Calderade

Another Mediterranean recipe from the Portugal chapter of La cuisine autour de la méditerranée.  It would have been nice to include the onions that are mentioned in the book version, but I had no onions and an oversupply of potatoes, plus some nice, ripe tomatoes (thanks Joyce!) and pretty much everything else this recipe called for:


1/2 cup olive oil
6-7 medium new potatoes, peeled and cut into rounds about 1/3 inch thick
1 cup dry white wine
salt and cayenne pepper
2 large, ripe tomatoes, peeled and chopped
5-6 small tilapia filets
1 branch worth of chopped fresh rosemary
1 branch of fresh thyme

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
In a 10 X 14 inch baking pan, add the olive oil and place in oven for 10 minutes. Remove and add layers of potatoes, seasoning each layer with salt and cayenne pepper. (Should end up with 3 layers.) Bake layers of potatoes for about 45 minutes or until fork-tender. Remove, add tilapia in one layer and cover with tomatoes, thyme and rosemary. Bake another 15 minutes or until tilapia flakes with a fork. Serve with white wine.

This made a great dinner last night, and I really enjoyed the leftovers for lunch today! To my surprise, we barely registered the cayenne; maybe it joined with the olive oil and wine in the bottom of the casserole? Also, the original recipe called for cod or another type of fish that is normally sliced thicker than tilapia and said to bake the whole thing for an hour. I went with the tilapia just because we already had it, adding it later so that it would not have time to dry out in the oven.

Completely unrelated, but in case anyone out there is wondering why the emphasis on healthy food, and why I haven't yet fried a single potato (or any other food items in my house) despite the steady supply...well, I haven't been able to run lately because I came away from a half-marathon in April with an IT band injury that's been slow to heal - in part because I put off going to see Dr. Renick. In the meantime, I've been very careful of what I eat so as not to puff up while waiting to start running again. But on Sunday morning, I managed to run for ten whole minutes after walking 20, cleaned house afterward and the IT band still feels OK!