Feeling like some Creative Fish!

So I’m at the store and they have beautiful big tilapia filets on sale… So… I got some… but for some reason thinking of all the normal ways I usually fix it were not making me happy… I just got the notion of wanting to make it “stuffed”.  So I decided I was going to make stuffed fish and set about to see what I had here in the house to stuff it with!  It was fun!  AND it turned out great!

I started with some thick Tilapia filets that were thick enough that from the center I was able to slice a flap on either side so when I stuffed it, it was open on top not the side…  the size and thickness of your filets will determine how you slice it to later stuff….any way you do it is fine…

Next I sauteed some

pancetta ( you can get it in little blister packs at Trader Joes already diced up)

some diced up zucchini

chopped sweet vidalia onion

chopped sun dried tomatoes

(all these things were chopped to be rather small and uniform in size)

Then while that was all sauteeing together,

I took about a pint of heavy cream and half a package of cream cheese and beat it together until lightly fluffy (not necessarily to full whipped cream stage) and then I added a hefty dollop of some leftover zinfandel I had but you can use any white or pink wine…and whipped some more.

I then added cream mixture to sauteed mixture and stirred all together and sauteed a bit more.   I added a little white pepper and I am telling you that I added JUST A PINCH of salt…the pancetta added enough saltiness and everything else had plenty of flavor..

Then you just scoop out the filling and stuff inside of fish halves and then pour remaining sauce on top.

Bake in 350 degree oven 20-30 minutes

Serve with some roasted potatoes and another green vegetable and you have a healthy meal with just a little “cream” fat and the pancetta is so little for flavor that it isn’t that bad either… but if you make sure you have some greens it helps the health factor a LOT. 

If you eat a lot of good things like this… with fish, veggies, etc, then a little cream or bacon isn’t horrible as long as you keep EVERYTHING IN MODERATION (and LOTs OF greens!!)

I really hope you enjoy this dish because according to my husband it was REALLY good…

Peace, Love and Happiness!

♥Dorina

House Vino!

When I first got married, Pas and Iused to keep a cheap bottle of white wine in the fridge that we drank with dinner.  Those were the days before our “wine tastebuds” had matured, so all we drank were sweet whites or zinfandels.  Well, years passed, and every time I turned around, I was either pregnant or nursing and so the drinking kind of fell by the wayside. 

Fast forward a few years…we go out to dinner and order a glass of wine and I can no longer drink half a glass without “falling out of my chair”!  So one day I said to Pas…”you know…we need to drink more!”  of course he was wondering what planet I came from since we didn’t really drink much or often.  But my answer was reasonable in my thinking…” I just want to build up enough of a tolerance so that we can go out and I can finish a whole glass without falling out of my chair!!!”

Well, it was a nice idea but never really went anywhere because we had already fallen into a habit of not drinking and so therefore not even bothering to waste the money anyway. (which of course is not a bad thing…in fact not bad at all…I just liked being able to enjoy my vino now and then).

Fast forward a few more years and all of a sudden we get to spend a year in Italy.  Woohoo!!!   Vino over there is cheaper than bottled water!  You can get a really nice local  wine for 1 euro 30 cents!  and a 2 liter bottle of water was 1 euro 50 cents!  (this is a bottle of wine for still less than $2!!!)  ….and it was GOOD!!!

Well guess what???  I drank wine EVERY DAY with my dinner!!  I didn’t get sloshed and I enjoyed my 1 glass –it tasted good and didn’t break my bank!  Yeah!!  I built up enough of a tolerance that I don’t fall out of my chair anymore after a few sips!!!

Ahhhhaaaaa!!!!  BUT…what about when we returned to the good ol’ USA???  You cannot get a bottle of wine here for under $2!  How was I going to keep up what had now become an expensive habit??  OH NO!!!

I was bound and determined to be able to continue enjoying that life enhancing nectar of the gods!  So I decided to go to our couple local beer and wine stores and I bought every “cheap” bottle of wine I could find…which were mostly $4.99-$6.99 which I had never touched before thinking that cheap was well….cheap!

Up until now, we had always stuck with the “middle of the road” bottles…there were the $20 and up wines that we considered  expensive and the cheap ones that we didn’t want to get and be cheap so we didn’t buy them because surely they were terrible and so we stuck with the $10-$15 bottles thinking it was at least decent.

Boy were we wrong!  So out of all these cheap bottles, there was only one bottle we didn’t particularly care for (which I ended up cooking with so no waste there!)  every otherr bottle of wine was good.  Almost all of them were better than the $10 and $12 and $15 bottles we used to get!  SO…now we had found some wines we thought we could call our house wine!….

That is…until one Sunday, my brother in law Anthony, walked in the door carrying a gallon wine bottle slung over his shoulder!  Pas assumed and so asked…”is that homemade”?  and Anthony said “yes” as he put it down on the table…with the label facing out saying in great big letters  “Home Made” by Opici Wines!  haha on us!  Opici makes this wine that is called Homemade…is only $13-$15 a GALLON bottle and it is a great hearty dark red wine that is not too sweet but sweet enough and not too dry. ( I can’t stand it too dry!)  It really tastes like a nice homemade vino.  

So with the taste and the price being right, this is now our HOUSE WINE.   

I have to also point out though that Whole Foods Market even tho they are very expensive in so many things had great “cheap” wine also…all of their 365 brand wines were good as well as most of their average $5.99 bottles.  Also here in my neighborhood Gary’s has a few and so did some of the local mom and pop shops. 

I urge you to go out and try a bunch of “cheap” wines.  Save the fancy stuff for special occasions but in the meantime do something good for your heart, your palate, your wallet and your mood and go find the “cheap wine” that is right for your HOUSE WINE!

♥Dorina