Peanut/Pecorino Crusted Halibut with Cranberry/Cinnamon Goat Cheese

Pictures of the whole day at my flickr page.

Here's the creme de la crust of the day. Greco's idea to partially recreate a dish we'd had of, at all places, the dog track. There it was potato crusted halibut. Here, we go nuts (oh, schnap, i did go there).

Here's the deal...And I must stress here that this dish was awesome, and only one part of the alaskan crab leg, stuffed custard-baked tenderloin, five-cheese baked mac n' cheese, mussels in spicy vodka marinara day...

Peanut/Pecorino Crusted Halibut with Goat Cheese

• 4-6 1-inch think halibut steaks (sub if you need, firm, white steak-fish);
• 1 to 1 1/2 cups crushed unsalted peanuts;
• 1 to 1 1/2 cups grated pecorino romano cheese (we went $20/lb version here, and you could tell, but grated Kroger Private Select would taste good too);
• 1 to 1 1/2 cups fresh breadcrumbs (Italian, plain, whichever);
• flour, salt, n pepper for dredging;
• 4 eggs and heavy cream for dredging;
• 4-6 oz. goat cheese, softened (ours was cranberry/cinnamon, and ROCKED);
• Olive oil and butter.

1. Mix the peanuts, pecorino, and breadcrumbs in a shallow dish. Same with flour, salt and pepper. Same with eggs and cream (beat this);
2. Set up a three pan dredge station with flour/salt/pepper, then beaten eggs/cream, then breadcrumb/peanut/cheese mixture;
3. Pat the steaks dry with a paper towel;
4. Dredge in flour mix, then egg mix, then coat completely with peanut/pecorino mix;
5. Place on buttered baking sheet;
6. Drizzle 1 t olive oil and place one small pat of butter on each steak;
   
7. Into the oven for about 20 minutes at 400 degrees;
8. Out of the oven to get smeared with goat cheese on top. Use the goat cheese to cover over any spots on the fish that are close to burning;
9. Back into the oven to broil for five minutes or less. Check the cheese on top. When it's melted and then set to crust over a little on top, pull it.

We severd this with plates and forks. You could also choose a nice wild rice dish.