Sea bass with buttered brown shrimp orzo
Serves: 2
Prep time: 15 minsTotal time: 
Recipe photograph by Sam Folan
Sea bass with buttered brown shrimp orzo
This simple and speedy fish dish is ideal for when you fancy something special for dinner. Rice-shaped orzo is tossed with buttery brown shrimps, lemon, samphire and chives as a base for crisp-skinned sea bass
Serves: 2
Prep time: 15 minsTotal time: 
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Nutritional information (per serving)
Calories
625Kcal
Fat
28gr
Saturates
11gr
Carbs
55gr
Sugars
2gr
Fibre
4gr
Protein
35gr
Salt
1.9gr
Abigail Spooner
Abi is our former Junior Food Editor. An obsessive foodie with a sweet tooth, she is happiest when baking and is a firm believer that there is always room for dessert (preferably following a big bowl of pasta)
See more of Abigail Spooner’s recipes
Abigail Spooner
Abi is our former Junior Food Editor. An obsessive foodie with a sweet tooth, she is happiest when baking and is a firm believer that there is always room for dessert (preferably following a big bowl of pasta)
See more of Abigail Spooner’s recipes
Ingredients
- 150g orzo pasta
- 1 x 70g pack samphire
- 30g butter
- 1 echalion shallot, finely chopped
- 1 x 70g pack cooked and peeled brown shrimp
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 x 180g pack sea bass fillets
- zest of 1 lemon, plus 1 tbsp juice
- small handful finely chopped chives
Step by step
Make it gluten free
You can swap the orzo out for rice (cooked to pack instructions) if you want to make the recipe gluten-free.
- Bring a saucepan of salted water to the boil. Cook the orzo according to pack instructions, adding the samphire for the final 2 minutes, then drain.
- Meanwhile, melt 20g of the butter in a medium saucepan and gently cook the shallot until soft; about 3-4 minutes. Add the brown shrimp and the remaining 10g of butter and warm through over a very low heat.
-
At the same time, heat the olive oil in a frying pan. Slash the skin of the sea bass fillets with a sharp knife if you like (it can help prevent the fish curling up in the pan), pat dry with kitchen paper and season. Once the oil is smoking hot, fry the fish skin-side down over a medium-high heat for 2-3 minutes, flip and fry for a further 1 minute; it doesn’t take long to cook through as the fillets are thin, so be careful not to overcook.Good to knowTo make sure you get a crispy skin on pan-fried fish, first pat the skin dry to remove any excess moisture. Preheat the frying pan, and don’t flip the fish prematurely or you risk it sticking; wait for the skin to release itself naturally.
- Stir the drained orzo and samphire through the buttery shrimps, adding the lemon zest and juice, chives and seasoning.
- Divide the orzo between two bowls and top with the pan-fried sea bass.
