Sweet and Spicy Citrus Tilapia Recipe (2024)

This recipe is easy and delicious. My 13-year old daughter thinks this is the best marinade ever for fish. Definitely a keeper!

Just affirming that this recipe is really good and super simple. I let mine marinate a half hour, then as other suggested, cooked it (3 min per side) in a frying pan with just a tsp. of peanut oil while I reduced the sauce in another pan. Squeezed a little extra lime over the fish when I flipped them. Served this with some white basmati rice and steamed green beans & red bell peppers.

Wonderful! Easy and very tasty. I made no changes to the recipe. Even my granddaughter, who at best tolerates eating fish, loved it and ate the whole piece. Will definitely be making this again. The dish is worthy of serving to company.

Made it for the first time last night and it was great! Will also try it with chicken

Made it for the first time last night and we really enjoyed it. Will definitely use it again!

I rate this 4 instead of 5. This is the base for my marinade for Yucatan Chicken or Fish or Pork. The difference is omit the red pepper and salt and replace with Achoite Paste about 2 teaspoons or a quarter of block. Marinade all meat or fish products for at least 2 hours. The chick (thighs work great) or pork overnight if possible then grill. Every time I make this with a different type of meat my family simply says Yum, is there any leftover. Remember the marinade recipe is for 24 oz or a 1 1/2 lbs of meat or fish adjust the recipe to meet your family needs. Or you can put all ingredients (chicken or pork) in a pot and and cook until done & serve with sauce and white rice.

Easy, quick, and very tasting. Could see the marinade working with a lot of fish. Also had a picky husband who liked this.

That was delicious! It will be added to my regular rotation. I may even try that marinade on chicken on the grill this summer. I used tilapia from Costco so the fillets were generous. The only change I made was using 1/8 tsp. red pepper and I broiled it for 10 minutes. It actually may have been finished a minute or two earlier but it was close to perfect at that amount of time. I thought the sauce was fine. I used one of my biggest dishes because of the size of fillet so they weren't swimming in marinade as mentioned in previous comments. All in all I think it was a great dish!

Loved this recipe, I wanted to change up from grilling my fish. I took some of the reviewers comments and applied to recipe: used cod, add some white wine, added smoked paprika and definitely drained off fish before broiling and reduced extra marinade and served with the fish. A keeper and a repeat in my home.

Used cod instead of tilapia and it was a hit with the family!

This is a keeper recipe for me. It made that cheapo tilapia taste like a million bucks! Some revisions: Added a dribble of white wine to the marinade. Then I marinated the fillets for about 20 minutes. Drained off all the marinade into a bowl before broiling the fish. Cooked the marinade in a little saucepan to boiling, then reduced the heat and let the sauce thicken up a teeny bit. After the fish was cooked, I poured the thicken marinade on. DELISH!!! Next time, I think I will add a little minced cilantro and substitute a tad minced jalapeno for the chili flakes. Think that would be nice with the cumin flavor.

I thought it was okay and I thought that my picky hubby would hate it. He loved it and ended up eating any leftovers too!

This was easy and delicious! I only made two changes. First, I used smoked paprika because it adds such good flavor. Next, while the fish cooked, I reduced the sauce way down. If you do the same, your fish will likely finish before the sauce (mine did) but just put them on warmed plates (I always put my plates in the microwave for 1 minute, to warm them up). Next time I make it, I'll probably use my hand blender to puree the sauce before serving. Oh and I served it with a quinoa artichoke salad. Man was it ever good! This is a keeper.

Quick, easy and DELICIOUS. A hit with both my husband and my teenage boys. The marinade came together quickly with ingredients that I had to hand. I will be making this again.

Not much I can say about this one , I would probably make it again because of its simplicity. Doesn't take much effort, you really taste the sweet more that the spicy(add extra pepper to give it a boost). The sauce is really good with squash and zucchini.

Delicious! Used slightly less red pepper and found it had the right amount of kick. Sautéed the marinated fish in a pan on medium-high heat and thickened the remaining sauce in a sauce pan. Took about 7 minutes to cook perfectly moist. Served with asparagus and crisp Sauvignon Blanc. Yum!

My husband I loved this!! We're trying to eat more fish these days. This will be a regular choice.

I love this dish and my kids do to!!

I am a novice in the kitchen and this recipe was simple and fantastic. I didn't have garlic cloves on hand so i just sprinkled garlic powder to taste and it was still delicious. I ziplocked the fish with the sauce for 15 mins rather than let it just lay all over the pan, *only broiled for 6 mins and tadaa! with asparagus. I am very proud of 2nd meal from cooking light.

Great, easy meal to make for a quick weeknight dinner. Sauce is thin (which we loved!) so if this is not your thing, serve with rice as suggested - delicious!

Added 1/4 tsp ginger and 1/8ish tsp red pepper flakes in place of ground red pepper. Sprinkled with smoked paprika and broiled for 8 minutes and served with corn on the cob. Yum!

Made the whole marinade recipe & saved what was left, this is terrific, put on grill & gave it about 7 min over all, marinade is very good on brown rice.

Delicious, healthy, gluten free, and with rice and veg it fed my family for about 5 bucks. A winner!

I tried this recipe tonight and it was amazing. My husband, who is a picky eater, loved it! I will definitely be trying this recipe again!

I really don't like the taste of fish, but this was awesome! Not too sweet and not too spicy and didn't taste fishy. Some adjustments I used frozen fish, Tropicana orange juice, and the cooking time was only 10minutes in my apt. size electric stove... but goosh darn it was it good!!!! ...

This was really good and really easy to make. The different flavors were a great contrast to each other. Would definitely make it again!

Wonderful bright flavor! My slight alterations were: marinating in the refrigerator for 30 min., sprinkled with a little garlic salt, used smoked paprika (in lieu of regular, which I think gave it a big flavor boost). Taking the advice from some earlier reviewers, while the fish was in the broiler, I mixed all of the marinade with 3/4 teaspoons of cornstarch and simmered in a small sauce pan until it thicken up. Served with brown rice and steamed broccoli with the sauce; great meal.

Delicious! I have tried many tilapia recipes and this is a winner! I even dipped my steamed broccoli in the sauce. I will make this again.

While the appearances of the fish were lovely, the taste just was average. The sauce was thin. There are better tilapia recipes on this Cooking Light website.

This is SO YUMMY!!! It has the perfect flavor combo. It's a little smoky in addition to sweet, citrusy, and a little spicy. It's a very flavorful spicy, not a numbing spicy. I would suggest putting the left over marinade/sauce in a saucepan with a little flour and simmering it until it thickens a little or it will be runny. It was good with shrimp too, I just sauteed them in a little of the sauce for flavor, then put it on a bed of rice and drizzled it with the thickened sauce. I will definitely be making this again, and soon!!!

The broiling time, at least on my broiler, was wayyy too long. I took it out after 7 minutes; I usually do tilapia on 5, but since this had some liquid, 7 was perfect. The spice combination is excellent. I like things pretty spicy so next time I would kick up the red pepper and paprika a bit. I squeezed some more lime juice on it after taking it out of the broiler.

I thought it was just ok. A little heavy on the cumin taste. Served with rice and asparagus.

This was a family hit. Dh and I enjoyed it as did our children. Nice balance of sweet and spicy!

I made this for my wife and myself with the following changes; I used crushed red pepper instead of the ground red (by mistake) and I baked it, covered with foil, at 350° for 15 minutes, because my wife has a thing about smoke alarms and broilers. It had a good taste base but not very flavorful. The leftovers actually tasted better after sitting in the sauce for two days. I would not make it again as I have other recipes we like better.

Amazing and EASY! Just don't over marinate. This is going to be a favorite with my husband and I. As for kid friendly, a bit spicy. My 2 and 3 year old would not enjoy it.

Really yummy! I make this recipe frequently, because of its ease and because it uses ingredients I typically always have in my kitchen. I like to broil the tilapia with some lime slices on top.

Not sure what I did wrong. I had a ton of sauce and the fish fillets swam in the marinade during broiling. Maybe there is a step missing or 1/2 cup orange juice is too much?

I followed this recipe exactly. The sauce smelled great and I thought it was going to be a winner. However, after 12 minutes under the broiler, it was completely burnt! This does NOT require 15 minutes. I am going to try this again, but will broil about 5-7 minutes, watching carefully. Lots of potential so 4 stars.

This was just okay for me. I might try it again without the paprika. I think I'm just not a fan of paprika.

This quickly became a family favorite!

A nice change from the every day Tilapia recipe. I'm not normally a fan of a sweet/sour flavor, so my first bite of this fish was a little startling. But by the third bite the complexity and spices had grown on me. I enjoyed it overall, and husband REALLY liked it. Will make again, though with the note that, as with other reviewers, 15 minutes would have been way too long in my oven.

I just wasn't very impressed. I tried the recipe twice. The second time I let it soak in the marinade for over 30 minutes. I'll never bother with this one again.

I loved this recipe! I doubled the garlic and added a little extra cumin. Cooked it for 15 minutes with no problem. It was heavenly, a very simple and easy dish for company. I can't wait to make this again!

Fantastic! Watch the time, 10 minutes was plenty of time for this to cook thoroughly, but this will probably vary according to your oven.

Yummy-delish! I cooked the Tilapia on the bbq, and drizzled extra sauce on while it cooked...turned out perfectly!

We're not big fish eaters, but we thoroughly enjoyed this recipe. It had a mild flavor with a little kick from the cayenne. Word of caution on cooking...if I'd broiled these filets for 15 minutes, they would have burned up. Took only about five minutes to cook. Served with corn on the cob, tomatoes provencale (old CL recipe) and bittersweet chocolate-cherry sorbet with fresh cherry compote (recent CL recipe). Would serve to company with no hesitation.

I cooked this stovetop in a cast iron skillet, turned out great. Very flavorful, would absolutely make it again. Served it with fresh corn on the cob and a romaine salad with avocado, fresh tomatoes and feta. Will definitely make it again, the whole family ate it up!

There was nothing too special about this recipe to me, so I'm the odd man out here. I thought the sauce might thicken a little in the oven, but it was just watery. I don't think I made any mistakes in the recipe. The only really good thing about this dish is that it looked pretty, but I won't make it again.

My entire family loves this recipe. I cut the red pepper to 1/8 tsp. because the kids don't like it too spicy. The sauce is great over rice and steamed vegetables.

Very simple and quite delicious. Only mistake I made was using parchment paper while broiling, oops. Perfect mix of sweet and spice! Definitely going into rotation!

Nice contrast in flavors, and so easy to prepare.

This was pretty easy to make and had good flavor.

I saw this dish in the latest issue of CL and immediately knew I wanted to make it. My husband and I LOVED it and can't wait to make it again. We enjoy spicy food, so if you don't like the spice, cut the red pepper flakes in half.

This was excellent. It was really easy to prepare, and the fish was cooked perfectly. Definitely had a little bit of a kick to it, but we like spicy in my house! We'll be making this again soon.

very nice, but toooooo spicy for me....would limit the red pepper