Hey y'all! Wednesday night I cooked a Rachael meal that I have had in my arsenal for about 4 years and never made. So glad I did because it's fantastic! Here is Rachael Ray's "Smoky-Spicy Bass with Greens & Andouille and Corn Cakes with Honey".
Last up were the corn cakes. This is really simple but has such a nice flavor to it. I took a box of jiffy corn muffin mix and followed the instructions on the box for corn pancakes. To give these a twist, Rachael adds in corn kernels from to ears of fresh corn as well as a couple scallions chopped, whites and greens, and the zest of an orange. Rachel Tip: Here is Rachael's trick to getting the kernels off the cob of an ear of corn. Take a large bowl and a smaller bowl and invert the smaller bowl inside the larger bowl. Stand the ear of corn up on the the smaller bowl and scrape down the cob with a sharp knife, scraping the kernels off the cob. The large bowl catches all the kernels and you don't have to chase them all over the counter. Once the kernels were scraped off the cobs I added them, the scallions and the orange zest into the batter. Pour the pancakes out onto a greased griddle heated over medium-low to medium heat. I used canola cooking spray, but Rachael recommends nesting a chunk of butter in a paper towel and greasing the hot griddle that way. Either way works great. I then used a 1/4 cup measuring cup to pour out the pancakes. it should make 8-10 corn pancakes. While the corn cakes cooked I placed a glass jar of honey in a pot with water and brought the water up to a boil. Once it boiled I turned it down to low and let the honey stay warm in the water bath. This makes the honey pourable. Once the cakes are done, you plate them up with the fish and the greens and drizzle the cakes with the warm honey.
First up is the fish. The recipe for this meal calls for Black Bass and also calls for skin-on filets. I've never seen this in my grocery store or even in the Whole Foods in Birmingham. You could probably ask them and they might could order it if you know in advance you are going to make this meal. You could definitely get it ordered if you have a local fish market. The grocery store I went to here in NY did not have any fish with the skin on so I just got a nice firm white fish to use. If you are able to find a white fish with the skin on that's perfect. If not, any firm white fish is good for this recipe. First I turned the oven on 250 and placed a platter in the oven to warm. Unless you just have a gigantic pan, you'll have to cook the fish in batches. Having the warm pan in the oven allows you to cook the fish in batches and keep the first two warm while the other two cook. For the fish I combined the necessary ingredients to make a sort of cajun/blackening spice rub. If you'd like to know the specific ingredients, they can be found in the recipe link below. Once combined, you will want to score the skin if you are using skin on filets of fish. Rachael Tip: Scoring the skin on the fish will help to prevent it from shrinking too much while it cooks and help to get you a nice crispy skin. Once scored, season both sides liberally with salt and pepper and coat both sides well with the spice mixture. The recipe calls for you to heat up a cast iron skillet over medium-high to high heat. I find in my cast iron skillet, no matter how much oil I use to coat the skillet, the fish still sticks. I have a non stick griddle pan that I will probably use when making this again. If you are better at using your cast iron skillet than I, then by all means, go for it! When the pan was nice and hot I added in the vegetable oil and then the fish. If you are using skin on filets, you will want to put the skin side down first. Cooked the fish for about 4 minutes per side and then transferred the fish to the warm platter in the oven. Once all 4 filets were done I turned the oven off and let the residual heat keep the filets warm to proven the oven from over cooking the fish.
While the fish is cooking you can start working on the greens. The recipe here calls for dark spicy greens such as mustard greens or dandelion greens. My grocery store again didn't have either one so I got 1-1.25 lbs of collard greens. If your store has mustard or dandelion greens, go with one of those and be sure to get at least 1 lb of greens. Greens cook way down so if you don't get enough, you'll end up with a very small amount of greens once they are cooked. If your store does't have mustard greens or dandelion greens, any dark bitter greens will do. Just be sure to get at least 1 lb. and no more than 1.25 lbs. Stem and chop the greens. Rachael Tip: To stem the greens, hold the greens upside down by the stem and using the opposite hand, curl your middle finger and index finger around the stem like a claw and strip the leaves from the stem. Once the greens were stemmed I piled them up and rough chopped them. After chopping the greens I added a couple of inches of water to my oval sauté skillet and brought the water to a boil. Once it was boiling I salted the water and added in the greens to cook for just a couple minutes. Rachael Tip: Boiling the greens for a couple minutes in salted water will help to take some of the bitterness out of the greens. After the greens boiled for a couple minutes I removed them to a colander to drain and dried out the pan. Make sure you dry it out well. Leaving water will cause the oil to spatter when you put the skillet back on the heat and add the EVOO in. After drying the skillet out and putting it back on the heat I added in a few tablespoons of EVOO and then the andouille sausage. If you're grocery store has a large butcher section, such as Whole Foods for my friends back in Birmingham, you may can find fresh andouille. If using fresh, remove the casings from the sausage and add it to the skillet, crumbling it as you add it and cooking it until it's is done. My grocery store did not have fresh andouille so I used andouille from the packaged meats case. This product is already fully cooked so all you need to do is chop it into half moon shapes and add it to the skillet. I let it cook for just a few minutes until it started to brown a little and it had rendered out it's fat. At this point i added in the onion and cooked until the onions became translucent. Once the onions were done I added in a little chicken stock, the greens, salt, pepper, freshly grated nutmeg and a couple splashes of apple cider vinegar. Rachael Tip: Freshly grated nutmeg really helps to bring out the flavor in any dark green. Also, you could use apple cider vinegar or white wine vinegar either one. I really love the flavor of apple cider vinegar so I went with that. I let the greens cook for a few minutes until tender and then turned the heat down to the lowest setting and put the lid on to keep them warm until i finished the meal. Just a disclaimer: I'm not a fan of greens in general. I've never liked collard greens, but I absolutely LOVED these. They were my favorite part of this meal.
Last up were the corn cakes. This is really simple but has such a nice flavor to it. I took a box of jiffy corn muffin mix and followed the instructions on the box for corn pancakes. To give these a twist, Rachael adds in corn kernels from to ears of fresh corn as well as a couple scallions chopped, whites and greens, and the zest of an orange. Rachel Tip: Here is Rachael's trick to getting the kernels off the cob of an ear of corn. Take a large bowl and a smaller bowl and invert the smaller bowl inside the larger bowl. Stand the ear of corn up on the the smaller bowl and scrape down the cob with a sharp knife, scraping the kernels off the cob. The large bowl catches all the kernels and you don't have to chase them all over the counter. Once the kernels were scraped off the cobs I added them, the scallions and the orange zest into the batter. Pour the pancakes out onto a greased griddle heated over medium-low to medium heat. I used canola cooking spray, but Rachael recommends nesting a chunk of butter in a paper towel and greasing the hot griddle that way. Either way works great. I then used a 1/4 cup measuring cup to pour out the pancakes. it should make 8-10 corn pancakes. While the corn cakes cooked I placed a glass jar of honey in a pot with water and brought the water up to a boil. Once it boiled I turned it down to low and let the honey stay warm in the water bath. This makes the honey pourable. Once the cakes are done, you plate them up with the fish and the greens and drizzle the cakes with the warm honey.
This one was a delicious meal all the way around and definitely a southern comfort style meal. Rachael's father is from Louisiana and you can definitely see how the flavors here come straight from that side of her family. Hope you guys enjoy this one. I sure did. Buon Appetito!
Recipe:
This meal was featured on Rachael Ray's 30 Minute Meals. The recipes can be found at the link below.
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