I stumbled across this great post on SeriousEats by culinary director Kenji Lopez-Alt. There’s nothing especially new here, but it’s nice to have this step-by-step tutorial for doing this. I didn’t worry about the exact ingredients; the procedure is what’s important. I did it with cod (readily available here in New England, although I wonder if the stocks have really recovered enough for it to be as plentiful as it appears). I added a couple teaspoons of minced fresh tarragon to the egg mixture — this allowed me to add some herbal flavor while keeping the quick-to-burn ingredients still relatively protected. It all came out exactly as Kenji suggested: perfectly cooked fish, golden-brown coating, and no mess or lingering odor to clean up. I used a ten-inch non-non-stick stainless-steel skillet, but for my pound of cod a slightly larger size would have been a bit better. No matter: it still came out great.
Proportions I used:
- 1 lb cod fillet
- ½ cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- fresh ground black pepper (not measured)
- 2 medium eggs (how did I end up with these?)
- about 2 tsp minced fresh tarragon
- 1½ tbl canola oil
- 1 cup panko
There was plenty of all of the breading stages left over to do at least another half-pound of fish, if not a whole pound.