My favorite way to eat fish is baked in a foil pouch. It keeps the fish tender and moist, plus it makes a pretty awesome sauce to go over a starch. I like couscous for this dish since it soaks up the flavor of the sauce. There’s a few components to the dish and several steps, so the layout for this blog is going to be a bit different. This recipe makes four foil pouches to serve four people.

Tomato Mixture

• 2 cups of tomatoes, chopped. (I used Roma tomatoes, but any will do)
• zest from 1 medium to large sized lemon
• 1.5 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
• ½ teaspoon salt

Mix together in a large bowl until well combined.

Flour Mixture

• ½ cup of all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon seasoned salt
• ½ teaspoon ground black pepper

Mix together in a shallow dish (large enough to fit the fish fillets in) until well combined.

Sauce Mixture

• Juice from 1 medium to large sized lemon (use the one you took the zest from earlier for the tomato mixture)
• 1/8th of a cup of white wine
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Stir together in a shallow dish (large enough to fit the fish fillets in) until well combined.

Preheat your oven to 425º F. Then get four sheets of foil set on the counter. Put ¼ cup of the tomato mixture on the bottom of the foil. This will prevent the fish from sticking.

Next, you get your fish fillet and lightly roll it in the flour mixture. You don’t want too thick of a coating, but you want to make sure that it’s covered. This helps to thicken the sauce that’s created in the foil packet as it bakes. For this recipe, I used mahi mahi (or dolphin fish). You can use any firm, white fish you prefer – cod or tilapia would work with this recipe. I have not tried it with salmon, but I’m sure it would be fine.

After rolling the fish fillet lightly in the flour mixture, you roll it in the sauce mixture to get it coated.

Then you lay it atop the tomato mixture with the flattest side of the fillet down.

Layer another ¼ cup of the tomato mixture over the fish fillet. Spoon two tablespoons of the sauce mixture over the top and wrap up the packet. Repeat the steps for the remaining fish fillets. There should be no tomato mixture left, a bit of the sauce leftover, and a bit of the flour mixture leftover.

Place all the packets onto a baking sheet and put it in the oven for about 20 minutes.

While the fish is baking, you can make the couscous.

Couscous:

• 1 ½ cups of dry couscous
• 1 ½ cups of low sodium chicken broth
• 3 teaspoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon chives (fresh or dried)
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper

Put everything except the couscous into a pot and bring to a rolling boil. Once boiling, remove pot from heat, add in the dry couscous and mix well to moisten it all. Put the lid on the pot and let sit for 6 minutes. Remove the lid and fluff the couscous with a fork.

After the fish has baked for 20 minutes, take them out of the oven and let it sit on the stove top for about 5 to 10 minutes. This lets it cool down a bit so it’s easier to handle. Very carefully open the pouch and you should have a lovely piece of fish with tomatoes and a sauce. Put the couscous onto a plate first, then put the fish next to it, then spoon all the tomatoes and sauce over the both of them.

Serve it with a side of sauteed veggies or a salad and it’s a complete meal!

If you don’t like couscous, you can omit it and serve it over quinoa or rice. Note: don’t use my recipe for the couscous if you’re going to use rice or quinoa…Follow cooking directions on the package for those.

If you’re going grain-free, you can serve it over cauliflower “rice”.