My first review! Here is how this is going to go down. I'm going to rate the recipe based on the following criteria: Execution of recipe, ease of ingredients, taste. Execution and ingredients will be weighted equally on a scale from 0-5. Taste will be rated on a scale from 0-10. 0 is the lowest score, 20 is the highest.
The recipe used today is from the America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook (You'll soon realize that I only have a handful of cookbooks so I will be drawing a lot of the recipes from the same book.) For my particular edition, it is listed on page 270.
Ease of Ingredients: (Availability is ranked based on likelihood that ingredient is already typically stocked in a kitchen. Ranking is Common/Uncommon/Rare/Very Rare)
Here's the ingredient list:
Dried Basil - Common, optional ingredient in recipe
Dried Thyme - Common
Eggs - Common
Garlic Powder - Common (Still had to go out and purchase)
Lemon - Common (Used limes as substitute)
Pepper - Common
Salt - Common
Vegetable Oil - Common (Used canola as a substitute)
Catfish - Uncommon (I don't know a lot of folks that keep seafood readily available. Although the name of the dish dealt with catfish, the comments mentioned that it could be interchangeable with other types of fish, which is encouraging. I used tilapia for this recipe)
Cayenne Pepper - Uncommon
Dijon Mustard - Uncommon (Mustard in general is common, but when you get specific, you may not have a particular type. In this case, I went with spicy brown mustard as a substitute)
Melba Toast - Rare (Had to go out and purchase)
I had most of the ingredients available and didn't have to shop for many unique ingredients. I was definitely heading to the store to get the melba toast. I could have used something else as a substitute, but I wanted to make an effort to only sub ingredients that are minor in nature and are not the core part of the recipe. 4/5
Ease of Execution (Techniques/Tools used):
Food Processor
Egg Wash
Oven/Baking
Labeled as a "fast dish", can complete in 30 minutes. My first real time using a food processor, but it wasn't difficult at all. Just a pain to clean afterwards. I find egg washes to be a little tricky, only because it gets messy and sometimes the crumbs won't adhere to the meat. Still, compared to some of my previous egg wash attempts, this was on the easier side. Once the fish is coated with the melba crumbs, then it goes to the oven on a wire rack hovered over an oven tray. Pretty simple. 4/5
Taste
I ended up using this recipe for tilapia and for some thin chicken breasts. I have a sister-in-law that is allergic to fish, but thought the recipe would be a play on fried chicken and would work accordingly. The recipe suggested that the fish be cooked 12-15 minutes. I was cooking the chicken at the same time and opted to go the longer time route. Ended up overcooking he fish a bit, but the results weren't disastrous.
The recipe calls for salt and pepper prior to the egg wash. I found that the wash rinsed away or eliminated the seasoning from before. I didn't add pepper, but I definitely had to add salt to the finished product, as it was rather bland without it. The melba toast makes the exterior very crispy; I suggested to my wife that this would be a great healthy alternative compared to traditional fried fish or chicken. The dried herbs were subtle, not overpowering. Didn't taste the mustard, which might be a consequence of using spicy brown instead of dijon. The lime wedges to add at the end helped too. A solid effort. 6/10
Total Score: 14/20 (***1/2)
