Fish with tomaoes, olives & capers over liguini

During the holidays I probably gobbled up at least 10 pounds of  meat --from the turkey last Thanksgiving, the prime rib, hams and more turkey on Christmas, the beef borguignon on New Year and all the other roasts and steaks in between.  I am frightened to check the scale to see how much I gained.  The mirror already tells me Santa has not left the house.  After New Year I can almost quiver at the mere thought of meat and hence I am challenging myself to serve mainly seafood at least for the first 2 weeks of January.  I love seafood, on a diet or not, but because husband is a picky eater I tend to cook meat for the most part.  At least for now husband and I are on the same page about eating seafood more often.
I am relieved that after a year I finally found our favorite fish recipe -- there scribbled in one of my old notebooks.  We use to cook this dish a lot, back when fresh seafood was easily available as husband used to live right next to Santa Monica seafood.  After we moved it seemed so much harder to find a good place to buy fish to make the dish.  This dish is good with halibut, petrale sole, red snapper and seabass.  Today, I splurged on a good piece of Chilean seabass.  Well I was forced to because I had no other choice.  I was all set to make the dish and a visit to Whole Foods presented me with only two choices of fish - halibut or Chilean seabass.  Both have the same price tag, a whooping $25 a pound.  That's right, $25/lb.  I took a deep breath and went for it.  I ordered a pound for 2 people.

After dinner I can only say that I was extremely happy how it turned out.  I still think $25/lb is expensive but the fish tasted so good I am happy for the splurge. It was buttery in texture and the flavor was delicate and divine.  Serving it with linguini pasta is the best.

Fish with tomaoes, olives & capers over liguini

1 lb sea bass fillets (or other white fish)

1 1/2 can diced tomatoes with juice

1 cup white wine like chardonnay

1 cup loosely packed fresh basil

1 cup chopped onions

2 teaspoon garlic, minced

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1-2 tablespoons Butter

Capers

1 cup chopped kalamata olives

flour

salt and pepper

Linguini pasta

hot pepper flakes

Heat a heavy bottomed skillet over medium heat.  Add 3 tablespoons oil then add onions when heated. Saute until tender, about 5 minutes.  Add 1 teaspoon garlic; saute for 1 minute. Stir in tomatoes, basil and wine.  Simmer uncovered until mixture thickens, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes.

Sprinkle fillets with salt and pepper then coat with flour.  Slowly add the fish into the pan and submerge into the mixture. Add capers, olives and butter.  Simmer until fish is just opaque in the center. Serve fish immediately over linguini pasta.

For the liguini : Cook linguini according to package directions,  then heat oil in another skillet.  Add 1 teaspoon garlic and pepper flakes.  Cook for 1 minute then add drained linguini .  Stir and cook for 1-2 minutes and serve.