In naming this blog, I acknowledged that fish are healthy, but none of the recipes described in this blog use fish. Well, there was a fish pie, but it was loaded with potatoes and cheese, so is not the solution to my family dietary dilemma. I've used shrimp a lot, because shrimp are delicious, and they come from the sea. Sadly, however, they are not even closely related to fish and contain a lot of cholesterol.
It's not that I dislike fish. I used to cook with fish quite often. I would poach it in milk and serve it with parsley sauce and buttery mashed potatoes. My husband thinks parsley sauce is bland so he doesn't eat it. I wrote a whole blog about that already, it turns out that adding shallots doesn't help, it hinders. My problem is that I don't know what to do with white fish to make it exciting enough so that my husband will really enjoy it while still keeping it healthy. I'm sure he'd love cod, if it was breaded, fried and served with cheese.
Today I cooked with cod. I steamed it with soy sauce, lemon juice, rice vinegar, bok choy, garlic, ginger and lemongrass I have never cooked with lemongrass before. It tastes a lot like lemons, but looks a lot like grass, so that was exciting. I made lemon juice by chopping two lemons in half and squeezing the living shit out of it, which was also fun. I didn't measure anything but combined the ingredients hap hazardly into an aluminium parcel, wrapped it up and put it in the steamer for about 15-20 mins until the fish was cooked.
The meal is based on several Thai-style fish recipes that were similar. Typically, they said to use a red chili but there was none in the supermarket today. Just in case it was crucial, I got some red pepper sauce for the table. The recipes recommended serving this kind of dish with jasmine rice. I'm not that into rice so I put a few steamed dumplings on the side instead. Dumplings are delicious. I made green beans because I am as white as the rice that white famously sticks to.
This is the result
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| Thai Steamed Cod with Lemongrass |
My husband liked it a lot. He says it's one of the best things I've made and he had second and third helpings. My son was not so sure, he thought it was nice but not amazing. I'm more of my son's persuasion. It might have tasted too much of citrus for me. My husband's history with frozen margaritas tells me that he's okay with tart citrus acid flavors. I don;t like lime margaritas, I like mango ones because they're less sour.
It was certainly really fun and easy to make, and healthy too. My husband and son both ate it, and so at least one meal this week was home cooked, low fat, and tasty. :)
