Bream Baked in Layers with Vegetables in the Oven
This isn't fish with a side dish, but a single dish in layers: potatoes on the bottom, bream in the middle, carrot and onion above and below it. The idea of the construction is that the fish releases its juice downward into the potatoes, while the vegetables on top hold the steam above it.
The bream here is cut into pieces, and it's not worth using it whole. In a layered dish a whole carcass rises above the vegetables, its top dries out, and the potatoes underneath stay raw — that's exactly why the fish goes in as pieces in this recipe.
The foil stays on almost until the end, and comes off for the last seven to ten minutes. Skip that step and the dish comes out tasting right but looking completely pale: nothing browns under foil.
There can be even more layers: baked bream with potatoes under an onion coat puts onion between the fish and the side dish. Bream baked in salt with scales on skips vegetables entirely.
Caloric content: 120kcal
Prepare the fish
Lay the first potato layer
Second potato layer with butter
Grate the carrot
Add the onion
Add the fish
Repeat the carrot
Repeat the onion
Coat with sour cream
Bake
Notes
- Cut the potatoes into thin slices. Thick wedges don't cook through in fifty minutes under foil — they steam instead of baking.
- Put the butter on the upper potato layer, under the vegetables. It's the fat that bream is missing: the fish itself is lean.
- Grate the carrot straight onto the potatoes. Grated carrot releases its juice into the lower layer; sliced into rounds it stays separate and a bit dry.
- Use 20% sour cream. Low-fat sour cream separates and runs to the bottom of the dish within fifty minutes.
- Bream's bones remain. Layered baking doesn't soften them. If that's a problem, use the back portion or a large bream over a kilogram — its bones are bigger and easier to notice while eating.
Questions and Answers
How long should bream with vegetables be baked?
Fifty minutes at 200 °C under foil, of which the last seven to ten minutes are without it.
Why do the potatoes stay raw?
They're cut too thick. In a layered dish they bake in steam, and the slices need to be thin.
Can it be made without sour cream?
Yes, but then the top layer will dry out. Substitute cream from 20% fat or more butter between the layers.
What to do about the bream's bones?
Use the back portion or a large fish: bream over a kilogram has bigger, more noticeable bones that are easy to set aside.
Recipe and step-by-step photos — kolizhanka.net.ua.
