"Who are you and what have you done with my wife?!"

That was what Brian said to me when he got home.  Why?

Not only was it a Wednesday when I was home solo until 7:45 with the three kids and I was trying a new recipe.  But I was trying a new recipe that happened to be walleye.

I have to confess that despite being born and raised in Minnesota I have never (no, never) cooked walleye.  To me, fish is pretty much tuna, smoked salmon or really any kind of sushi.  Otherwise, I'm not so much a fish girl.  But there I was, making walleye. 

So now here I sit at 11:15 p.m., so that must mean it's time for me to update on my "30 Day Shred" progress and what we did to continue with the Lifeasmom.com "Eat From the Pantry" challenge.

Nicely, tonight the two of those things combine.

Back to this walleye.  This was given to us by a friend who caught it.  Again, I am a pretty much a girly girl.  I don't hunt or fish or camp.  And as much as I get how fun those things are for many people.  I am the first to tell you they wouldn't be fun for me.  Whenever I say that to someone, inevitably, they come back with, "Aw come on now, it is so fun!  You have to try it."  At which point Brian usually pipes up, "Oh no, you don't know Molly then.  She wouldn't have fun and we wouldn't have fun."

I share all that because I think part of the reason I hadn't used it yet was I just had no idea that to do with it.  You mean he caught it on a pole out on his own?  It had been in the freezer ever since.

Amazing as it is, I was able to find it in our freezer.  Yeah, I think we'll do just fine on the pantry challenge this month.

Clueless Mc-clueless that I am about cooking fish, I asked some girlfriends at work over lunch today what to do with it.  And my friend Angie suggested walnut-crusted walleye.  I googled it and found this recipe.  Which was perfect, because as good as Angie's description of slathering it in butter sounded, it didn't seem like a wise choice given the state of my hips.  Here is the recipe.

Ingredients (all of which I had on hand)

2 pounds walleye

3-4 tablespoons olive oil

Zest and juice from one lemon (used lemon juice)

1 teaspoon freshly chopped thyme (used dried),

plus extra sprigs for garnishing

3/4 cup walnuts

3/4 cup panko (Japanese bread

  crumbs -- I used a frozen French loaf piece and put it in the food processor)

Directions
1.    Preheat oven to 375˚.

2.    Place walleye on a large, foil-lined cooking sheet.   Drizzle with olive oil and lemon juice.  Season with kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. 

3.    Lightly grind nuts in a food processor; do not puree.  Combine nuts with panko and thyme.  Press into flesh of fish.

4.    Bake on middle rack of oven 17-21 minutes, or until fish flakes easily with pricked with a fork.  Serve.


I served it with a side of steamed broccoli.  We were able to get 5 servings out of it and I figured out the nutritional information and the whole meal came in right about 500 calories.  And while I am not a fish lover, I thought it was pretty good.  And Brian even more so.

Brian did joke it was like I was pregnant again with him having a beer with dinner and me having water.  But at least for awhile here I need to be strict.

After taking down the Christmas tree (kind of nice to have the living room back to normal) I made myself head back downstairs to do day three of the "30 Day Shred."  The first 10 minutes were brutal.  My quads hurt so much today, at one point I actually preemptively apologized to my boss for my odd walk when we were heading down the stairs.  My wobbly, strange, off-balance gait was just north of a drunk stagger.

The last 15 minutes felt better than the first 10, but I know today isn't the last of the pain.  Onward.