A Fun Fish Dish Done “Vera Cruz” Style!

First, a huge shoutout to my sister-in-law Cherie: not only is she a great Chef, but she made fish in a “Veracruz” sauce and I was hooked!

Veracruz-style fish, or Pescado a la Veracruzana, is a Mexican dish featuring white fish fillets (often red snapper) simmered in a vibrant, tomato-based sauce with a distinctly Mediterranean flair, including ingredients like olives, capers, onions, and garlic. The dish’s flavors come from the combination of these briny, pungent ingredients with the sweetness of tomatoes and the mild heat from optional jalapeños and other peppers. The name comes from the Mexican state of Veracruz, one of the first places where the Spanish settled, influencing its culinary style.

With that said, let’s get cooking!

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

½ yellow onion diced

1 14.5-ounce can fire-roasted tomatoes

3 garlic cloves grated on a microplaner – or in my case a dozen cloves!

10 green olives such as manzanilla – I used a whole jar of Sicilian Castelvetrano

2 tablespoons capers in vinegar or brine – I omitted this as I don’t like them!

1 tablespoon chopped pickled jalapenos – also didn’t add

1 tablespoon pickled jalapeno juice – also didn’t add but here in case you want to

1 bay leaf

2 lbs white fish snapper, sea bass, halibut or even redfish or trout

tablespoon flat-leaf Italian parsley

salt to taste

Instructions:

Heat olive oil and sauté the onion and garlic, salting it with about ¼ teaspoon of salt. Let it sweat and cook down until softened, about 7-10 minutes.

Drain the roasted tomatoes through a fine mesh sieve over a bowl to save the juice.

Add the drained tomatoes, grated garlic, olives, capers, jalapeños and jalapeño juice and bay leaf. It’s easy and fast:

Let that simmer for a half hour or so to bring the flavors together – then it’s time for the fish!

Here’s a look at what’s next: the sauce is bubbling away in the pan, and it’s time to combine everything like this:

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

As the video showed, I poured ¼ cup of the reserved tomato juice from the drained tomatoes in the base of the dish. I topped it with the fish and a sprinkling of salt and pepper. Then I spooned the Veracruz sauce over the top of the fish and put it in the oven to bake for 15 minutes, then took it out of the oven:

It smelled great, and it was time to plate the fish and Veracruz sauce over a mound of rice as the base:

This Veracruz Sauce Rocks!

Cherie, thanks so much for the recipe because I love this sauce! The richness of the roasted tomato sauce combined with garlic, onion and green olives…my kind of dish!

I also loved how well it presented itself on the plate…you can add as much of the sauce as you want, and the rice was, for me the perfect base for the dish…I will absolutely make this again!

This dish reminded me of my “fish in crazy water” recipe I made as well…this is a delicious way to enjoy fish – see the recipe here:

I have been fortunate enough to go to the south of France, and I love the food there – one in particular:

Soupe de Poisson – this thick, rich fish soup is topped with slices of baguette that have been slathered with aioli and shaved parmesan…amazing!

See more of my Cannes food adventure here:

My wife Alex and I also cooked in the South of France with a very special couple:

We had the chance to cook at a terrific cooking school in the south of France – run by the iconic Chef / Cookbook Author Patrica Well and her husband Walter, and I have posted about that great adventure before…you can see what we cooked here:

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Let me know if you’ve had fish “Vera Cruz” style, and if you like the recipe, please share on social media – thank you!

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