This is a quick meal that we fired together based on what was in the fridge and cupboards. I buy fresh fish from the fish monger once to twice weekly depending on my schedule and freeze single and double portions for the coming week. If I don’t do this then we don’t manage to have fish so I make the effort as fish is very important in the athlete’s diet. I always buy fish from the fish monger when possible and only caught at sea white fish. Salmon is increasingly hard to obtain but I will always buy organic.

There are many reasons to eat white caught at sea fish the main reasons are the following:

Benefits of caught at sea white fish:

• High quality source of protein

• Low in fat (allowing leverage with other sources of healthy fats)

• Rich in iodine, selenium, phosphorus, and zinc; B6 and B12 are often also in rich supply

• Easily digested and a superb pre-race choice

White sea-fish that are delicate such as plaice and the other flat fish are tastiest cooked simply with no fussing; for example in the pan in some butter or coconut oil, grilled or quickly baked with a touch of butter or coconut oil. We sometimes add a dusting of oat flour or coconut flour as this gives a delicious tasty coat when pan-fried. I find that there is no need for egg as the flour coating sticks well. Flat fish will cook in minutes so avoid over cooking!

Ingredients:

• Plaice – the white side or the dark side it doesn’t really matter. Most people prefer the white side. Dry with a paper towel.
• Oat flour
• Butter or coconut oil
• Large capped mushrooms
• Non-smoked bacon
• Celeriac – peeled and sliced into thinish slices if you are in a hurry (approx. ¼ to ½ celeriac depending on how many you are feeding)
• Pesto – home-made or shop bought
• Sea salt and black pepper
• Organic spinach; approx. ½ a bag per person (avoid the non-organic sprayed variety if you can and wash well)

 Instructions; in rough order of appearance 🙂

1. Place the peeled and sliced celeriac in a saucepan with approx. ½ inch of water. Cover with a lid and steam until soft which will take approximately 10-15 minutes.
2. Once this gets going turn on the grill and grill the large capped mushrooms and 1 to 2 pieces of bacon per person.
3. Once the celeriac is cooked through drain it and mash with pesto and season to taste with sea salt and black pepper.
4. Heat a large non-stick and preferable non-teflon pan. Melt your butter or oil and place the plaice flesh side down. Fry for approx. 2 minutes and while it is frying pat some oat flour on the skin side of the cooking fish to lightly coat the entire skin surface. After 2 minutes approximately flip the fish onto the oat flour coated side and cook through which will take approximately another 1-2 minutes.
5. As the fish is cooking gently wilt your spinach in a small bit of water. Once wilted strain excess water by pushing the spinach hard against the saucepan side and pouring off excess. Spinach has a habit of disappearing!!
6. If you have managed to keep your focus then all parts of the dinner should be cooked at the same time (good luck with that!). Serve your fish on the pesto celeriac mash, wilted spinach, grilled mushroom and bacon. Serve with a dash more pesto if liked and as for my boyfriend well he sneaked in a slice of cheese as you can see in the above photo!
7. Enjoy 🙂

Love, Andrea