Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Fillets of sole with sorrel

May 30, 2013 by Mary Frances 28 Comments

I did something really terrific last night. (at least I thought it was!) You should know that sorrel is one of my favorite herbs. It’s lemony and light and so interesting and surprising. I had some fresh sorrel I had just cut from my garden upstate on Monday, that I wanted to use and some fillets of sole. We got home late and hungry. Before it got so late, I had in my mind to roast the fish and make a sorrel sauce. You know, with garlic and olive oil and maybe a touch of cream, but it was late and we were starving, so I came up with this idea. Lazy, I suppose, but a beautiful concept. I remembered this dish I used to make all the time with sorrel when the kids were young. It was sautéed chicken, with lots of onions, and then you throw in the sorrel on top, cover it and it melts. It’s not a pretty dish because the greens turn dark, but it tastes fabulous.

So I thought what if I reversed that and put the sorrel on the bottom of the fish, having it melt underneath? Genius – don’t you think?! You wouldn’t see it then but still get all the flavor, having it form a simple sauce.

So that’s what I did – and here’s our green and white meal. But it was really, really yummy!! I served the fish with sautéed mustard greens with garlic and steamed Jasmine rice topped with chopped parsley.
FILLETS OF SOLE WITH SORREL
– serves 2

2 sole fillets, rinsed and patted dry with paper towels
2 handfuls of washed sorrel
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Chopped fresh chives

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Slick a rimmed baking sheet with olive oil. Arrange 2 handfuls of sorrel in the shape of your fish fillet. Drizzle a tiny bit of olive oil on the sorrel and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Place your fish fillet on top, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.

Roast for 10 – 12 minutes, depending on the thickness of your fish. Figure on 10 minutes for an inch of thickness, measured in the thickest area of your fish.

When done, carefully remove the fish with the sorrel leaves distributed on the bottom and garnish with chopped fresh chives.

This is the beauty of having super fresh ingredients, combined with LOVE, to make a fabulous, healthy meal in no time at all.

Enjoy!!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

February 14, 2012 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

So tonight, what will you be doing? I’m not a big fan of going out in NYC. The restaurants are always packed and besides, I’d rather serve my own LOVE-filled food at home!

I’m planning on making a veal chop recipe with grapes, honey and sage. It’s a very memorable dish that I made years ago and I really haven’t repeated, quite frankly, because veal is so expensive. But tonight, it will be just the two of us so I figure I’ll go for it!

Now Zach (23) is still living at home with us and he needs a place for his dinner with his girlfriend. So I suggested a candle light dinner in our office conference room with food brought in. Sounds pretty good – right? They’ll be alone. I just need to get the conference room in shape from all the editing and packing for the move that we’ve been doing.

When the kids were little, I would always make these heart cookies that my mother used to make for us. They are an oatmeal based cut-out cookie, that you sandwich two together and then ice all over with a buttercream frosting. They are really good and get better with age as the butter soaks into the cookies. But as you can imagine, they are a ton of work. My oldest son, had us all over for dinner on Sunday night at his apartment in Williamsburg, and was asking about the cookies. With the move, I don’t think I’ll get to them this year.

It was wonderful to have dinner at our older son’s home, particularly after the full day of packing we did at the office. Zach helped us on Sunday and both boys helped on Saturday. (We are blessed with great kids.)

The dinner was a delicious chicken tagine with homemade chick peas and farro instead of cous cous (much better) and served with a mixture of mustard greens and kale, wilted under the broiler, and then tossed with a dressing of olive oil and balsamic vinegar! Divine!!

To all you young moms out there, this is what can happen if you serve your kids great fresh food cooked with LOVE. They will want to continue the tradition and even step it up a notch! Our older son’s most recent purchase – the French Laundry cookbook from Thomas Keller! I don’t even have that one and it is gorgeous!!

Happy Valentine’s Day to you all!

Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Fillets of sole with sorrel

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Pages

Blogs We Love