Halibut with Lemon and Chives

April 29, 2009  •  Fish & Seafood, Technique, Tools

I promised you the recipe for the halibut I made the other night when I was doing the grill pan surf and turf dinner for my husband. Start with the freshest halibut you can find – this was really fresh and on sale at Whole Foods and boy, could I tell the difference between that and some ordinary grocery store piece of halibut.
I sprinkled the fish liberally with salt and pepper before searing it flesh side down on a nonstick grill pan. (Hint: for those of you like my friend Ellen, keeping the skin on while cooking it helps to hold the fish together, and using a nonstick grill pan lets you get some light grill marks on the fish without shredding it when you try to turn it.)Ignore those lamb chops that are hogging the picture here – I neglected to take a solo photo of the halibut on the grill pan. After it seared for a couple of minutes on the flesh side, I turned the halibut, I drizzled it with some of the lemon juice from the half lemon above and sprinkled the fish with chopped fresh chives (plant them in your yard or a pot and they come back every year bigger and better than ever!), and put the whole grill pan in the oven. (Make sure you have an oven safe handle on your pan!)

You can see I have some nice browning on the fish, but it was still incredibly moist. This technique will work well for lots of semi-firm, low-fat fish like halibut. To serve, simply use a fish spatula to lift the fish off the skin (it will stick a bit to the pan anyway which helps) and onto your plate.

Chives on Foodista

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