Grilled Swordfish with Parsley Herb Salad

French Friday’s with Dorie –

This Grilled Swordfish with Parsley Herb Salad (prepared and presented here as part of our French Friday’s with Dorie project) is exactly the type of dish I seek out to add to our weeknight menu planner. The preparation has all of the simple panache of a restaurant entrée but with enough ease of preparation to allow you to get on the table in mere minutes.

If swordfish weren’t so damn expensive I would say it was perfect Monday through Friday fare. Unfortunately, the rising food prices of desirable foods such as grilled swordfish is what keeps me trotting off to work each morning, Monday through Friday, so I can continue to enjoy them.

When I see grilled swordfish these days on the menu  it gives me something of a “vintage food” vibe (although perhaps not quite as ‘vintage’ our recent Retro-tastic ™ Pie Plate Salad.) I recall the days when a thick cut of swordfish steak wasn’t the extravagance it is today and, in fact, it was as inexpensive as it was ubiquitous on restaurant menus. Here in Southern California the ideal cut had it served as a baseball sized, thick chunk (think steakhouse style filet mignon) and not as the budget conscious slices preferred by more conservation-minded (and sensible) Europeans.

A good, fresh swordfish needs very little help. All that is really needed is a light oiling and dusting of herbs before grilling or, even better, a light lemon-y herbed marinade soak, especially if the cut is at all thick. Back-in-the-day restaurant menus would frequently feature swordfish topped with copious amounts of chunky, fruity, cilantro-y, “haute cuisine” salsa mixtures that would all but take over the plate and palate. (I worked at one restaurant in the early eighties that claimed it was “famous” for its “Swordfish Veracruz”. As good as it was (and it was!) there was no ability to actually taste the fish itself. We were all sure chef had gleaned it from the many Old El Paso Recipes he must have found featured on the back of salsa jars or Cracker Barrel cheddar cheese wrappers. See “vintage cooking“.)

Grilled Swordfish with Parsley Herb Salad

The fish shines here with a perfect amount of flavoring and ‘sauce’ and never once gets too aggressive or threatening. Rosemary, lemons, capers, piment d’espelette, olive oil and that’s it. Marinate a couple hours or all day if you can but 30 minutes is a minimum. Dorie’s has a winner here with this easy grilled swordfish preparation.

On another exciting note, I’m still on cloud nine since learning that Sis Boom Blog walked off with Best of Show at the 2013 Orange County Fair this year. I haven’t yet been ‘on site’ but my spies were nice enough check out the judges display of the category winners and then send me pictures and tweets to share with me the good news. I am particularly proud that the Coeur à la Crème post (also for French Friday’s with Dorie) won for the Blog Post: Memoir or Personal Story category because, well, that is what I try to do here. Mostly.

I imagine this is how Moses felt:

This Grilled Swordfish with Parsley Herb Salad  was an assignment for French Friday’s with Dorie, a cooking group working its way through Dorie Greenspan’s culinary tome “Around My French Table”. We generally avoid including the recipes in our posts. However, wherever there has been a significant adaptation by me or where the recipe has already been publicly posted by Ms. Greenspan or her publishers or by hundreds of other bloggers I will either include it here (only when adapted) or provide a direct link to it. Please feel free to contact me via the link provided on my page if you need any assistance finding a French Friday with Dorie Recipe. You should buy the book though.

It will change your life as it has mine.