The best dinner ever…

 

Picture from The New York Times online cooking column

A few days ago, I bragged on the cooking skills of one of my grands; today I want to brag on my own cooking. The other night I fixed one of the best dinners I’ve done in a long time. In fact, Jordan pronounced it “the best dinner ever,” and Jacob liked it well enough to request the recipe for a file he’s keeping of things he really likes. It was baked cod with a buttery cracker topping.

My local family loves salmon—and those shrimp I’m allergic to—but they weren’t much on fish in general. I sauteed Dover sole one night, but it is as fragile as it is delicate in flavor and fell apart so that we ended up with fish hash—tasty but no eye appeal. The last time I tried cod I overcooked it, so we swore off it for a while. But the other night I got it just right—done enough for Jordan who has a horror of raw, yet still moist and flavorful. And it looked terrific. I am so sorry I forgot to take a picture, but I have “borrowed” the one that came with the recipe.

Cooking hint: when cooking fish filets with crumb topping, spread a thin layer of mayonnaise on the fish before adding the topping. It both hold the crumbs in place and keeps the fish moist. This is my addition and not in the recipe. Texas residents may remember the Black-Eyed Pea chain of restaurants and particularly their whitefish with crumb topping. I learned the mayo tip from them, I think.

Cooking hint two: for buttery crackers, you can’t beat Ritz original.

The crumb topping for this recipe was seasoned with plenty of butter, lemon zest and juice, salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, and chives (I used green onion tops). You can find the recipe here: Baked Cod With Buttery Cracker Topping Recipe - NYT Cooking (nytimes.com) I hope the paywall doesn’t keep you out.

The topping was so good on its own that I used it the next night to make salmon patties from my last can of good salmon, canned fresh where it was caught on the Oregon coast. (I hope to be able to order more in the spring when the salmon run again.) Salmon patties are a favorite from my childhood, and I often make them just for me. Mom called them croquettes, insisted on nothing but saltines for binding ingredients together, and then rolled the little round logs in more crushed saltines. I found the croquette shape to hard to deal with, patties much easier, and forgot the idea of a crumb coating. I also switched to Ritz crackers—they crush easily into fine crumbs. Ordinarily I season with salt and pepper, maybe a bit of dry mustard and a dash of Worcestershire, but with those already seasoned crumbs I just added egg to the salmon and then enough crumbs to make a mixture that would hold together. Usually it’s one egg for a 7 oz. can of salmon; last night, because my eggs were small, I used two.

With both the cod and the salmon cakes, I served a lemon/butter sauce: You can find it here: Lemon Butter Sauce Recipe (Versatile & Easy) | Kitchn (thekitchn.com) If I’ve said it before, it’s worth repeating: kitchn.com is a terrific source of recipes—and cleaning tips, though the latter don’t interest me nearly as much.

Next on my fish list: either salmon piccata or salmon with spinach and artichoke hearts. Wish I felt like splurging on lobster.