Alice Taylor: Pan-Fried Fish with Potato Salad

There is no easier or cleaner way to cook fish at home. This works with literally every fish you can think of, from boneless fillets to squid or prawns. 

Serves: 2   

Time: 25 minutes   

  

Ingredients   

For the Fish:   

• 2 skin-on fish fillets (snapper, or any white fish)   
• Fresh herbs (optional)   
• Salt and black pepper   
• Oil, for cooking   

For the Potato Salad:   

• 500g potatoes, sliced 1cm thick   
• 1 pickle, chopped   
• 1 tbsp capers, chopped   
• ½ small red onion, thinly sliced   
• 2 tbsp olive oil   
• 1 tbsp white wine vinegar   
• Fresh herbs like basil or parsley (optional)   

  

Method   

1. Season the fish fillets with salt 5-10 minutes before cooking. Pat them very dry with a paper towel, then rub with oil. Add fresh herbs and pepper to the flesh side if desired.   
2. Bring a pot of heavily salted water to a boil. Add the sliced potatoes and cook for 5-6 minutes until just tender. Drain well.  
3. While the potatoes cook, make the dressing: in a bowl, combine the pickle, capers, onion, olive oil, vinegar, and herbs. Add the hot potatoes and toss gently. Set aside. 
4. Heat a cast-iron or heavy-based pan over high heat. Place the fish fillets on a sheet of baking paper, then transfer them skin-side down into the hot pan.   
5. Cook on the skin side until the fish is almost cooked through (the flesh will turn opaque from the bottom up). This usually takes 4-6 minutes depending on thickness.   
6. Flip the fish for just a few seconds on the flesh side, then remove from the pan immediately.   
7. Serve the fish alongside the warm potato salad.    

  

Tips     

• Dry skin = crispy skin. Patting the fish completely dry before cooking is the secret to perfectly crisp skin.  
• Use baking paper: Placing the fish on a sheet of baking paper before adding to the pan prevents sticking and makes flipping easier. 
• Adjust timing: Cooking time depends entirely on the thickness of your fillet. A good rule is about 3-4 minutes per centimetre of thickness on the skin side. 
• Any fish works: This method is perfect for snapper, salmon, or even squid and prawns (adjust timing accordingly). 

  

LISTEN ABOVE  

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News talk z'b.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Alice Taylor From Alice Taylor eats us with us this
morning with an amazing sounding recif he good a ellis
good morning?

Speaker 1 (00:19):
How are you?

Speaker 3 (00:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (00:20):
So well, thank you so good to have you back
with us again on Saturday mornings.

Speaker 4 (00:24):
Oh, thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
This sounds great and looks amazing. And this is like
a really simple and easy way to cook fish at home, right,
because I know that some people go, oh, it can
be a bit messy and can stink things out and
all of that kind of thing, but this is a
nice simple way of doing it.

Speaker 4 (00:38):
Yeah, well exactly. And I mean I was one of
those people. I didn't really like to cook fish because
often it would stick to the pan and it's a
bit messy, and it can smell a bit, you know,
and all of that. But I saw my partner, he's
a chef as well, cook fish like this and I
just couldn't believe it. So we shared it on my
page last week and people loved it. So I thought

(00:59):
maybe you guys would enjoy it as well.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
Yeah, great, So run us through it.

Speaker 4 (01:03):
So basically of preparing the fish it's really easy. It's
kind of like it's so simple that I can't believe
I didn't really think about it before. But essentially, what
you're going to do is take your fish filets. If
you have the skin on, that's great. We're going to
get really crispy skin this way and heat up your pan.
We use a cast iron pan, but you can use

(01:24):
like a stainless steel pan whatever you have, really really
really hot, and don't add any oil or anything. Instead,
what you're going to do is take your fish filets,
put it into like onto a plate or something, pour
over some oil and some salt, and then place those
onto like a big sheet of baking paper that fits
the pan. And then all you do is just take

(01:45):
the entire sheet of paper and just chuck it on
the pan and you don't hear any mess. It's the
most crispy skin. It's so so easy.

Speaker 5 (01:55):
Oh my gosh, it's just like it seems so obvious,
you know, yeah, nice, yeah, but you get get the
benefits of the crispy skin without a getting sick in
to the pan exactly.

Speaker 4 (02:06):
And all you do is, you know, when you're done,
you just lift the baking paper off and your pant
is clean, it goes in the bin, and the fish
is perfect. And so that's that's the way that we
do it. And the recipe, the recipe that I've given
you guys today, has a really easy potato salad in
it as well, because honestly, the fish I'm not even
sure if you can consider it a recipe, but the

(02:27):
potato salad is a fish cooking is yeah, cooking hack,
but it's so it was so good that I had
to share it. But in terms of the potato salad,
it's it's really easy. One of my favorite ways to
sort of save money on food is to go out
to the supermarket less, and so by doing that, what
we do is keep like lots of little pickles and
capers and sort of things and jars that last a

(02:49):
long time. So this is a really easy potato salad
where you basically boil potatoes, you add pickles, capers, you
can add a little onion, and the dressing is just
olive oil and vinegar and any fresh herbs that you have.
If you don't have, then that's completely fine. And it's
just the most delicious potato salad.

Speaker 2 (03:08):
It's so good, looks amazing, Okay, Hey, thank you so much. Yeah,
it looks super easy, like well you reckon twenty twenty.

Speaker 3 (03:15):
Five minutes maybe when at most yeah, at most.

Speaker 2 (03:19):
Super fast and also just incredibly like nutritious and healthy
and tasty, so all of the things we love. Thank you.
What I will do is we'll make sure that recipes
up on newstalksb dot co, dot ins and if people
want to find you on Instagram and your socials, what
is the best way to do that?

Speaker 4 (03:33):
Alice, I'm kind of everywhere now, but I'm mainly also
on Instagram and Alice Taylor Eats everywhere wherever you kind
of go do your social media, I'll probably be on
there at Alice Taylor Eats.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Hey, look, IMA's just a text to say, get a
good morning. I cook burger patties and steak like this
as well. So I don't know if you've tried that,
but maybe that could be a good way of you
could expand this technique.

Speaker 4 (03:59):
I'm going to have to try it today, I think.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
Yeah, because that would make sense. Actually, I suppose if
you if it's anything you want the crispyiness on the
app Saturday, but you don't want to stand it. Yeah, yeah,
that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
Yeah, exactly, bloomy potentially, you know sometimes yeah, oh my gosh,
we might have just revolutionized cooking.

Speaker 4 (04:17):
I reckon else well, I think so, and I think
the non stick pan. You know a lot of people
don't like using nonstick pans. They might have them, and
even those you can't get really really hot. So this
is a great technique. Yeah, anything you want to cook, really,
it probably works perfect.

Speaker 2 (04:31):
Hey, thank you, all right, we'll catch it in very soon.
That's Alis Taylor from Elis Taylor Each. You can find
her on the social platforms. Of course. That pan fried
fish with potato salad recipe is going to be up
on the News Talk Z'DB website.

Speaker 1 (04:42):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, listen live
to News Talks EDB from nine am Saturday, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio