Sole Fillets in Lemon Butter -- A Quiet Meal for the Kitchen That Carries You Through

The house feels different without Mamma's voice on the phone. Tuesday mornings used to be Mamma calling at 10 AM to ask what I was making. Now Tuesday mornings are quiet. I make coffee. I look at the phone. I do not call her. I cannot call her. I sit and I drink the coffee and Sven (the puppy) tries to climb into my lap and the silence is not unbearable but it is new. Elsa called from Voyageurs. She said the loons came back this week. She said Mamma always loved the loons. She said it had not been the same year without her. I said no. It had not been. We talked for ten minutes. Elsa does not call often. The calls she does make are small and dense, like a hard candy. I save them. I roll them around in my mind for days afterward. Astrid drove up from the Twin Cities for a long weekend. We sat in Mamma's kitchen at Fifth Street (Erik has not sold the house yet; we are not ready). We made meatballs together, in Mamma's kitchen, in Mamma's bowl, on Mamma's stove. We did not say much. We worked side by side the way we worked side by side as girls — at thirteen and ten, at nineteen and sixteen, now at sixty-something and sixty-something. The hands knew. The kitchen knew. The kitchen carried us through. I cooked Wild rice soup this week. The Thursday constant. Damiano Thursday: soup. The crowd was the usual size — about a hundred and twenty plates served between five and seven. Gerald and I worked side by side without talking. The not-talking was the friendship. The work has its own rhythm: ladle, hand, smile, ladle, hand, smile. The rhythm carries us through. I sat in the kitchen at 11 PM with a glass of wine and Paul's photograph. I did not cry. I just sat. The not-crying is its own form of being with him. We did not need to talk all the time when he was alive. We do not need to talk all the time now. The companionable silence has carried over. It is enough. It has to be. And on a morning like this, with the lake doing what the lake does and the dog at my feet and the bread on the counter and the kitchen warm enough to live in, it is. Paul used to say that the difference between a place and a home was that a home was a place where you knew, from any room, what was happening in any other room. I knew, from the kitchen, when he was reading in the living room. I knew, from the bedroom, when he was getting coffee in the kitchen. The Kenwood house is still that kind of home. From the kitchen I know that Sven is asleep on his bed in the dining room (the small specific snore). From the kitchen I know what time the radio in the living room is set to come on. The home is the body of knowledge of itself. I still live inside that body of knowledge, even though Paul is not the one creating most of the data anymore. I keep a small notebook on the kitchen counter — green spiral-bound, from the drugstore. I write in it most days. The notebook holds the things I do not want to forget — Erik's stories about Pappa, Karin's notes about Mormor, Sophie's first words about her babies, the recipes I have changed slightly and want to remember in their changed form. The notebook is a small museum. The museum will go to Anna eventually, and then to Sophie, and then to Sophie's daughter Ingrid, and then onward. It is enough.

The Thursday soup at Damiano is its own kind of anchor — a hundred and twenty plates, a rhythm that doesn’t require words, a kitchen that knows what to do even when you don’t. On the evenings after, when it’s just me and Sven and Paul’s photograph and a glass of wine, I want something quieter: a pan on the stove, a little butter, lemon, something from the lake country I carry inside me. Elsa called about the loons at Voyageurs, and I kept thinking about water — clean and cold and sure of itself. Sole fillets in lemon butter is that kind of dish: honest, unhurried, ready in the time it takes the kitchen to warm up around you.

Sole Fillets in Lemon Butter

Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 12 min | Total Time: 22 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 4 sole fillets (about 6 oz each), patted dry
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (about 1 large lemon)
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
• Lemon slices, for serving

Instructions

1. Season the fish. Lay the sole fillets on a clean surface. Season both sides with salt and pepper, then dust lightly with flour, shaking off any excess.
2. Heat the pan. In a large skillet over medium-high heat, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter with the olive oil. When the foam subsides and the butter is just golden, the pan is ready.
3. Cook the fillets. Add the fillets to the pan in a single layer — work in batches if needed. Cook 2 to 3 minutes per side, until the fish is opaque through and the edges are lightly golden. Transfer to a warm plate and tent loosely with foil.
4. Build the lemon butter sauce. Reduce heat to medium-low. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter to the pan. Once melted, add the garlic and cook 30 seconds, stirring, until fragrant. Pour in the lemon juice and stir up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the lemon zest and parsley and stir to combine.
5. Finish and serve. Return the fillets briefly to the pan, spooning the sauce over the top, or plate the fish and pour the sauce over directly. Serve immediately with lemon slices alongside.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 275 | Protein: 31g | Fat: 15g | Carbs: 5g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 340mg