About Fish: Grill, Fry, Poach or Steam?

Although I would never have believed it, the best two pieces of fish I have eaten lately were poached and steamed: The salmon was poached and the cod was steamed and I cooked both, much to my surprise. I tried both on a whim and found this method of cooking to be far superior to baking or frying.

I am not a gourmet cook- I have taken exactly one cooking lesson and that was in Florence, Italy, so I was more than a little distracted. But I like to know what I am eating and am learning to care about where the food is from since I am more than a little concerned about the rapidly diminishing quality of American food.

My husband and I love fish; living in northern Nevada as we do, the price of fish tends to be a lot higher than in many other parts of the country; therefore, we like to make the most out of our purchase. Although farm raised fish is on average, at least 25% cheaper than wild, we try not to buy farm raised as we are skeptical about the living conditions of those fish and the details of how they are raised.

My whim of trying the poached salmon occurred on a day when I felt fat since I'd not been able to work out for several days and I wanted to avoid calories. It was a holiday and my husband wanted to take me out for dinner; ordering the poached salmon seemed like the least destructive entree that I could order. To my surprise, the poached salmon was actually far superior to any I had eaten at gourmet restaurants. And when I decided to replicate it at home, I found that I could do it without too much anxiety- it was a matter of keeping the water at a minimal boil, best established via a candy thermometer to keep the water temperature between 160 and 180 degrees. However, a few days, I tried the steaming a piece of salmon and found steaming a good deal easier and just as good as the poached.

However, I do have a pound of wild halibut in the refrigerator which I will grill tomorrow- somehow, poaching or steaming halibut seems to be an affront.

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