Sauteed Halibut with Creamy Chard Pasta
Halibut is soul satisfying. It is meaty in structure, but delicate in flavor. This means that it is forgiving in the cooking and can be adapted to almost any recipe. I served this seared halibut over some pappardelle noodles with a Swiss chard, Romano cheese, cream sauce. I finished it with a brown butter/honey/lemon glaze.
Serves 2
Ingredients
- ½ lb halibut (I had 1 larger steak, about ¾ “ thick)
- 2 C chopped chard leaves with stems chopped separately into small dice (No chard? Use 3 C spinach.)
- ¼ – ½ lb pappardelle pasta
- 1/3 C diced shallots
- 1/3 C shredded Romano cheese
- 2 T diced garlic
- 1 C cream
- ¼ C white wine
- ¼ C milk
- 4 T butter
- 4 T EVOO
- 1 T lemon juice
- 1 T honey
- Salt and white pepper
- 4 T light olive oil (coconut or avocado oil) to sauté the fish
- ½ t red pepper flakes
- ¼ t nutmeg (freshly grated) (Feel free to go wild here, but know that if you add too much it may taste soapy.)
- 1 T minced parsley to finish
Method
You basically have 3 different things going on here, and the trick is to time them. You are making a chard cream sauce, some pasta, and sauteed fish. Your sauce and pasta actually can hang out while your fish finishes, so don’t feel rushed. Just reheat that pasta in the sauce to get it warm before plating. This cream sauce is very forgiving.
- Preheat oven to 350F.
- Start salted water to boil.
- Salt and white pepper fish on both sides and set aside. If you do not have white pepper, no problem—use black. White pepper is a bit stronger and doesn’t have black specks on the food for presentation.
- Sauté chopped chard stems and shallots in 2 T butter, 2 T EVOO, and salt to taste.
- Add garlic and chard leaves. Toss to begin to wilt. Once wilted slightly, set aside off the burner. Be gentle, just warm and wilt. It will cook later in the process.
- Heat 4T light olive oil (avocado or coconut oil) in a cast iron skillet until shimmering. Once hot, add the fish and move just slightly to get oil under it. Saute for 4-7 minutes on the first side depending upon how thick your fish is. (Mine was a steak and quite thick—3/4-1”, so I did 7 min. If you have a ½” fillet, you might want to do 4 minutes.) Once it has a nice char on it, turn it over and place in the oven, staying in that cast iron pan. Turn oven off!
- Since your water is now likely boiling, add your pappardelle and cook for 9-10 minutes, or whatever the package says.
- Meanwhile, when the pasta is almost done (like 2 min left), reheat the chard and add wine. Reduce to make the wine disappear. Add cream, nutmeg, red pepper flakes, cheese. Add milk to desired consistency. When combined and hot, take off heat and wait for pasta.
- When pasta is done, add it to your chard cream sauce, warm, then remove from heat. If too thick, add more milk or pasta water.
- Time to check your fish. Remove from oven and check temp. You are looking for 160-165F. If it is under 150, return to oven and turn up temp to 400 for 3-5 min. If it is 150-160, return to the oven that is off while you finish. If it is 160+, take out of oven.
- Heat 2 T butter with 1 T honey until butter begins to brown. Remove from heat and add lemon juice.
- Brush the fish with the lemon/honey/butter while it is resting. This is really a glaze, not a sauce for the dish.
- To plate, pile the chard pasta on a plate and top with the halibut.
- Garnish with parsley.
Stay briny,
–Stacey
Butternutplace 