Farmers Market Recipe: Heart Healthy Pesto Baked Turbot

from Contributing Food Editor, Katheryne Phillips

In the spirit of love and Valentine's Day, this recipe is not only a great idea for a romantic dinner for two, but it's super heart healthy as well.

I’m super excited to share this recipe with all of you, because it includes one of my favorite fishes, Turbot. Most people don’t even know about this delicious flat fish. It's firm, yet delicate, with an extremely buttery taste. I would compare it to Sea bass in texture and taste, but it's less than ½ the price per pound. That makes this recipe not only good for your heart, but good for your wallet too. There are a lot of steps to this dinner, but they are easy steps, and so worth the outcome.

Pesto baked Turbot with leeks and roasted tomatoes, rainbow quinoa, and parmesan romanesco.

2 6-8oz fillets of turbot skin off

2/3 cup rainbow quinoa

1 1/3 organic chicken stock

6 crimini mushrooms chopped

2 leeks chopped and soaked clean

Handful of cherry or grape tomatoes

1 head of romanesco (about 1lb)

¼ cup good quality fresh cello grated parmesan

1 shallot diced

2 cloves of garlic (smashed and diced)

1 cup of fresh basil leaves

1 cup fresh spinach leaves

Zest of one lemon

Juice of one lemon

Teaspoon of dried oregano

Teaspoon paprika

Olive oil

1 sauce pan

Pot with lid

Tinfoil lined baking sheet.

Oven safe glass or casserole baking dish

First step is the quinoa because it will take the most amount of time.

Quinoa: Begin by toasted the quinoa in a hot pan. Toast over med-hi heat for about 3-4 minutes or until you can smell the grain actually toasting. To prevent burning the quinoa, consistently swirl the grain around the pan. Once it’s toasted, set it aside.

Heat your chicken broth in a small pot with a lid until its boiling. Add a pinch of salt, and then toss in your toasted quinoa. Put the lid on the pot, and simmer for about fifteen minutes at low heat.

Now add your chopped shallots to a hot pan and sauté with a tablespoon of olive oil until they start to soften, add your chopped mushrooms, (more oil if needed) garlic, dried oregano, and sauté for another 3 minutes. Add a pinch of salt and cook for another minute. Once all of your veggies look soft remove from the heat.

If the quinoa has absorbed all of the liquid in its pot, remove it from the heat, and mix in the mushrooms and shallot mixture. Lightly stir all together. If you’d like to keep the quinoa warm while the fish bakes, put all of it back into your pan, turn heat to lowest setting, cover with a lid and let sit until dinner is ready. You may want to add a bit more broth at the end of this step if it gets dry.

Fish: Pre-heat your oven to 375F.

Put all of your basil, spinach, chopped garlic, lemon juice and a 1/3 cup of olive oil in to a food processor and blend together. Add salt and pepper to taste.

In a small bowl toss your tomatoes with olive oil and salt.

Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large sauce pan. Add your chopped and cleaned leeks, and a pinch of salt.  Sweat over med high heat for about 8 minutes or until the leeks have softened and turned opaque in color. 

Once the leeks become soft cover the bottom of your baking dish with them, this will create a soft bed for the fish to bake in.

Next place your Turbot fillets in the baking dish. Top the turbot with a heaping pile of pesto, and arrange your small tomatoes around the fish. Bake at 375 for 20 minutes. The fish will be flaky in texture when it’s done. After 20 minutes, remove the fish from the oven and cover it with tin foil. Set it aside and turn your oven up to broil.

In a mixing bowl, toss 3 tablespoons of olive oil, paprika, lemon zest, parmesan and a pinch of salt and pepper. Take the romanesco florets off of its core by cutting around the stem in a circular motion.  Once they are all free toss them in the olive oil, parmesan mix and lay them on your tin foil lined baking sheet. Place them in to the broiler for 6-8 minutes. Keep an eye on the florets, making sure they don’t burn while they broil. They should get soft and somewhat browned on all of their edges. The toasted parmesan should give them a bit of a crunch.

Now all you have to do is serve and enjoy the fruits or in this case fish of your labor.

This is a recipe by Katheryne Phillips of KatheryneCooks.com