This is a simple marriage of butter, shallots, and mushrooms, splashed in a dose of hard cider (the dry, sparkling kind from France or England, sold nearly everywhere you can buy beer and wine) and used to poach fish in a hot oven. The fish may be haddock, cod, monkfish, halibut, red snapper, or any other white-fleshed fish. The cider provides a distinctively sour fruitiness, not at all like white wine, and the completed dish has complementary textures: crunchy shallots, meaty mushrooms (portobellos are good here), and tender fish.

　　

Ingredients

makes 4 servings

　　1 tablespoon butter

　　1/2 cup sliced or minced shallot

　　1 cup roughly chopped portobello or other mushrooms

　　1 1/2 pounds white-fleshed fish fillet, like cod or red snapper, about 1 inch thick, in 1 or 2 pieces

　　Salt and freshly ground black pepper

　　1 cup dry sparkling cider

　　

Step 1

Preheat the oven to 500°F. Smear the bottom of an ovenproof skillet with the butter; sprinkle the shallot and mushrooms around the sides of the skillet. Season the fish with salt and pepper to taste and lay it in the center of the skillet. Pour the cider around the fish.

　　

Step 2

Bring to a boil on top of the stove, then transfer to the oven. Bake for about 8 minutes; it’s highly unlikely the fish will need more time than this unless it is very thick (or you like it very well done). Baste with the pan juices and serve.

　　

Variations

Step 3

The lone improvement you can make to the main recipe is to add more butter. Although I stopped at 4 tablespoons—1/2 stick—I realized that there really was almost no upper limit as far as my taste buds were concerned. But the dish is awfully nice when made on the lean side, too.

　　

Step 4

Substitute any aromatic vegetable, or a combination, for the shallot: onion, leek, carrot (cut very small), celery, fennel, scallion.

　　

Step 5

Use a mixture of mushrooms, or fresh mushrooms combined with reconstituted dried mushrooms. A little of the strained mushroom-soaking liquid added to the poaching liquid is nice, too.

　　

Step 6

A teaspoon of thyme leaves added to the poaching liquid is great; also good is parsley (a small handful of stalks), chervil (a small bunch), or dill (a few stalks). Garnish with chopped fresh leaves of the same herb.

　　

Step 7

Some seeds are good in the poaching liquid, too—try caraway, coriander, or fennel.

　　From Mark Bittman's Quick and Easy Recipes From the New York Times by Mark Bittman Copyright (c) 2007 by Mark Bittman Published by Broadway Books.Mark Bittman is the author of the blockbuster Best Recipes in the World (Broadway, 2005) and the classic bestseller How to Cook Everything, which has sold more than one million copies. He is also the coauthor, with Jean-Georges Vongerichten, of Simple to Spectacular and Jean-Georges: Cooking at Home with a Four-Star Chef. Mr. Bittman is a prolific writer, makes frequent appearances on radio and television, and is the host of The Best Recipes in the World, a 13-part series on public television. He lives in New York and Connecticut.