Baked Fillet of Flounder Stuffed with Spinach

Flounder fillets are cooked to flaky perfection, rolled with a herbed breadcrumb stuffing, and set over a baby spinach sauteed with garlic and capers. Easy to make, and featuring only simple ingredients, these stuffed flounder fillets make for a deliciously elegant weeknight dinner.

However, let’s start off with one truism – seafood can be intimidating to prepare. Full stop. For starters, seafood features an array of irregular textures, ranging from delicate and flaky (bass and cod) to oily and thick (swordfish and salmon) to firm or even rubbery (squid, octopus and certain shark varieties). Then tack on a truly vast array of flavor profiles that run the gamut from light and clean (haddock and fluke) to tasting like the saltwater it’s been fished from (sardines, herring, and mackerel), and one might be forgiven for asking “Where do you start?” and then once you’ve found a starting point, you might further ask “How do you get it right?”

The answer is to start with what you’re comfortable with, and branch out from there.

To that point, I believe that every at-home chef or aspiring dinner-party virtuoso should have at least one ‘really’ good fish recipe in their repertoire. I’m talking about the kind of fish recipe that’s not only delicious, and therefore impresses the palate, but that also ‘looks’ excellent, thereby combining great flavors with equally great visuals.

Baked Fillet of Flounder Stuffed with SpinachPhoto byLiving the Gourmet

Ingredients

• 6 slices of filet of flounder

For the Stuffing:

• 1 1/4 cups of Italian style seasoned bread crumbs
• 1/2 cup of chopped Italian parsley - stems removed and chopped
• 1 tbs. capers plus a tbs. of caper juice - chopped
• 1 stalk of celery - chopped fine
• 4 cloves of garlic - chopped fine
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1/4 cup of grated Parmesan or Romano cheese
• Olive oil - for drizzling
• Paprika and Dried Oregano for dusting over the fish

For the Sautéed Spinach:

• 4 cups baby spinach
• 3/4 cup walnut pieces
• 3 - 4 cloves of garlic - chopped
• Sea salt
• 1/4 tsp. Red pepper flakes
• Olive oil

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Heat a large cast iron frying pan with 2 tbs. olive oil.
3. Add the chopped parsley, chopped garlic and celery and toss for minute.
4. Add the capers and caper juice and toss.
5. Add the breadcrumbs, lemon juice and cheese and give a good drizzle of olive oil and toss.
6. Remove from the heat.
7. Place the flounder flat on a plate and line the flounder with a thin layer of the breadcrumb mixture.
8. Roll and carefully seal with a toothpick. Be gentle since the flounder will rip apart.
9. Place on a rack in a baking pan, if you do not have a pan with a rack, that’s ok, just drizzle a little olive oil in the pan and place the flounder rolls in a baking pan.
10. Sprinkle the flounder with paprika and dried oregano. You may dust the tops of the flounder with a little of the extra breadcrumbs and a drizzle of olive oil.
11. Bake 20-25 minutes or until the fish flakes easily with a fork.

**If you enjoyed today's recipe, visit Living the Gourmet for more easy and delicious recipes!