Sea Bass with Fennel, Leeks and Grapes

I had two sea bass fillets, some leeks and a bulb of fennel. I also had the remains of a bag of new potatoes and a handful of green grapes. These are the full ingredients (very simple), and this is what I did:-

2 sea bass fillets
Half a bulb of fennel
1 leek
8-10 green seedless grapes
Butter
Olive oil
White wine
Lime juice
Salt
Pepper

I put a pan of salted water on to boil and while that was heating I thinly sliced the leek and the fennel. I melted a large knob of butter in a heavy based pan, together with a good slug of olive oil, and then added the sliced leeks and fennel.

I let these soften and then added the sea bass fillets, skin side down, and sprinkled them with sea salt and pepper. (About now the pan of water was boiling and I threw the baby new potatoes into it.) I then added about a glass full of white wine and about a tablespoon of freshly squeezed lime together with the juice of a lemon and the grapes. I let the juices reduce down a bit and then turned the fish so it was skin side up and put the pan in the middle of the roasting oven for about 10 minutes to get the skin browned and more crispy.

The end result was unexpectedly good – moist, flavoursome fish with a lovely fresh sauce.

Given that the sea bass fillets were quite small, we were still feeling a little peckish afterwards. So there’s nothing like a good rocket salad to fill the hole. I had half a bag of the wild stuff (stronger and more peppery) in the fridge, so we took a couple of handfuls each and dumped it on our used plates, sprinkled on some fresh parmesan, some good olive oil and some quality balsamic vinegar and it really did the trick – there were some traces of juices from the fish dish which mingled in with the salad and the whole was really surprising – something about the lime and the balsamic worked really well together.

Hope you enjoy it too.