Striped bass has to have one of the best looking skins out there. An amazing metallic silver color, with darker stripes. Just beautiful. Course it tastes great too. A firm flesh, that is meaty and light tasting. Just perfect for baking as it doesn’t fall apart on you too much. What is more the neutral flavor of the flesh means that a nice flavorful sauce is in order.

This is a modification of a recipe by Jamie Oliver, from his book Jamie’s Kitchen. A lot has been said about Jamie Oliver. Personally, I think the bloke is great. Good simple food, that is pretty easy to cook and gives consistent results. Perhaps the most impressive thing about Jamie is the accessibility of his food. I haven’t met anyone (home cooks) that doesn’t enjoy at least some of his food. It is universally acceptable. Some professional chefs have said some not so great things about him (“he is neither naked nor a chef”), but I like the bloke. And to top it off he did a decent make-over on school dinners in England. I have to say actually that I don’t remember school dinners being that bad. Of course, that was obviously quite a while ago now. Things have changed, fresh food has gone off the school menus, and been replaced by fast food. It is good to see a celeb chef really wanting to try and sort out the bad nutrition in schools. Hopefully something similar will happen here, because frankly the school dinners I have seen here have been dire. I wouldn’t mind getting involved in all that over here I have to say, good nutrition is really important in kids (well duh.).

So, anyhow, the recipe. This dish of Jamie’s calls for white fish and mussels. I didn’t have any mussels, and really didn’t feel like driving down to Mutual Fishto get any. Shame, because I love the store, and the people are fantastic. It however was late, and I was tired. So no mussels today. Booo. So what did I substitute? Potatoes and fennel. Some chopped up yellow spuds, and some thinly sliced fennel bulb to be more precise.

Making this is really very simple. In a wine glass add a good pinch of saffron to a glass full of white wine. I like to use Chardonnay here. This should sit for a bit. Maybe 10 minutes. Now take a long line of tin foil, at least 30 inches by 12. Fold it in half, so you now have a doubled up sheet about 15″ x 12″ or so. fold up the edges to form kind of a tin foil bucket. Pop the chopped potatoes and fennel in the bottom. Throw in some chopped garlic, and some coarsely chopped parsley.  On top of this put your fish. In all honesty, and meaty white fish would work here – Halibut, cod are both fine. Sprinkle in some salt and pepper. Now pour in half of the white wine/saffron mixture. Close up the tin foil bag by folding the sides in to the top. Make sure the tin foil is folder over tightly. Repeat with a second bag. Oh – this recipe, like all others on this blog is for two people.

So, Robert’s your father’s brother (Bob’s your uncle) really. Just pop these in a 425 oven for about 20 minutes. The fish is done when it is opaque and flakey. The potatoes and fennel should also be just soft enough to eat.

So saffron. I don’t use a lot of it to be honest. I should, it is bloody fantastic. There really isn’t another spice out there that can give such a complex flavor so quickly. Of course, you pay for it. By weight, saffron is the most expensive spice on earth. For good reason really though – you get hardly any of it from a single crocus. Thankfully Trader Joes normally stocks it, and at a very attractive price too. For me it is a spice that goes great with seafood, and anything brothy that it can soak into to develop its complex flavor. Bouillabaisse is a great example of where saffron is used really effectively (as is this recipe of course!).

So cheers everyone. This could be my last post before we head off to Holland for a week. Just at the right time too. A bunch of workman are doing a job on our house, and it is about to get messy.