Swordfish

This easy pan-roasted fish dinner looks and tastes like you spent hours in the kitchen, but it’ll be on your table in less than 30 minutes.

Firm tuna or swordfish holds up to the heat of the grill in these chipotle-spiced brochetas de pescado. 

Tender grilled swordfish steaks are topped with a bright, garlicky Mediterranean-inspired dressing of chopped whole lemon and oregano.

Salting fish removes the fishy-tasting juice from the flesh.

We're flipping the script and marinating after grilling. In this case, it's swordfish steaks in a punchy red wine vinegar dressing with capers and oregano.

Firm, thick swordfish steaks can handle being cooked over medium-high heat like a steak. An even higher temp chars the leeks so that they're smoky outside and sweet and juicy inside.

This satisfying seafood dinner comes together in as little as 20 minutes. Cooking the fish, then making the warm, herby mustard dressing in the same skillet also means cleanup is a breeze.

Homemade harissa is simpler to make than you might think, and packs a flavorful punch on swordfish.

Golden raisins add a sweet burst of flavor to this elegant-but-easy 30-minute seafood pasta dinner.

You've probably never seen smoked swordfish before, but you probably weren't looking. Find it at Mexican, Spanish, or other specialty grocers, or at a well-stocked fish market.

Chef Kenney says that combining the herbs for the salsa verde with seaweed really gives this dish "that fresh-from- the-sea flavor." In Oahu, he uses just harvested limu, but hijiki, which is widely available, works well, too.

NVA: Mangoes originated in India, but today they are loved in cuisines all over the world. The Sanskrit word for mango is amra, meaning "of the people." I think barbecue means "of the people" in America so I have united them here. Justin and I demonstrate this dish at mango festivals from time to time. The bonus: We always bring a bowl of it premade so that the guests can have a taste. That means the batch we make up on stage comes home. You'll be left with half of the BBQ sauce from this recipe, but you'll be pleased as you can use it on any kind of thing in the world that you might barbecue. It is outrageously good on a burger.

You’ll find many recipes for swordfish in Sicily, where it is plentiful, often combined with citrus to give the meaty fish a bit of pizzazz. Here the citrus flavors come from the pesto; it’s great over grilled chicken or a steak, too.

Many Sicilian dishes feature swordfish, since it is very plentiful in the waters surrounding the island. Eggplant is also found in many dishes from this area, but I prefer the texture and taste of Japanese eggplants over the larger ones because their seeds are so tiny; there is also no need to salt the cubed eggplant because they aren’t as bitter as the fully mature ones can be.

An achiote rub is the classic Yucatan way of marinating fish. I tasted this rub for the first time in Isla Mujeres in the early 1970s, when you could still live on the beach in a palapa and hammock, eat great seafood, and drink cold beers for a few dollars per day. The fishermen would rub fish with an achiote-citrus paste and grill them on the beach over fires made from coconut husks. When I worked at Chez Panisse in the late 1970s, I duplicated this rub from my taste memory for some of their famous garlic festivals. The light citrus flavors of the achiote paste are a beautiful contrast to the oily texture of the swordfish. If you don’t have swordfish, use another meaty ocean fish such as wahoo or mahi mahi.

One departs Italy—and the European continent—for the journey to Sicilia through the narrow Straits of Messina. The city is an unlovely place, the ravages and wrecks of her face so corrected that she seems benign, with few of her old graces. Snugged inside the tumult of her port sit a few humble houses still dispatching, to the fishermen and the local citizenry, the stews and broths from the old tomes. And it was at one table there where we ate a most luscious rendition of swordfish. A dish typical of Messina, and now of the whole island, it seems, this one was extraordinary for the rich elements of its stuffing, but more for the divine splash of Malvasia in its little sauce.