Braised Halibut With Asparagus, Baby Potatoes and Saffron

Heat your stainless steel Al Clad pan until you can add a few drops of water that beads up and “dances” (not just a sizzle) around the pan and evaporates. Add the oil and your pan is now essentially non-stick. Your fish will sear much better giving you the famed Maillard reaction.

The mix of flavors is excellent, but the broth made as specified is weak. Most importantly, use a fish stock instead of water, and use 8 anchovies (or add Thai fish sauce to taste at the end). I made this with twice the almonds, 3 times the garlic, and dissolved twice the amount of saffron in rose water (not plain water). It was fantastic.

Delicious! If you can stand the price of halibut this is well worth making. Do yourself a favor and use a nonstick pan to sear the fish - I used my beloved All Clad and struggled mightily to get the fish turned over and out of the skillet without having it fall apart. As always with NYTimes recipes it takes longer than indicated - closer to an hour than 35 minutes if you're a regular home cook. The anchovies add flavor and you don't know they're there. Good enough to serve to company.

With asparagus out of season, I used large mushrooms, quartered so they were the same size as the new baby potatoes, and seared quickly on the outside (like the fish) to set aside until the later braising. As for the fish, Lake Superior whitefish right out of the cold clean waters of the greatest of the Great Lakes was, as always, superb.

Delicious sauce. I was serving a houseful, so for cost sake I substituted cod for halibut, which needed a little more cooking time. Seared the fish in an iron skillet, so it had a nice crust. Substituted small red potatoes for fingerlings, and they worked fine cut in half.

The mix of flavors is excellent, but the broth made as specified is weak. Most importantly, use a fish stock instead of water, and use 8 anchovies (or add Thai fish sauce to taste at the end). I made this with twice the almonds, 3 times the garlic, and dissolved twice the amount of saffron in rose water (not plain water). It was fantastic.

Based on what others had said about the broth, I used less liquid, used some fish stock and some water, and deglazed the pan with white wine before adding the broth and water. My finished dish was more of a sauce than a broth. I also don't have a mortar and pestle, and the sauce was grainy from the nuts so used the immersion blender on it. I also poached the fish for only four minutes and it was perfect. This is a really elegant and easy dish.

Loved the flavors but had some prep/timing issues. Used anchovy paste rather than whole fish to mix w/ garlic & ground almonds. (Why ground almonds? Why not just scatter some toasted, slivered almonds over the dish before serving?) Used a thick slab of halibut. I get the need to sear, but after sitting for 15 minutes post searing, the fish was basically cooked through. So put asparagus in liquid first for about 3 minutes, then poached fish for only 2 minutes — just to reheat. Used only 2c water.

#) USE A NON-STICK when cooking the fish . . . then transfer oil to a larger heavy pot (like a Le Creuset) for the rest

#) Let the oil cool down before adding the garlic paste or else the garlic will burn instantly

Quite tasty and sophisticated. Used 1 lb halibut and kept all other ingredients the same to make 2 generous portions. Deglazed pan with 1/2 c white wine and added 1/2 c water to simmer vegetables. Total of 1 c liquid instead of 3 c. No need to reduce. Fish was fully cooked after sautéing and resting in a 160F warming oven while vegetables cooked. Finished with a drizzle of EVOO.

I microwaved the asparagus for 2 minutes and then added it to the broth with the fish and after a few minutes of simmering everything was cooked to perfection
Very tasty and light

I used cod, but it needs a little more cooking time to get the nice flake you want.

Fantastic spring dish. I had no problem with the fish. I heated my All-Clad frying pan with olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan to sizzle. My fillets were thick so I seared all 4 sides. I cut the recipe in half for 2 of us but used the full amount of water. My asparagus were right out of the garden as was the garlic. Lovely flavor, very filling. I love dinners that are cooked in one pot. This was an elegant dinner that could be served at the finest of restaurants.