I believe in cod

A chef at a fine restaurant once said, "My customers are always asking for a firm, white fish without an assertive taste. I give them exactly that, and they never order it!" The fish he was talking about is cod.

Blame it on the Filet O'Fish sandwich, or soggy fish'n'chips, but cod gets no respect. Yet it is a nutrition powerhouse: Cod has almost the same amount of protein as sockeye salmon with half the calories.

And because it's a mild fish, you can spice it up just the way you like.

Here is a dinner I fixed last night. The prep took a little more than 15 minutes, since I grated the potatoes by hand, but the cooking took a little less than that.

Prosciutto-wrapped Cod with Artichokes and Hash Browns
Serves 2

Ingredients
2 white or red potatoes (not russets)
Salt and pepper
12 ounces cod
6 slices prosciutto or other strips of semi-dry ham
Olive oil
4 small spring onions, sliced
Handful of parsley leaves, snipped
1 cup of marinated artichoke hearts, rinsed of oil and chilled

Instructions
Grate the potatoes into a bowl of water. Drain, put on a clean dishtowel, and squeeze all the water out of them. They must be very dry. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Wash and dry the cod, and cut it into 6 strips, 4-6 inches in length. Season with salt and pepper and wrap each strip with a slice of prosciutto.

Lightly oil a sturdy pan that will hold the cod. Put about a tablespoon of oil in a large cast-iron frying pan and heat to medium.

When the oil starts to smoke, put the grated potatoes into the frying pan and spread them out thinly. Sprinkle with the onions and parsley. Fry undisturbed for about 10 minutes so they form a golden crust. Flip and cook 5 minutes more.

After you put the potatoes in the frying pan, put the pan of cod into the oven. Bake for 14-15 minutes until the fish turns opaquely white.

Serve with the chilled artichoke hearts.

Hash browns, or hashbrowns, revisited

With company visiting, hashbrowns were again served for breakfast. And again, they turned out splendidly. I do want to pass along a couple of tips that I don't think I stressed enough on my post of Sept. 26, or else the editors of the Washington Post weren't listening. A recipe they ran on Oct. 21 had this to say about the breakfast potatoes:

Making hash browns can be tricky. To get the onions caramelized just right and keep the potatoes crisp at the same time, cook them separately and toss them together with a spice mix just before you’re ready to serve them. This is a good way to use leftover baked potatoes; hash browns made with raw potatoes will turn out mushy.

Wrong! If the photo they ran with their recipe is any indication, what they ended up with were very tasty country potatoes, not hashbrowns. (I like the compound form of this word, since everyone knows that hash does not modify browns; the word is a contraction of hash-browned potatoes, so why not contract it to its logical end?) (Click here to see the Post recipe.)

The secret to using raw potatoes is this: Grate them into a bowl of water. Drain well, then dump the shreds on a clean, absorbent towel, roll it up and wring the potatoes dry. "Dry" is the key to nonmushy potatoes.

Heat the oil on medium heat before adding the potatoes, then, when you have them spread over the pan, lower the heat a little. Add finely diced onions and seasonings then, including dots or slices of butter if you'd like. In about 10 minutes or so, the bottom will be browned and you can turn your hashbrowns over and continue cooking until done.

If you put your onions in first, thinking that they will caramelize nicely, you will end up with burnt onions by the time the potatoes cook. If you put in the onions after the potatoes, they will steam as the potatoes cook on the first side, then when you flip the hashbrowns, the onions will brown as the second side cooks. Yum!

Hashbrowns, ham and eggs

Ack! Life has interfered with Lori K's Cafe this week. To make up for it, here's the yummy hashbrowns I made this morning. They didn't look as neat as this picture, but I'm sure they tasted better.

Lori K's hashbrowns with eggs and ham

Serves 2

Ingredients

2 medium white potatoes

1 medium yellow onion

2 tablespoons oil

1 tablespoon butter

Garlic salt and pepper

2-4 free-range eggs

Sea salt

2 thin slices ham (I used ham-off-the-bone from the Harris Teeter deli)

Instructions

Grate the potatoes into a bowl of cold water. When completed, swish all the gratings around in the bowl and drain well. Chop the onion.

Heat a large cast-iron skillet to medium-high heat, then lower it to medium-low heat and add the oil. Swish it around so that all the surface and up the sides a half-inch are coated. Add the potatoes in a clump in the middle, then move them out to the sides. Sprinkle the onions on top. Cut the butter into small cubes and distribute evenly atop the potatoes and onions. Season with garlic salt and pepper.

Cook for 5-10 minutes until the edges of the potatoes are brown. Cut the round of potatoes into quarter sections by slicing across the pan with a metal spatula, then slicing again perpendicular to the first slice. Flip each quarter so the toasty side is now up. Make a little well in the center of each potato quarter and put an egg in each (or 2 of them, for 1 egg apiece). Season with pepper and a grind of sea salt. Cook for 10 minutes, or until the whites have set.

When almost ready to serve, heat the ham slices for 30 seconds in the microwave.

Put the ham on the plate, put the hashbrowns with the eggs atop them over the ham, and garnish with parsley. Add hot sauce if you'd like. Serve immediately with strong coffee.