Provencal style snapper

Red snapper Provencal style

From "Paris Bistro Cooking" by Linda Dannenberg
This recipe comes from La Fontaine De Mars. The restaurant uses daurade, a Mediterranean fish not available here. The recipe suggests red snapper, porgy, group or orange roughy instead. Red snapper was the only option from the nice man at the Kowalski's meat counter, where he always seems thrilled that someone wants to buy something.

Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup thinly sliced onions
2 tomatoes, sliced
2 8-ounce fillets of red snapper or similar fish
1 sprig parsley
1 sprig thyme
1 bay leaf
1 cup dry white wine
Pinch of saffron
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

Method
Saute onions in hot oil over low heat until soft, but not brown, about 10 minutes. Add tomatoes and cook about 2 minutes more. Remove from heat.

Preheat oven to 350. Place fish in a baking dish and sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper.

Wrap parsley, thyme and bay leaf in cheesecloth to make a bouquet garni. Tuck in between fillets. (If you don't have cheesecloth, I suspect you could get by with just tucking the herbs in between the fillets; you'll just have to fish them out separately later.)

Spoon onions and tomatoes over top of the fish.

Combine wine with saffron. Stir in tomato paste. Pour mixture over fish in pan. Bake for 30 minutes. Sprinkle parsley over fish for garnish.

The original recipe calls for it to be served with white rice. I used quinoa instead. In any case, serve it with something to sop up the sauce, since that's the best part.

Rating: The saffron in the sauce is definitely nice. The fish is fine. The dish isn't a wower, for some reason. I'm considering trying it again over chicken breasts, which need more help than does the fish.

Followup note: I've since tried this again over chicken breasts. A very nice treatment.