Slow-Baked Sea Bream with Tahini Sauce and Pine Nuts

This creamy and aromatic dish is a reflection on the flavours used within Palestine. The nutty tahini combines wonderfully with the butter, garlic and lemon to bring out the best from such a tasty and tender white fish.

(recipe and image produced by the ‘Welcome to Palestine’ team)

Ingredients

Serves 4 – Time 35 minutes

2 x 400g Sea Bream Cleaned, Gutted and De-scaled
100g Pine Nuts
3 Large Garlic Cloves
1 Medium Lemon
1 Tbsp Tahini
50g Salted Butter
1 large Handful of Parsley
3 Tbsp Olive Oil
1 Tsp Harissa

Instructions

Pre heat the oven to 160 degrees Celsius.

Whilst the oven is heating up put the garlic, tahini, oil, lemon juice, parsley, harissa, butter and 50g of pine nuts into a food processor and blitz until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

Lay the fish in a deep sided roasting tin and score evenly along both sides of both fish. Smother the insides and outsides with the creamy mixture making sure to massage the sauce all over.

Bake the fish in the oven for 25 minutes until the sauce is thicker and beginning to caramelise.

Just before the fish is ready, dry fry the remaining pine nuts in a frying pan until golden brown and sprinkle over the fish.

This dish tastes great with salad, rice or couscous and a dash of plain yogurt and lemon. We love to serve the fish on a bed of fresh spinach.

TIP: It is normally recommended that, when possible, sea bream should be bought from a market or fish monger as a wild caught fish at a minimum weight of 400g per fish.