Before The Weather Hits

The weather report for the remainder of the week does not look promising for grilling.  Rain tomorrow, possible snow the following, and freezing temperatures after that.  So it was somewhat of a no-brainer to make sure that I grilled tonight.  Last week's somewhat healthier cooking was properly countered by the weekend dining.  It was time to get back in the game with the Red Snapper Fajitas With Black Bean Salsa on page 283.

I wanted to have as much done as possible before The Bride came home.  The fish could marinade for no longer than half an hour, otherwise the texture becomes mushy due to overexposure to acid.  The plan was to have everything in place, so that when she arrived I could drop the fish in the marinade, fire up the grill, and thirty-four minutes later (fish cooks for four minutes) be eating.  With this in mind, the first step was to create the marinade and set it aside.

Next up was the salsa, which was very similar to the salsa I created for a grilled chicken thigh taco much earlier in the blog, but with the additions of black beans and red onion.

I mixed that up and also set it aside for later.  

A couple of hours later, The Bride pulled into the driveway.  I placed the fish into a Ziploc Bag with the marinade for its set time and lit the grill.

After the allotted time I took out the fillets, wiped off the marinade, and (after this picture was taken) brushed them with olive oil.

The purpose of the olive oil at the end is to prevent the fish from sticking to the grill.  In this matter, I have conducted a fair amount of research.  There are two thoughts: oil the grill grates and then put on the protein, or oil the protein and then place on the grill grates.  The research overwhelmingly states that the latter technique works better.  With proteins other than fish, this has worked quite well for me.  With fish, however, I remain unsuccessful.  It is one of the reasons I have abandoned the flesh-down-first-then-flip technique with salmon, opting for indirect cooking instead.  What I am irresistibly drawn to, however, are those wonderful grill marks that indirect cooking provides.  Thus, I gave the direct cooking method another "college try."  With one of the fillets I only had minor issues with the flesh sticking to the grill, and therefor achieved nice markings on most of the surface area.

The other fillet experienced much more sticking, and less-than-desirable results.  Oh well.  I guess it's a good thing that these would be shredded and placed into tacos.

I plated The Bride's meal first, but I know that she would not have wanted a taco (she LOVES traditional tacos, but rather dislikes fish tacos), so I selected a piece that had the nice grill marks, and used a piece of romaine lettuce as a base to enhance the plate's visual appeal.  With a generous dollop of salsa to finish it off, I was done!

I, unlike my better half, enjoy fish as my protein in tacos.  Wanting to keep the carb count down, I opted to use a lettuce wrap instead of a tortilla shell.  I shredded a bit of the less-visually appealing fillet and placed it in the lettuce piece with the salsa.

Low-carb fish taco!

This was a light and refreshing meal...more aptly suited for summertime, but pleasant nonetheless.  The lettuce wrap was a good call, it added a wonderful crunchiness to the softer fish and salsa textures.  Flavors were complimentary, but not overwhelming.  In fact, the marinade may have been underwhelming.  I think more salt may have been in order.  The Bride and I agree that the salsa's additions were not preferred compared to the other tomato/avocado salsa.  Otherwise, this meal has a nice diversity in that it can be either a knife-and-fork meal like The Bride's version, or a silverware-free meal like mine.