Back in Action - Tropical Thanksgiving

After a somewhat brief hiatus, I am back to blogging!  The holidays were extremely busy, but don't worry, you no longer have to go through KitchenTravel withdrawal...

Now that it is 2011, I have to catch you up on a few things, namely my trip to The Bahamas over Thanksgiving 2010.  As the meal planner of my family, I organized several days of delicious, tropical-themed dishes that were enjoyed after long, hard days of golf, tennis, beach time, and laziness.  Almost all of these dishes were served with a hearty portion of fried plantains.  Lucky for us, the Bahamian grocery store sells an enormous bag of frozen plantains - all you have to do is defrost them a bit and dump them into a frying pan with a little bit of oil.  And they are YUMMY.

But first, let's set the stage.  The Abaco Club at Winding Bay is where we ate these delicious meals...

 

 

Now that I have made you sufficiently jealous, I will now make your mouth water...

Meal One: Jamaican Jerk Chicken with Mashed Sweet Potatoes, Fried Plantains, and a Green Salad

Meal Two: Shrimp Tikka with Mango Chutney and Grilled Corn on the Cob.

Meal Three: Beef Kebabs with Red Onion and Bell Pepper, Greek Salad, and Fried Plantains (forgot to take photos of the Beef Kebabs...apologies!)

Meal Four: Fish Tacos and Fried Plantains

These fish tacos were to die for and are very easy to make.  They are even customizable if you want to add/subtract ingredients!  Here are the easy steps:

Ingredients:

- Red onion

- Red wine vinegar

- 1/4 cup olive oil

- 1.5 teaspoons chili powder

- 1.5 teaspoons dried oregano

- 0.5 teaspoons cumin

- approx. 1/2 cup chopped cilantro

- 1 jalapeño

- 1 lb. mahi mahi

- small tortillas

- salsa

- avocado

- sour cream

- mango

- limes

- anything else you may want to add!

1. Thinly slice a red onion and marinate in red wine vinegar for at least 30 minutes.

2. Grab a gallon-sized seal-able plastic baggie and add 1/4 cup olive oil, 1.5 teaspoons of chili powder, 1.5 teaspoons of dried oregano, 0.5 teaspoons of cumin,  1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro (chop up some more to add to your tacos later), 1 minced jalapeño, and 1 lb. mahi mahi (without any skin).  Seal the bag and squeeze/shake so that the marinade spreads evenly over the fish.  Marinate for 20 minutes.

3. Cook the fish in a medium-sized frying pan over medium heat for 5-7 minutes.  Add a little salt and feel free to pull apart the fish as you cook (because that's how you will want it in your taco!)

4. Warm the tortillas (if you want) and then assemble your tacos (don't forget the marinated red onions)!  In addition to the fish, I added salsa, sour cream, fresh mango, fresh avocado, extra cilantro, and a bit of fresh lime juice to my tacos.  They were unbelievably tasty!

And of course, I should mention that we did eat Thanksgiving dinner.  We just didn't cook it :)

Credits: My Fish Taco recipe is adapted from Lourdes Castro's cookbook, Simply Mexican, which I found online. The photos were taken by yours truly.