Crispy Baked Old Bay Swai with Minted Farm Share Peas

Spicy seasoned swai on a bed of fresh minted farm share peas.

The doctor's office. Sports practice. Getting the oil changed. The pharmacy. Piano lessons. The salon. A flight. Picking up your kids from school, if in fact you have kids, if not--choose another reason for waiting. When you know you'll have time to kill--do you bring along something to do? A book or magazine to read, a craft project to work on?

I knit, I write, or I read. In the wintertime I knit, mostly on a rainbow blanket that is long enough to keep me warm during hockey games. The rest of the year I'm writing or reading as knitting when it's hot out doesn't thrill me.

As an indented aside, that's part of the reason I've been working on this blanket since I was pregnant with my first child, who is in high school. Mostly it's just because I knit slowly. Like I cook slowly. The years in Hawaii were a total wash.

Last Spring, while waiting in the orthodontist's office, I was flipping through an EveryDay with Rachael Ray magazine. The No-So-Mushy Peas caught my eye, because I look for ways to use the fresh peas from our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm share. This recipe is described as a spring classic, and I get that--I'm craving it again this year!  Just like Alanna's Chicken Cider Stew heralds Fall to me, Rachael Ray's fish and peas now mean Spring.

For other recipes using peas, please see my Pea Recipes Collection, part of the Visual Recipe Index by Ingredient. I've got additional interesting recipes on my Colorful Veggies Above the Ground board, one of my Pinterest boards (link to follow me on Pinterest).

Crispy Baked Old Bay Swai with Minted Farm Share Peas (slightly adapted from the April 2014 issue of EveryDay with Rachael Ray, you can find the recipe here on Food Network)

3 cups panko
1 Tablespoon seafood seasoning (I use Old Bay since I grew up eating blue crabs in MD)
2 teaspoons lemon pepper seasoning
1 Tablespoon dried minced onion (I used Tastefully Simple Onion Onion)
1 Tablespoon chopped fresh thyme leaves
1 Tablespoon snipped fresh chives
1 egg, beaten
4 fillets Swai or other white fleshed fish, rinsed and patted dry
1 cup fresh flat leaf parsley leaves, packed
1 cup fresh mint leaves, packed
1 quart fresh pea pods, shelled (about 3 cups--interestingly some dogs like pea pods)
1 Tablespoon olive oil
¼ cup finely chopped spring onions (white with a little bit of green parts)
1 cup chicken stock (here's how I make mine)
½ teaspoon salt (unless your stock is salted)
to serve--sherry vinegar to splash on top of a lemon to squeeze

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and place a cooling rack onto a rimmed baking sheet.
In a shallow pan, stir the panko with the seasonings and herbs. Set aside. Pour egg into another shallow pan. Set up a work flow, as shown above [kitchen dogs optional], and dip each piece of fish first into the egg, coating both sides, then into the panko, coating both sides and pressing into the fish. Transfer to the prepared pan. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until the fish is firm to touch, opaque in the center, and the panko is nicely browned.
While the fish is baking, dump the herbs into a food processor and pulse a few times until they are blended. Scrape out and set aside, then dump the peas into the food processor and pulse to chop roughly.
Add the oil to a medium saucepan over medium heat, and sauté the onions until softened, about 3 to 5 minutes. Add the chicken stock, salt if using, and peas, then bring to a simmer over medium high heat. Cook 10 minutes, then stir in the reserved herbs.
Serve the fish on a bed of peas with a splash of vinegar.