Baked Trout ~ Cooking with Mom

Mom sent out a text message to all her chickens yesterday, "Hi! How many takers do I have if I cook FRESH baked speckled trout tonight?".  When she said 'FRESH' she meant fish that was swimming just the day before.  It didn't take long for my brother, sister and I to respond.  We all love the food and company at our parent's house.

Mom never has just one thing going on in the kitchen.  She cooks up big meals with plenty of dishes to make sure everyone has their favorites.  Last night we had baked trout with onions and capers, rotini pasta with mushrooms and peas, sauteed mixed vegetables, caprese salad, bread and fruit salad . . . all for an impromptu Thursday night meal.

I showed up with my camera, my kids and a big appetite.  Mom was already in the kitchen.  This was the scene:

A tray of tomatoes from the garden

A bowl of thinly sliced mushrooms

Some cut and cleaned veggies, peas, cut tomatoes, some wine and garlic

I wish I could go through all of the recipes, but this post would go on forever, so today I'll show you the fish.  I asked mom for the recipe, but there isn't one . . . "it's just how I do it".  There are no measurements . . . Just eyeball it - you can do it!

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

You'll start by setting up 4 separate dishes: fish, egg wash, bread crumbs, and the pan you will bake your fish in.

Fish.  Rinse each fillet and dab with a paper towel.  Lay out them out on a baking sheet.  Lightly season with Tony's Chachere and garlic powder.

Egg wash.  Mom used eggs and white wine, because she had it on hand.  You can use water if you're out of wine.  Whisk or stir with a fork.

Bread crumbs.  Put bread crumbs in a shallow dish (mom was fancy and used some homemade bread crumbs) you can use panko.  Season with salt and black pepper, stir with a fork.

Baking Sheet.  Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray AND drizzle olive oil on it.

Once you're set up, the process goes like this --> grab a fish fillet, dunk it in egg wash,

dredge it in bread crumbs,

lay it on the baking sheet.

Repeat, repeat, repeat, until you have a tray that looks like this.

Pack it in there in one nice layer.  Then drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with parsley, layer on some sliced onions, sprinkle in some capers (don't shy away from the capers - they ROCK), and squeeze a lemon over the top.  MMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm........

Place the baking sheet in the oven and reduce the oven temperature from 400 to 375.  Bake for 45 minutes.  When they come out of the oven, squeeze another lemon over the top for good measure.

All I can say is - WOW!  And, "Thanks, Mom!"