Happy day after Cinco de Mayo! Hope your Mexican feast was as yummy as ours! I will be posting the recipe for margarita cupcakes shortly, but first… after much delay, fish tacos!
For as long as I can remember, I have hated fish. This didn’t bode well for me when I was growing up because my family would go camping at Lake Mary Ronan in Montana every weekend during the summer to go fishing. If fisherman’s luck was on my parents’ side, we would have freshly caught fish at least once a weekend. Not so lucky for me. Once I moved out, I never ate fish again! (My wonderful mother would make me a hamburger whenever they had fish when I was visiting them for dinner – I’m spoiled I tell ya!)
My stance on fish changed DRASTICALLY when we went to Maui for our honeymoon… I decided to take the “when in Rome” stance and try fish tacos the first day we were there. We literally went from the airport to the rental car place to our condo to drop off our stuff to the first restaurant we could find (Jawz Fish Tacos in Kihei, I heart you!). I had their Ono Fish Tacos… I am STILL drooling. They were seriously just simple fish tacos: fish, cabbage, cilantro rice, and salsa… but I was in love. I had fish tacos probably at least once a day while we were there… and we were there for a week. That’s a lot of fish!
After we got back from Maui, I started to go through withdrawals. Laugh all you want to, but I felt like a junkie! About a week after being home, we went to dinner at some friends’ house… for fish taco night. Thank you Scott and Brandi for feeding my habit! 🙂 A couple of days later, I decided to make our own fish tacos! I’m a junkie I tell ya!
Since then, I have a new appreciation of fish, but only SOME fish. Tilapia, cod, Mahi Mahi, halibut – you’re ok in my book. I’m going to stay away from salmon and the “fishier” types until I can find a way to get them to not taste like fish. (I saw a thing on tv saying if you soak your salmon in milk for an hour it gets rid of the fishy taste/smell… I’ll try that trick on a day when I feel more adventurous! 😉 )
Anyways, here is a yummy fish taco recipe (complete with a simple cilantro sauce and pico de gallo that you could make ahead) that I hope you will enjoy! I will also post an avocado and mango salsa recipe below that we tried a few weeks back that was super good! Matt suggested that it would have been good on a fish taco too!
Simple Fish Tacos
1 lb skinless cod or tilapia
8 white corn tortillas
2 cups thinly sliced cabbage
1 lime for juicing
1 cup pico de gallo (see recipe below)
1 cup cilantro lime sauce (see recipe below)
1 cup of shredded cheese (your choice – we used sharp cheddar)
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a baking dish and place the fish inside in a single layer. Season with salt and pepper and squeeze a lime over the top (I sometimes season mine with a little cumin as well). Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the fish flakes easily with a fork.
While the fish is cooking, heat a pan on the stove over medium-high heat. Lightly spray the tortillas with cooking spray and cook 2-3 minutes or until lightly browned, turning once. Place them on paper towels and cover with tin foil until you are ready to eat.
Pico de Gallo
2 tomatoes, seeded
1 small onion
2 limes, juiced
1/3 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
1 clove of garlic, crushed
Dice the tomatoes and onion, and chop the cilantro. Mix in the chopped cilantro, lime juice, and garlic. Add a pinch of salt and pepper and refrigerate until you’re ready to eat!
Cilantro Lime Sauce
1/2 cup mayonnaise
3 tbsp milk
2 tbsp sour cream
1 clove of garlic, crushed
2 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
1 lime, juiced
Mix all the ingredients and add salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate until dinnertime!
Now all you need is to put them together! In Hawaii, they did 2 tortillas since they tend to rip, so that’s what I did. Then fish, then cheese, then cabbage, then cilantro sauce, then pico! We even added a little guacamole, but you could omit that or just use an avocado slice.
Here’s our spread:
For the other fish recipe I mentioned, cook the fish the same and then prepare the mango avocado salsa as follows:
Mango Avocado Salsa
1 ripe mango, diced
1 ripe avocado, diced
2 teaspoons cumin
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
Salt and pepper to taste
As you can see from the photo, I served it on top of the baked fish with a side of sautéed asparagus and couscous. Matt thought the salsa would be awesome in fish tacos, so we’ll try that at some point (when I need my next fix). Enjoy!
Happy Dishing!
~Des
Dishing with Des 