Can fish be comfort food?

Well, YES, it can. But you expected that answer, didn't you?
Let's be honest. Cooking fish freaks out people. This is a fact. People who feel comfortable cooking just about anything else have a certain reluctance to turn to fish. OR, they learn to cook one type of fish or one fish recipe. Show of hands: how many of you have a single salmon dish in your repertoire? And when your friend who doesn't eat meat comes over, that's what you serve. And you HOPE that s/he doesn't come over too often in a short period of time, because then it's got to be the same thing again and again and again.
As a country, we don't eat much fish. When we eat it, it's shrimp. And it's fried. Either in combination (fried shrimp), or shrimp some other way, or fried fish. DEEP fried fish. Prepared in a way that you can't taste the fish because, well, fish tastes "fishy."
Uh, no, it doesn't. This is another one of those foods where, I am sad to say, our past has destroyed our palettes, and we all need to be reeducated.
I do not deny that fish needs to be cooked differently from other foods. It's usually more delicate than meat (but then think of swordfish and tuna). It spoils faster (that it does. And I could give you the biochemistry of this, but you WILL be bored). It picks up flavors easily and strongly.

Well, so what? Let's cook some fish. Let's start with something simple and easy: flounder.
Most people dont' want to start with a fish that is too strong. Honestly, I'm in that camp. I am not a fan of the oily, stronger fish like mackerel, bluefish, sardines, fresh anchovies, and so forth. I followed Diana Kennedy's advice and put them in my mouth, ONCE... It was enough for me. So on this one, folks, I hear you. The while, flat fishes like sole, flounder, sand dabs, fluke, all are so neutral that they allow you to manipulate flavors. I'm going to tell you my favorite way to cook flounder, with some tips along the way.

When I cook fish, I find a non-stick pan indispensable. There are cooks who have been preparing fish in regular pans, for years. Not me. I find the non-stick the only type of pan that will work for me, the way I cook fish. I suggest you use one too. A nice, heavy one.

Ok, to the matter at hand. Flounder are very delicate. If you move the fish pieces too roughly, they will fall apart and you will get something similar to what the British call "kedigree". If you want to keep the whole fish, you should start with smaller pieces. Manipulating fish fillets does take practice. Try to get pieces that are so small that the whole piece can fit on your paddle, or near to it.

You can also add some structure to a fish fillet by coating it. Now, you CAN use a bread crumb or cracker or some kind of thicker crust to make your fish, but let's try not to mask the flavor too much. I like to coat flounder with a thin barrier of seasoned flour. To do this, I get a big, strong plastic bag, and mix flour and salt, and perhaps some pepper together. Then I toss the pieces in, and just shake. I pull the fish out and lay them on a surface until I'm ready to cook them - but I don't wait long. FIsh is moist, and the minute water or any liquid hits flour, a reaction starts which is going to gum things up. So I have my pan ready. I cook flounder in a mix of half vegetable oil and half butter. I do this because I want some of the flavor of the butter, but I don't want it to overwhelm the fish. Melt it down and let it get warm. The fish is going to cook, VERY fast and if you want a good color, you need high heat. Don't overfill the pan, but lay the fish fillets down to cover the pan and let them sizzle away. It won't take more than 2-3 minutes for the side to brown. You just keep at it until it's brown enough for you then flip.

When you do the flip here, you're going to notice something: there is almost no more oil left. What has happened is some of the flour has gone off, into the oil and you have the makings of what a southern cook would call a "roux." And, of course, some of the fat has gone into the fish. Don't add more fat when you're cooking one batch. If you have to cook two, it's a different story. If you add a double batch of fat to the pan, you'll get fatty fish.

Anyway, as the fish cook, move them to a tray of some kind, with paper towel. Don't worry about covering them. We're going to get back to them in a minute.

When all the fish fillets are cooked, then what you are going to do is make a little sauce. This is my favorite, with some variations. Take the pan off of the heat, and add about a half cup of a dry white wine. My favorite here is sauvignon blanc, but vigonier will work. Chardonnays, I find, are a bit too strong for mild fish, but it's your call. The wine will dissolve the flour and make a bit of a thick pan sauce. I then add some capers. What I didn't tell you is that, while all of this was happening, I have a few tablespoons of capers sitting in water, to reduce their salt content. Then the fish goes back in for a minute, just to coat it with the sauce, and then it comes out again, right onto the plates.

Now, variations? Oh, heavens, if you can do this, you can do a million things. You could use lemon juice in place of wine, for example. If you do that. save some of the lemon juice for the very end, so that the flavor is nice and bright on the fish. You could leave out the capers. You could add something else, like almonds, or halved grapes in season. You could also add something more substantial like peas. The peas are especially good if your liquid is something like cream.

This sounds very complicated, but I assure you that, if you were to try this, you would find that from start to finish, it is very fast, and very easy. And you can start your journey toward eating some very good dishes. To my taste, I would be hard pressed to say "I like fish better than meat," or "I like meat better than fish." It's an apples and oranges kind of thing (well, maybe it's not, because I DO like one of those better than the other. And since I know the citrus bomb reads this, I'd best not say TOO much. She knows...).

Cook some fish. It's good for you.