The Pink Dish: New Recipe Night: Ginger and Cilantro Baked Tilapia

I apologize for the long delay as I'd promised this recipe on Tuesday. Well let's just say it's a bit hard to blog about food when food is the last thing you can think about. Now that I'm over that mysterious stomach bug I'm ready to share this yummy new treat with you. This recipe comes courtesty of Pinterest and my sister's lovely food board. I didn't intend to have ginger in both of my recipes that I made on Tuesday...it was something of a coincidence I guess. The very odd part being that I'd never ever cooked with ginger before. No fresh ginger to speak of in the grocery store so I settled for a jar of crushed ginger. Honestly it looked kind of gross when I opened it but it smelled oh so good and made for a very delicious dinner. Well, that mixed with the sesame oil......MmmmmmmMmmmmmmGood.

Ingredients:

*2 large tilapia fillets (or similar thin white fish) - about 3/4 pound
*1 jalapeno pepper (optional)
*3 garlic cloves
*1 inch grated ginger (1 tablespoon)
*2 tablespoons soy sauce
*1/4 cup white wine
*1 teaspoon sesame oil
*1/3 cup chopped cilantro
*Scallions, chopped for garnish
*Extra cilantro, to garnish

Directions:

1) Heat the oven to 475ºF. Pat the fish dry and season lightly with salt and pepper. Place in a glass baking dish.

2) Chop the pepper and garlic, and grate the ginger. Put in a small food processor with the soy sauce, white wine, sesame oil, and cilantro. Whir until blended.

Crushed ginger in a jar. I'm still kinda creeped out by the looks of it. ;)

3) Pour the sauce over the fish, rubbing it in a little.

4) Bake for about 8 minutes, or until the fish flakes easily and is cooked through. It will be very moist and gelatinous, still. Serve immediately over brown rice, garnished with scallions and cilantro.

I made quite a few changes to this recipe. Most of them were for convenience but the kick I gave to the brown rice was for some added flavor.....I added 1 Tbsp of butter after cooking it and a tsp of lime juice. Mmm. I didn't use a food processor because I don't have one. The last time I bought a food processor I brought it home, unpacked it from the box, tried to make salsa with it, couldn't get it to turn on, cleaned it, took it back to Walmart and told them it was broken. I've yet to attempt another food processor purchase. I took it as my sign a few years ago that I didn't belong in the kitchen. ;) I ended up not needing the processor seeing as how I left out a few ingredients that would've needed blended. I went without the white wine, scallions, and the jalapenos. The jalapenos were left out simply because I forgot to buy them. The wine was left out simply because I don't drink wine. The scallions were left out simply because I don't know what a scallion is. Hehehehe. FYI, I'm not kidding. So with all of my omitions being mentioned, the fish ended up with a perfect taste which can only get better with all the missing ingredients I'm sure. ;) If anyone wants to gift me with a bottle of "cooking wine" I would be your friend forever. Oh yeah, one more thing....ENJOY!!!!