Food-based excitement...

Last night, Orpheus and I made dinner for a friend of his whose 22nd birthday fell on last Wednesday. We made her a fish dish that, upon its’ description to her at the bar, had her salivating drunkenly upon the table. One that, incidentally, I’d only come up with in the midst of putting together dinner upon realizing that I had only mahi-mahi to work with, and not tuna. Of O’s friends, she’s probably my favorite. A. is very, very tall, modelesquely skinny, quite pretty, from a good family, and is quite demure (albeit in the calculated sense, which is half the fun). She has all the benefits of good breeding and money with none of the usual social indecencies associated with those happy conditions. A. is lovely dinner company, and loves to cook as well, so I got plenty of compliments and questions on what is to follow: Mahi-Mahi Citroen with Sweet Peppers…

Mahi-Mahi Citroen
Serves 2
• 2 fillets mahi-mahi, skin removed, fresh or thawed
• ½ small sweet onion, sliced very thin
• 1 dry ancho chili pepper, very finely minced
• 1 large clove garlic, finely minced
• Multi-color Peppercorns, fresh ground, to taste
• Juice of 1 small fresh lime
• ½ orange, sliced thin
• 1½ -2 Tbsp. Soy sauce
• 1½ -2 tsp. toasted sesame oil
• (Optional: a thin sliver of fresh ginger, peeled, crushed, and minced)
• ½ Tbsp. butter
• 1-2 oz. Voignier or very dry Gewurztraminer

Directions: Combine all non-fishy ingredients in a gallon-size freezer bag, reserving the butter and wine for later… Use a bag with a good seal, so it doesn’t leak all over creation. Mash up oranges so juice and pulp incorporate. Add fish, and give about 30 minutes to marinate, turning occasionally so juices distribute, at room temperature. When ready, melt butter in pan at medium heat. Throw your whole bag full of goo into hot pan, cook for five minutes uncovered. Flip fillets, add wine to sauce, cook five more minutes. Plate fish. If sauce is still too thin, turn up heat and thicken just slightly. Pour sauce over fish and serve. It’s easy to double the recipe… Just add a touch more of everything, and you’re set.

An excellent side dish for this recipe is my avocado salad, which is just a diced roma tomato, a thickly sliced avocado, half of a very small sweet onion, thinly sliced, with a hint of sesame oil, and about ½ a lime’s worth of juice, with a small sweet pepper sliced thin to garnish. Salt and pepper to taste. It’s like butter. Especially when followed up with a boozy mango-banana shake (rum or vodka, couldn’t be drunker). Hell, I suppose you could even do a couple starter-courses first, and make it a really easy “fancy” meal. Miso soup, followed by a simple lettuce salad w/thin-sliced onion and sweet pepper and Japanese steak-house ginger dressing… Everything is easy to prep before hand, except the avocado salad, which you can compound while cooking the fish, and the miso, which kind of needs to be done just before serving. I didn’t have time for the pre-courses yesterday, nor the inclination, as Aphroditie brought me a lovely present that necessitated a little shopping before I cooked. Most of the time, I’d be pissed with a gift that required accessories, but I was most grateful for this one. It helped things a bit, as I’m still rather mad at her for going back to BF. Overall, it was just a lovely night, and kept getting better after the dishes were done… Hope I can be all smiley-blushy tomorrow when writing, too… For now, try the recipes, and have fun!

Note: I made quite an error yesterday, supposing that Minotaur by Benjamin Tammuz was an inspiration to Phillip Roth in writing his book Operation: Shylock. Though Tammuz did set down his pen and publish in 1989, the language of the original text was Hebrew, a language that I’m pretty sure PR doesn’t actually read for fun (or profit, even). The first English edition didn’t appear until 2005. Please accept my apologies for the mistake!