Pan-fried fillet of sea bass on buttered spinach leaves

• By Mark Camilleri

For 6 people, you will need:

Six small sea bass (cleaned, de-scaled and filleted), two tablespoonfuls of olive oil, two tablespoonfuls of butter, two lemons (cut into wedges), salt and freshly ground pepper, 600g of fresh spinach (washed and trimmed), 600g of potatoes (boiled and mashed), three eggs, plain flour, 200g of nibbed almonds, sunflower oil for shallow frying.

Use the mashed potato to make 18 balls of roughly the same size. Roll these in flour, beaten egg and then nibbed almonds. Refrigerate them if you are not going to fry them immediately. Fry them in shallow oil until they are golden-brown. You can do so ahead of the meal and keep them warm in an oven heated to 150C. Don’t fry the fish ahead of time, though. Heat a heavy-bottomed pan, put in some butter and olive oil, and fry the fish in it for a couple of minutes on each side. If you are not sure whether it has cooked through, cut a little slit in it and check. In another pan, sauté the spinach in butter and sprinkle it with salt and pepper. Serve the fish on the spinach, drizzled with olive oil, and with potato balls and lemon wedges to the side.