I run hot. Who doesn’t in July? It makes me tired and fussy, sighing over and over inordinately and picking fights with the dog. I often want to live in the basement forever or bathe in iced tea. But I cheer up when there’s a dinner that looks and tastes like this on the table. And even though we cook quite a bit of our summer meals on an outdoor grill, the weather isn’t always cooperative. Sometimes I take one look out on the deck (see left photo) and decide we are cooking indoors. The other option is to go out to eat but we rarely go out to dinner. This isn’t a complaint. We could do it. We just don’t do it very often as we like to eat at home. (In hot weather, some restaurants aren’t really cool, either.) The other day, my rockfish was thawed. The plan was to grill it simply and top it with a blueberry-peach salsa. Maybe some asparagus? Instead, moving indoors after glancing at troublesome skies, I knew a different meal was about to take place. I had had a taste for roasted vegetables for days and, despite them not being terribly summer-ish, thought I’d roast them up in my countertop Breville oven. Carrots and baby potatoes are nearly always in my larder, so I’d go with those. Should I grill the fish in the stovetop grill pan or do something different? The rockfish is kinda flakey and tender; I had had concerns about grilling it and keeping the thin fillets intact. I knew I was jonesing for a solid pan of some sort.
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