This recipe is inspired by a dish I had several times in an Italian Restaurant on 8th street in Wisconsin Rapids when travelling there on business. I generally prefer meat over fish, so this should tell you something that I ordered it more than once. They called their dish Baked Atlantic Cod. Obviously, they would not give me their recipe, but after several trials I think I got it right.
After fine tuning the recipe I have prepared various fish this way: cod, halibut, salmon, sole, basa and they all worked well so you probably can use almost any fish..
Recipe
I prepare this dish as individual portions in elongated porcelain boat-shaped baking bowls, so the recipe will show amounts for a single portion.
Also, as in most of my cooking recipes (and yes, arbitrarily, this is a cooking recipe even though it is baked), the amounts are approximate and just a starting point.
Ingredients
| Per single serving | |
|---|---|
| 6-8 oz 170-225 g | Atlantic cod (or other fish) fillet1 |
| 1.5 tbsp | extra virgin olive oil |
| as needed | butter (thin slices) about 2×2 in each slice. I often use potato peeler to get them. |
| 1 tbsp | lemon juice |
| 1 tbsp | prepared mustard |
| 1 tbsp | prepared horseradish |
| 2 tbsp | bread crumbs |
| 2 tbsp | grated Parmiggiano Reggiano2 |
| to taste | salt, ground black pepper |
- You can try to get fresh cod or other ocean fish, but unless you live close to the sea it will likely be “previously frozen”. Using frozen fish is OK, as long as you completely defrost it before cooking. Two quick ways to defrost fish are:
– putting the packaged fish (in a sealed plastic bag) in room-temperature water, or
– using microwave defrost program (I tend to set it to shorter time by entering lower weight of the fish into the program. The idea is to get it defrosted but not
heated) You may need to wait a bit to complete the defrosting. ↩︎ - I prefer the original Parmiggiano Reggiano over North American imitations, but that is not to say that such substitution wouldn’t work. I just did not try it. ↩︎
Directions
- Place two slices of butter on the bottom of the baking bowl. Add 1.5 tbsp of olive oil.
- Rinse and pat dry with a paper towel a fish fillet. Place it on top of the butter in the bowl.
- Sprinkle the lemon juice over the fish and let sit for a few minutes.
- Season the fillet with salt and pepper.
- Mix the horseradish and mustard and smear the mixture on top of the fish fillet
- Place 2-3 slices of butter on top of the fillet to cover most of it.
- Mix the bread crumbs with grated Parmiggiano Reggiano and sprinkle the mixture on top of the fish. Use more or less according to your preference. I use enough to cover the fish and get some mixed with oil and lemon juice around it.
- Bake in a 375°F (190°C) oven or toaster oven for about 20-25 minutes, until internal temperature is about 145°F (63°C). Cooking time depends on the thickness of the fish so for thin fillets you may need to shorten the time. Do not overcook the fish.
- Serve while the dish is still sizzling but warn everybody that the bowl is very hot.