Lemon and Tarragon Poached Halibut with Blood Orange Sauce (and Seriously Awesome Potatoes)

I enjoyed the saffron-scented halibut that I made a few months ago.  But it needed a sauce.  So I decided to try and make my own sous vide halibut with a fun sauce.  I will admit, this halibut was not as firm as I would like.  I think I'd try a firmer fish next time.  Despite the years I've been cooking, I'm still not that great at picking what types of fish work with what sauces or methods of cooking.  That said, the flavors of the fish and sauce worked well together.  I'd make the sauce for a breaded fish too. I thought blood orange on its own was a bit sweet so I added some lemon juice to tie it in with the poaching liquid and the citrus salt in the potatoes and I think it worked pretty well.  The sauce was kind of sweet and sour, but in a mild way; it didn't overpower the fish.

The potatoes were the star of the dish.  I liked them even more than the jalapeno poached potatoes that are the usual roasted potato staple in my house.  They have two kinds of salt in them.  Why?  Because I have a vast army of nice salts that were given to me as gifts and I want to find more ways to use them.  I've got some citrus salt that is pretty strong and some very nice salt with roasted spices.  I put some citrus salt and pepper on the potatoes and added a little thyme. Before I neglected it this winter and then let my dog run around on it, I grew some lemon thyme in my herb garden.  I figured citrus salt and thyme would work pretty well together since lemon thyme is so good.  I wanted to make sure there was enough salt on the potatoes but I didn't want the citrus to be overpowering, so I added a little of the roasted spice salt as well.  If you don't have any, regular salt would work fine.  The potatoes were perfect.  Just the right amount of crunch and flavor.  They were tangy, but not overly much.  The thyme made them smell fantastic.

I have descended into full blown cooking nerd mode. (Saffron-Scented Halibut)

I spent most of high school and college avoiding chemistry.  Then I got into cooking.  My husband bought me an immersion circulator for Christmas!  I didn't know that there was a model that could hook on to an ordinary large pot instead of a giant plastic tub.  It looks more like lab equipment than a cooking tool. I've always been curious about cooking with one because I watch way too much Iron Chef America.  The Anovo immersion circulator is very easy to use.  I'm using it here with a pasta pot and some tin foil. One of the first things I wanted to try out was fish.  This is saffron-scented halibut with tomato compute and zucchini.  It was fantastic!  The zucchini was cooked through, yet still crunchy instead of mushy and gross.  The tomatoes had the right amount of softness.  The fish was perfectly cooked.  It was moist, flaky, and evenly cooked.  The saffron sauce had the right amount of zing from the oranges but it didn't overpower the flavor of the fish.  This dish did involve a good bit of prep work but total cooking time for everything was 17 minutes.

To make the meal, I attached the immersion circulator to my pasta pot, set it for 140 degrees F through its very simple touch screen interface, and covered the pot with tin foil.  The instruction manual emphasized that covering the pot is necessary and suggested tin foil if a special lid wasn't available.

I feel a bit like a mad scientist.