MINUTES

THREE OR FOUR
ingredients are traditional in a clambake: clams (which should be littlenecks, not steamers, to minimize sandiness and make eating easier); lobster, of which you don’t need much, about half per person; corn, an ear (or two, if it’s good) per person; sausage, which you can certainly do without if you prefer; and melted butter, which is entirely optional (and I find entirely unnecessary). If you have those things, all you need to do to mimic a real outdoor clambake, basically, is dump them in a pot, cover it, and turn on the heat. No kidding.

1.
Put the meat if you’re using it in the bottom of a very large pot, like a lobster pot (or divide the ingredients between 2 large pots). Add the clams and mussels, then the potatoes. Top with the lobster and corn and add ½ cup of water. Cover and turn the heat to high.

2.
Cook, shaking the pot a little every few minutes, for about 20 minutes. Remove the lid and carefully (there is a danger of scalding) check one of the potatoes to see whether it is done. If not, re-cover and cook for another 10 minutes or so.

3.
Put the corn, meat, and lobsters on one or more platters. Put the mollusks in a large bowl and ladle some of the cooking juices over them. Serve, if you like, with melted butter.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 1 HOUR

BOUILLABAISSE, THE MEDITERRANEAN
fish stew that is more difficult to spell than to prepare, is traditionally neither an idée fixe nor the centerpiece of a grand bouffe, but a spur-of-the-moment combination of the day’s catch. The key to bouillabaisse is a variety of good fish of different types, so use this recipe as a set of guidelines rather than strict dogma and don’t worry about duplicating the exact types or quantities of fish.

1.
Put the olive oil in a casserole or large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the zest, fennel, saffron if you’re using it, and chile and cook for about a minute. Add the tomatoes and turn the heat to medium-high. When the mixture boils, reduce the heat to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, until the mixture becomes saucelike, 10 to 15 minutes. (You can prepare the dish several hours in advance up to this point; cover and set aside until you’re ready to eat.)

2.
Add the monkfish and raise the heat to medium-high. When the mixture begins to boil, reduce the heat to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally, until it is just about tender, 10 minutes or so.

3.
Add the clams, raise the heat to high, and stir. When the mixture boils, reduce the heat to low, cover, and cook until the clams begin to open, 5 to 10 minutes. Add the shrimp and white fish, stir, and cover; cook, stirring gently once or twice, until the white fish is just about done (a thin-bladed knife will pierce it with little resistance), about 5 minutes. (If the mixture is very thick-there should be some broth-add a cup or so of hot water.) Stir in the garlic and cook for 1 minute more. Stir in the parsley and serve, with crusty bread.

SIMPLEST STEAMED FISH

FLOUNDER POACHED IN BROTH

SPARKLING CIDER-POACHED FISH

GRILLED FISH THE MEDITERRANEAN WAY

FISH BAKED WITH LEEKS

COD CAKES WITH GINGER AND SCALLIONS

COD WITH CHICKPEAS AND SHERRY

EMMA’S COD AND POTATOES

ROAST MONKFISH WITH CRISP POTATOES, OLIVES, AND BAY LEAVES

ROAST MONKFISH WITH MEAT SAUCE

GRAVLAX

SALMON BURGERS

HERB-RUBBED SALMON

ROAST SALMON STEAKS WITH PINOT NOIR SYRUP

ROAST SALMON WITH SPICY SOY OIL

SALMON ROASTED IN BUTTER

SALMON AND TOMATOES COOKED IN FOIL

TUNA OR SWORDFISH WITH ONION CONFIT

TUNA AU POIVRE

GRILLED SWORDFISH “SANDWICH” WITH GREEN SAUCE

SHAD ROE WITH MUSTARD

FISH TACOS WITH FRESH SALSA

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 10 MINUTES

IF YOU HAVE
forgotten how delicious a fillet of fish can be, do this: Steam it, with nothing. Drizzle it with olive oil and lemon. Sprinkle it with salt. Eat it. If the number of ingredients and technique are minimal, the challenge is not. You need a high-quality and uniformly thick piece of fish to begin with, your timing must be precise—which is all a matter of attention and judgment, really—and your olive oil flavorful. That taken care of, there is no better or easier preparation.

1.
Put at least 1 inch of water in the bottom of a steamer (see Note), cover, and bring to a boil. Put the fish on the steamer’s rack—making sure the rack is elevated above the water—cover again, and steam for 4 to 8 minutes, or until the fish is done. You must check often—taking care not to scald yourself when removing the steamer’s lid—and stop the cooking the instant a thin-bladed knife meets no resistance when poking the fillet. (A good-sized halibut fillet may require 10 or even 12 minutes.)

2.
Transfer the fish to a warm platter and drizzle with olive oil and lemon juice. Sprinkle with coarse salt and serve.

VARIATION

Simplest Steamed Fish with Soy

You can drizzle the fish with anything you like in place of the olive oil and lemon. Try, for example, a drizzle of soy sauce and a little minced peeled fresh ginger and/or chopped scallion.

NOTE

To jerry-rig a steaming vessel, I use a large oval casserole with a rack that fits in it; it was designed for roasting meat. Since the rack sits only about a quarter of an inch above the bottom, though, I have to elevate it, which I do by resting it on a couple of glass ramekins. As long as you have a large rack that fits inside of a larger pot, you will figure something out.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 20 MINUTES

THIN FISH FILLETS
can be tricky to prepare, mostly because they fall apart the instant they’re overcooked. But the fact that quarter-inch-thick fillets of flounder, sole, and other flatfish take so little time to cook can be an advantage. By poaching them in barely hot liquid, you slow the cooking and gain control. By flavoring the liquid first with a quick-cooking aromatic vegetable, you create a dish that needs only bread or rice to become a meal. Unlike with broiling or sautéing, the fish never dries out.

The traditional liquid for poaching fish is court bouillon, a stock made from scratch using fish bones, onions, carrots, and celery enhanced with white wine and herbs. Assuming you don’t have any court bouillon on hand—and who does?—my poaching liquid of choice is chicken stock, and the canned variety is fine, because you’re going to add flavor to it, and quickly, in the form of leeks and fish.

1.
Put the stock in a large skillet that can be covered and turn the heat to high. Let it boil and reduce by about half while you prepare the leeks. Trim the leeks of the root and green end; cut the white part in half the long way and rinse thoroughly. Chop each half into ⅛- to ¼-inch-thick semicircles, adding them to the boiling broth as you cut them.

2.
When all the leeks are added, cook for another minute. Add salt and pepper to taste and stir, then add the fish. Cover and turn off the heat or keep the heat at an absolute minimum. Uncover and check the fish after 3 minutes; it is done when a thin-bladed knife encounters no resistance. Continue to check every minute until the fish is done.

3.
Serve the fish with the leeks and some broth spooned over it; top all with a sprinkling of coarse salt.

VARIATIONS

• Use any aromatic vegetable you like in place of the leeks, alone or in combination: shallots, onions, scallions, garlic, celery, or carrots (cut carrots into very small pieces or shred them on a grater or in a food processor so they’ll cook quickly).

• Add fresh herbs, especially parsley, chervil, or dill, alone or in combination.

• Add spices, alone or in combination. For example, for a North African-style dish, use a few coriander seeds, a small piece of cinnamon, and a little cumin. Or add a couple of teaspoons of curry powder to the broth.

• You can also use this technique for thicker fillets, like red snapper, sea bass, or cod. After you cover the skillet, keep the heat on low and, after about 6 minutes, check the fish every minute. When a thin-bladed knife encounters no resistance, the fish is done; when it begins to flake, it’s overdone—but only slightly, and it will still be juicy.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 15 MINUTES

THIS IS A
simple marriage of butter, shallots, and mushrooms, splashed in a dose of hard cider (the dry, sparkling kind from France or England, sold nearly everywhere you can buy beer and wine) and used to poach fish in a hot oven. The fish may be haddock, cod, monkfish, halibut, red snapper, or any other white-fleshed fish. The cider provides a distinctively sour fruitiness, not at all like white wine, and the completed dish has complementary textures: crunchy shallots, meaty mushrooms (portobellos are good here), and tender fish.

1.
Preheat the oven to 500°F. Smear the bottom of an ovenproof skillet with the butter; sprinkle the shallot and mushrooms around the sides of the skillet. Season the fish with salt and pepper to taste and lay it in the center of the skillet. Pour the cider around the fish.

2.
Bring to a boil on top of the stove, then transfer to the oven. Bake for about 8 minutes; it’s highly unlikely the fish will need more time than this unless it is very thick (or you like it very well done). Baste with the pan juices and serve.

VARIATIONS

• The lone improvement you can make to the main recipe is to add more butter. Although I stopped at 4 tablespoons—½ stick—I realized that there really was almost no upper limit as far as my taste buds were concerned. But the dish is awfully nice when made on the lean side, too.

• Substitute any aromatic vegetable, or a combination, for the shallot: onion, leek, carrot (cut very small), celery, fennel, scallion.

• Use a mixture of mushrooms, or fresh mushrooms combined with reconstituted dried mushrooms. A little of the strained mushroom-soaking liquid added to the poaching liquid is nice, too.

• A teaspoon of thyme leaves added to the poaching liquid is great; also good is parsley (a small handful of stalks), chervil (a small bunch), or dill (a few stalks). Garnish with chopped fresh leaves of the same herb.

• Some seeds are good in the poaching liquid, too—try caraway, coriander, or fennel.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

TIME: 30 MINUTES

THIS IS ONE
of those recipes in which the shopping may take you longer than the cooking, because fennel stalks—or those from dill, which are nearly as good—are often discarded by grocers. When you buy a bulb of fennel, you’re buying the bottom, trimmed of its long stalks; when you buy a bunch of dill, you’re buying the feathery tops, trimmed of the stalks that support them. Because this recipe requires some of those stalks, you will probably have to speak directly to a produce manager, visit a farmstand or a friend’s garden, or simply get lucky.