Fish, Anyone? (1 of 10)

To put it bluntly, I'm less than enthusiastic about seafood.   Now neither my husband or I would be considered a "picky eater," but it could be said that he is considerably more adventurous when it comes to food than I am.

Give me borscht and wassail and lapin a la cocotte. Give me "Spring Mix" with weed-like mysteries. Give me game and quinoa and kefir, but please... hold the scallops and squid and shrimp and crab and lobster and all manner of  fishy-tasting fish.  (I even try to avoid the fishy-smelling parts of the grocery store!)

That said, I do like salmon (not ALL fish is evil) and tuna salad.... and since being married to my man, I've learned to really enjoy milder fish like tilapia and sole.  This month, Real Simple magazine (no, they're not paying me to mention this, although I wish they were. ;) had an intriguing article that inspired (in progressive order) today's lunch, the lunch conversation, this post and 9 to follow.

I hereby pledge to try one fish recipe from said magazine article each week for the following 9 weeks, with recipe commentary, husbandly evaluation, wifely evaluation and a feather in my cap for adding fish to our diet at least once a week for this time period.

So without further ado, this week we tried (with sole instead of tilapia), Dijon Fish Cakes with Greens!

Photo from Real Simple Magazine

Wifely evaluation:  These were wonderful!   It doesn't hurt that I am a HUGE fan of dill (the dill plants in my garden are happy as a clam, even with our chilly temps, and I can't wait to cook with fresh dill this summer - it means that summer is REALLY here in my opinion!).
Husbandly evaluation: "I like them. And I will say this about them.  It reminded me of our romantic date on top of the space needle." (I was/am quite flattered by this compliment..... Good move, honey. ;)
Recipe commentary: I either mis-measured the dijon, or they needed more than the recipe calls for to really carry the flavor, but even without that touch they were delicate and mild, but flavorful.  Also, I saved time by cooking the sole in my non-stick skillet just until done instead of baking it in the oven. The downside of this was that the fish was a bit moister (even though I drained it) so I ended up using more breadcrumbs than called for to make the cakes "stick together."  I plan to try again with baked fish and will report the results here. :) Yes, they were that good!

Note: I used sole instead of tilapia because I can't readily find tilapia from farms the U.S.  Most of it's from China (which concerns me) and some from Honduras (not as bad, but I want to buy local!).  I plan to check at our local food co-op this week, so hopefully I can try some of these "tilapia recipes" with tilapia!


Note #2: It might seem obvious, but for those of you with whom I've been having gluten-free and dairy-free convo's, I now toast a slice or two of GF bread and make my own bread crumbs in the Magic Bullet for recipes like this.