Crispy Fish Bites with Lemon-Shallot Dipping Sauce

These Crispy Fish Bites are the delicious healthy fish sticks your whole family will love! 

Sooo... we're shopping for a new car. Yes, in the midst of the ridiculous amount of everything involved with moving to Alaska, we're car shopping.  We had nothing better to do (just kidding), so we decided to look for a new (to us) car. More like one of our rides bit the dust at a most inopportune moment. Sigh. That's always the way of it.

During our last move, both, BOTH of our cars broke down the week we were moving. So now we're car shopping while trying to get in all of our doctor's appointments that need to be made for paperwork purposes, house-hunting, and all of the other millions of little things that go along with moving a great distance (I literally have lists of lists that I need to make - no joke). Of course, if you know me, you know that I kind of love this sort of thing. Planning. I'm a planner. I can't even help myself.

I digress... because we've been super-busy lately, we've been going out to eat... a lot. That's not really the usual for us, normally going out is a treat, so when it becomes a reoccurring thing, it gets old quick. I just start to feel gross after a while, ya know? And once I've hit my restaurant-food threshold, I'm done. I just can't take it anymore. I want a home cooked meal. A fresh-tasting meal. Not an oil, sugar and salt-laden whatever. I'm over it. 

Since I recently hit this threshold, I decided to make these fish bites. An oldie but a goodie for my fam, it's an adaptation from a lightened-up Fish and Chips recipe from Everyday with Rachael Ray... so basically this is a lightened-up version of a lightened-up version. You'll have that. Since I always keep fish in my freezer (awesome last minute meal trick!), the only thing I needed to pick up that I didn't already have on hand was shallots (and the sweet potatoes that I made for a side dish). Not too bad!

Something that I switched up that I feel pretty strongly about is using whole wheat panko instead of regular whole wheat bread crumbs (just fyi, these pictures are showing white panko and not whole wheat panko, because I ran out of the whole wheat and I had some white in my pantry that needed using up, but this is the whole wheat panko that I usually order from amazon). They make a much crispier coating for your fish sticks and are, undoubtedly, where it's at.

The other big thing that I switched up was the sauce. The flavors are similar but the original had mayo in it. According to Autumn, homemade mayonnaise is allowed on the 21 Day Fix, but it counts as a teaspoon, and I don't know about you, but I want a sauce that I can basically go nuts with.

I want to have enough to dip my fish sticks and my sweet potato fries ( because priorities), and a teaspoon or two just ain't gonna cut it. Plus, homemade mayo is freaking delicious, but I don't always feel like taking the time to make it, ya know? Also, I just want to throw in that I'm absolutely addicted to the combo of this sauce + sweet potato fries. It. Is. Everything. It's pretty amazing with the fish sticks, too, but those sweets?! Oh ma goodness.

You should most definitely bake up some sweet potato fries to go with this. I beg you.

If you make this recipe be sure to snap a pic and tag me @thefoodieandthefix on Instagram so I can check it out! It makes me ridiculously happy to see what you guys are making 🙂

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📖 Recipe

Crispy Fish Bites with Lemon-Shallot Dipping Sauce

Yield: 4 Servings

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

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Ingredients

Lemon-Shallot Dipping Sauce:

• ½ cup low-fat (1% or 2%) cottage cheese
• ½ cup plain Greek yogurt (1%, 2% or non-fat)
• 1 Tbs lemon juice
• 4 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
• ½ cup finely chopped shallots

Crispy Fish Bites:

• 1 lb of cod or whatever whitefish you like, cut into sticks and blotted with a paper towel
• 2 eggs, beaten
• ¼ cup cornmeal
• ½ cup whole wheat panko
• 2 Tbs finely chopped parsley
• olive oil or coconut oil cooking spray

Instructions

Lemon-Shallot Dipping Sauce:

1. In a blender, blend together all sauce ingredients EXCEPT for the shallots. Put into a container and stir in the shallots. Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Crispy Fish Bites:

1. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Season your fish lightly with salt and pepper (another great addition would be some old bay, I left it out because it's too spicy for my kiddos, but it's really good).
2. Make a breading station (I used two cake pans for this and they worked perfectly!) Your first dish will contain your beaten eggs, your second dish will contain the cornmeal, panko and parsley (all mixed together, but I know you knew that), set these dishes up next to a baking sheet that's been lightly sprayed with cooking spray. With each piece of fish use one hand to dip into the egg, then the other (your dry hand) to coat in the bread crumb mixture, then set on the prepared baking sheet. Do this until all pieces of fish are coated. This is JUST enough breading for the fish, so do your best to distribute it evenly.
3. Once all of the fish are coated, give the tops a light spray with the cooking spray and bake in the oven for 12 - 15 minutes or until they flake easily with a fork and are golden brown.
4. Serve with the dipping sauce 🙂

Notes

21 Day Fix Container Equivalents per Serving: 1 ½ Red, ½ Yellow, 1 TSP

Weight Watchers Personal Points Links:

Crispy Fish Bites

Lemon-Shallot Dipping Sauce

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 4 Serving Size: ¼ of the fish bites and 5 Tbs of sauce
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 324Total Fat: 8g