Something Fishy: Cod and Red Quinoa

Before I started dating my husband, I couldn't have told you the last time I'd eaten fish of any kind.

Why?  Ok, admittedly, the reasoning is a bit wacky.  Ok, REALLY wacky.  I had fish growing up, or at least my dad did.   For whatever reason, I had this thing about not eating things you keep as pets.  It just seemed odd to me that we'd have fish in our home, but it'd be ok to eat them as well.  Seemed like a slippery slope to me as a kid, what was next, our dog Lady?

We never ate Lady (or any dog for that matter) but I never enjoyed fish and at some point, I stopped eating it entirely.

Enter my husband and his love for fish.

For the longest time, I flat-out refused to cook it, but somewhere along the road, I gave tilapia a try and it wasn't so bad, so I'm on the baby-step-track back to fish eating.  Stepping away from the only fish I've ever cooked, I decided this week to give cod a try since my fishmonger told me it'd be the next step and I'd probably like it since it had a "buttery" taste.

So, with a new fish in hand, I decided to mix it up with something else new: red quinoa.

If you've never had quinoa, you should try it.  It's, um, interesting.  When I first tried it, I was thrown off--I expected it to be more like couscous (not sure why) but what I got was something like a bean sprout/chia seed combination.  Like I said, interesting.

The hubbs has never had quinoa though, so I figured I'd see what I came up with.  The turnout: a super-quick meal that was healthy and really pretty.  I now get to add cod to the list of fish I eat.

However, we will NEVER have fish as pets in our house.

Cod and Quinoa
serves approx. 4 people

Ingredients:

1 cup red quinoa
1 lb cod, sliced into 4 equal filet's
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 onion, sliced and diced
1 tsp. paprika
1 tsp. garlic salt
1 1/2 cups water            

Directions:

In a medium sauce pan, add 1 Tbs olive oil to the pan  and heat over medium-high.  Add onions and cook until tender-almost brown.  Add water and quinoa.  Bring to boil and reduce heat, cover and simmer until all water is absorbed.

Meanwhile, in a medium frying pan, bring the remaining 2 Tbs. olive oil to heat.  Season each side of the code filets with salt, pepper, garlic salt and paprika.  Add to pan.  Grill on first side for approx. 4 minutes, or until the sides begin to turn.  Flip and cook for an additional 3-4 minutes on other side.  (Only turn fish once, otherwise they flake too much and you lose the presentation.)