Shrimp cocktail, Thai style

This was the starter for our Good Friday dinner (us secularized Swedes don't mind indulging on that day. Either.). A huge bunch of salad in our organic fruit and vegetable box, some shrimp in the freezer, the need for something fresh and savory with a punch, and the idea of a Thai style shrimp cocktail was born. To be honest, the original idea was to make fresh spring rolls but with salad leafs instead of rice paper wrappers, but the salad didn't want to roll up neatly so we ended up with something that looked more like burritos. To keep them from unrolling we served them standing up in shot glasses, and then I realized that hey, this is more of a shrimp cocktail than a spring roll.
Whatever it is, it's delicious and was a perfect start for our dinner. It was followed by a Tunisian lamb tagine with apricots and almonds (we've blogged about it here although this time we made a slightly different version) and for dessert an assortment of cheeses (Beaufort, Manchego, a fantastic unpasteurized Brie, and an anonymous but delicious blue cheese of French origin) accompanied by an amazing port.
I don't have any measurements in the recipe, just eyeball it. The Prik Nam Pla, or dipping sauce, is the most important part of this dish, so don't get scared off by the fish sauce and skip it!



In a bowl, mix shrimp (we used frozen and thawed, but fresh is of course better), some julienned carrot, de-seeded cucumber in thin slices, julienned papaya, fresh cilantro and white sesame seeds. Place a spoonful on a salad leaf and roll it up in a fashion that works for you.
Serve with the dipping sauce.



Prik Nam Pla - Thai dipping sauce

2 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp fresh lime juice
1 tbsp demerara sugar
½ red chili, finely chopped
2 tbsp cilantro, finely chopped

Mix all the ingredients and let it stand for a while. Taste before serving if you want to add more lime juice. We ended up doubling the amount of lime juice, but that was a tad too much. Wait until the sauce has been standing for a while before tasting it, because the flavors mature and if it's too "fishy" when it's just been made, it might be perfect 20 minutes later.

Paper Chef 49: Prawns meet Peppery Passionate Pinaple

It's Paper Chef time again! I know, we haven't been doing this much lately (feels like forever since last time), but now we're back on track!

This months challenge is brought to us by Cath of ShowFood Chef, and with only a few days 'till Valentine's day it time to get jiggy with it, the ingredients for this month are prawns, fennel, sweet peppers and... passion, smoking hot and with a carte blanche in terms of interpretation!

Now, let's get the boring stuff out of the way so we can focus on the hawt stuff! We're making a prawn burger... it's like a crab-cake-in-a-bun, only with shrimp instead of crab. Well throw in the fennel and bell peppers for seasoning. After two tries, this is the recipe:

Prawn burgers
(makes three large or four smaller)

250 g Shrimp
75 g Fennel
75 g Red bell peppers (for keeping with this month's theme)
15 g Bread crumbs
1 tbsp Rice flour
1 Egg
Salt and Pepper to taste

If you're living in Sweden and can come by frozen peeled shrimp practically for free, thaw and pat them dry, if you live somewhere where you get good quality fresh prawns, dice them. Dice the fennel and bell peppers and add it all to a food processor. Give it a few spins, don't over do it (you could probably get away with a knife and hard labor instead). Add the bread crumbs, rice flour and egg and combine thoroughly. I don't think it's a good idea to actually add salt and pepper and then taste the batter, so just add whatever amount seems appropriate to you (that's how I usually do it when it says “to taste”, unless it sits on the stove). Let it rest for a while. Heat a frying pan with some butter (or oil if you are so inclined), shape the batter into patties and fry until golden brown on both sides. This is the tricky bit since they have a tendency to fall apart, but perfectly manageable.

Sandwich between two halves of a bun of your choice (we typically go for some roll rather than ready-made burger buns)... voilà!



In retrospect, some fresh red chili would have added a nice tang to this. I guess third time's a charm, but that will have to wait for another post.

That's the “prawns” bit of the title, now for the Peppery Passionate Pineapple!

This is a real killer salsaish thingy we made for the burgers that really elevate them to new culinary heights. For enough to the above recipe, combine

2 slices Fresh Pineapple, diced
2 Passion fruits, the gooey innards
2 tsp Peruvian Pepper, lightly crushed
1 tbsp White Crema di Balsamico (reduced white balsamic vinegar)
1 tbsp Crude (or Muscovado) Sugar

in a sauce pan and bring to a boil. Let it simmer while frying the burgers.



Mmm, mmm! Makes you want to rip out the spoon and gobble it down to the last gooey slurp! Perfect for that Valentine's Day's atmosphere!

Daring Cooks November: 寿司

...or sushi, as it's usually transcribed. Contrary to what many people believe, sushi is not about raw fish. No, the essence of sushi is the rice, dressed with rice vinegar.

Our hosts this month was Audax of Audax Artifex and Rose of The bite me kitchen. I must give a special thanks to them: they have spent a lot of time in the forums answering questions, giving advice and encouragement.

The challenge came in four parts:

1. Making perfect sushi rice, and then using it to make:
2. Dragon sushi roll – an avocado covered inside-out rice roll with a tasty surprise filling
3. A decorative spiral roll
4. Nigiri - the litte "pillows" of rice with various toppings

Spiral roll spread out, Jenny adding the final touch: roe.

As I said above, sushi does not have to be about fish. The private Daring Cooks forum, where members can showcase their creations, was filled with people taking the most creative and mouth-watering approaches to sushi. As we love fish and seafood, we decided to go down that more traditional route, but with a regional twist to it.

Since we intended to share the outcome between more than just our four eyes (apparently legend has it that the Japanese eat with their eyes, the Koreans with their stomachs and Chinese with their noses), we made way more than what the challenge called for, and enlisted a cousin of Markus and her boyfriend to help with the eating part. We ended up making:

1. Two dragon rolls (one dragon and one caterpillar) filled with smoked eel and “pressgurka” (a Swedish “fresh pickle” cucumber, recipe below).
2. Two spiral rolls with salmon, shrimp, roe, cucumber, avocado and mango.
3. One California roll (salmon, avocado and cucumber).
   
4. One Japanese coin roll with salmon and pressgurka (we used the pictures on this page to guide us).
5. Plenty of Nigiri with avocado, salmon and smoked shrimp.
   

Trilobite, the ancestor of dragon roll.

Making sushi is something we have wanted to try for several years now, but never found the time to (alright, we had time, but there's something to be said for a good kick in the right direction as well, so thanks again to Audax and Rose for that kick!). We really had a good time making the sushi (apart from all the rice washing and straining, which might be necessary, but no fun waiting for), and will definitely be making it again (otherwise we end up spending a fortune to let someone else have all the fun!). 'Nuf writing, picture time!


Dragon roll, took Markus an hour to carve, an hour I tell you! (An hour of good fun that is.)


Not as scary as the dragon, but equally delicious: the caterpillar roll.


Japanese coin rolls, apparently these look like ancient Japanese currency. Spiral rolls in the background.


Day-after-lunch. We were defeated by the sheer amount of deliciousness the day before, so two rolls made it to our lunch table: one spiral roll and one California roll, along with pressgurka (which works surprisingly well with sushi), gari and wasabi.


Close up on the spiral roll.

Pressgurka
Pressgurka is normally made in thin slices, but thin sticks works better when filling sushi so that's what we used. This is usually served with fish, but also works with steaks and such. We were served something very similar to this, minus the parsley, at a Korean restaurant in Hong Kong. Maybe that's why so many Swedes seem to like East Asian food – the sour, tangy and sweet flavors are very similar in these two kitchens.
Press- is a prefix from the word pressa which means “to press”. It's because the cucumber is pressed down using something heavy before the liquid is poured over the cucumber. Gurka is cucumber. That concludes today's Swedish lesson!

1 cucumber, cut in thin slices for traditional pressgurka, or in thin sticks for use in sushi. If making sticks, remove the seeds from the cucumber before using.
3/4 tsp table salt
1 dl water
2 tbsp vinegar (acetum)
2-3 tbsp sugar
2-3 tbsp finely chopped parsley

Place the cucumber slices or sticks in a suitable bowl. Sprinkle the salt on top and mix around a little bit. Place a plate or something similar on top, the plate should touch the cucumber. Put something heavy on top of the plate, I usually take my mortar and pestle. The weight will press down on the cucumber (hence the name) and make it release liquid. Let it stand with the weight on for about half an hour. In the meantime, mix water, vinegar (acetum) and sugar until the sugar is dissolved. Add the parsley. Pour the mixture on top of the cucumber and mix around a bit. Let it rest for at least half an hour before eating. Best eaten fresh, but it will keep in the fridge for 2–3 days.

The other recipes can be found at the Daring Kitchen – Command HQ of this Blogosphere quadrant.

Fine print a.k.a. blog checking line
The November 2009 Daring Cooks challenge was brought to you by Audax of Audax Artifex and Rose of The Bite Me Kitchen. They chose sushi as the challenge.

Smörgåstårta

I know: that's a lot of weird looking characters in the title... must be something Swedish. Why, yes it is! There are a few modern Swedish loan words in the English language, ombudsman is one of them, and smorgasbord is another. The “Smörgåstårta” is closely related to the smörgåsbord (as we write it, since we have three more letters than you do). It's basically a cake topped with a smorgasbord!

Naturally you don't want to make it a regular cake (spongecake and whipped cream/fondant), since you're topping it with savory stuff, so the base takes some creativity to work.

Looking back at the word “smörgåsbord” it's actually a compound consisting of “smörgås” (open top sandwich), and “bord” (table). I guess the original meaning is a large variety of toppings for an open top sandwich served on a separate table. The word “smörgåstårta” is also a compound consisting of “smörgås” (again) and “tårta” (cake, etymologically the same word as tort). This holds the key to making the cake base: bread!

Rather than baking the bread ourselves, we brought two large loves of toast bread, cut them down to even squares, and assembled them to form a large sheet cake. To “glue” the layers of bread together we used a filling made of spiced cheese and crayfish. The spiced cheese is a bit of a specialty (I doubt you can find anything similar if you don't know where Boxholm is located), but it's basically regular cheese that has been aged with caraway and cloves.

The sheet cake (we ended up with three layers) is covered in a mix of mayonnaise and crème fraîche, and then decorated with whatever you want on it.

Smörgåstårta
A lot of sliced toast bread
Mayonnaise
Crème Fraîche

Spiced cheese and crayfish filling
150 g crayfish tails
50 g aged spiced cheese, grated
1 tbsp dill, finely chopped
1 tbsp mayonnaise
1 tbsp crème fraîche
1 tsp dijon mustard
½ tsp caraway seeds, ground (use a mortar and pestle)

Garnish
Shrimps
Ham (rolls)
Cucumber
Grapes
Smoked salmon
Roe
Lemon slices
... you can basically have whatever you like/think looks tasty.



This post is horribly late, I had some trouble finding the recipe for this write-up. We enjoyed it on Jenny's birthday more than a month ago... If you ever have the chance to try this Swedish delicacy, do not hesitate, it is truly delicious!

Kräftskiva!

As we call the legendary Swedish crayfish parties.

Around this time of the year people in Sweden like to fish out fiercely armed and armored crustaceans from rivers and lakes, boil them with crown dill, dress up in silly hats, drink lots of seasoned moonshine, sing songs and painstakingly disembowel the poor critters.

In other words: have a general good time.

We decided to have our own little private kräftskiva. As long as we don't have to boil them alive ourselves, and don't have to wear the silly hats (ok, we just forgot to buy/make them this year), it's really nice!

As you have probably guessed by now, crayfish is a must-have, as is the snaps (but I don't think that counts, as it is a must-have for any Swedish seasonal party). Other than that, it's nice to have Västerbottenpaj (a pie made with Västerbotten cheese), bread, salad, beer and lots of wet wipes.


Västerbottenpaj

As we decided not to boil our own crayfish and buy ready made pie, the only thing we really made for this (ok, we didn't distill our own snaps or brew our own beer, or grow our own salad, but you know what I mean) was the bread. Now crayfish needs a special bread, and Jan Hedh recommends a variant of Zopf, shaped like a crayfish and seasoned with dill. Basically just add some dill (we used frozen, but crown should work better) during kneading, shape it like a crayfish and sprinkle chili powder (for the color, we used Ancho style) and dill seeds on top before baking.

Now all you need to do is figure out how to get inside the shells of the main theme... for us it comes naturally after years of practice, and we meant to shoot a “Crayfish anatomy 101” photo series for you, but decided to enjoy ourselves instead. We'll happily answer any questions you might have in the commentary section though.


Can you tell which one's bread and which one's real?

Risotto Marinara

The original recipe for this risotto comes from Swedish chef Marcus Samuelsson who runs the restaurant Aquavit with branches in New York and Tokyo. In its original form, it is a tomato and crab risotto which is served together with pan fried zander and shiitake and truffle sauce. I made the whole dish a few years ago and it was delicious. Tomato, crab, tarragon, coconut milk, zander, truffle and shiitake sounds like a huge crash of conflicting flavors, but they work remarkably well together. When I make it again I will make sure to post the recipe. Swedish readers can find the recipe in Allt Om Vin 1/2007, p. 84. The version I made tonight is very tweaked, but the basic idea is the same.

This risotto is a bit more labor intensive than others, but it's well worth the extra effort. The addition of whipped cream, egg yolks and cheese may seem unnecessary, but believe me, it's not. Taste the risotto before adding it - it will still taste nice, but after that final touch the risotto gets a much more rounded and sophisticated flavor. It goes from "good" to "oh yum". If you happen to have some black truffle sea salt in your kitchen, like we do after my trip to Gotland, it is delicious to sprinkle the risotto with a few grains.



Risotto Marinara

4 servings

3 tbsp cream
3 3/4 dl tomato juice
1 3/4 dl water
1 3/4 dl unsweetened coconut milk
1 tbsp concentrated vegetable stock
2 tbsp olive oil
1 shallot
1 garlic clove
1 tsp dried tarragon
2 dl arborio rice
3 tbsp dry white wine
2 egg yolks
3/4 tbsp mushroom soy
1 tbsp finely grated Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano cheese
200 g mixed seafood (we used a mix with squid, octopus, blue mussels, clams, and shrimp)

Whip the cream into soft peaks. Cover and put it in the fridge.
Mix tomato juice, water, coconut milk and concentrated vegetable stock in a pot. Bring to a simmer, and then leave it on very low heat. It should be barely simmering.
Peel and finely chop the shallot and garlic.
Heat the oil in a large pan. Add the onion, garlic and tarragon and sauté over medium heat until the onion is soft.
Add the rice and stir until all the grains are glazed with oil. Add the wine and stir until it has evaporated.
Stir in about one deciliter of the tomato liquid, stir, lower the heat and let it simmer slowly until almost all the liquid is absorbed. Then add an other deciliter of liquid, wait until it has absorbed and keep going until you have added all the liquid deciliter by deciliter. Stir occasionally. When it's done, he risotto is creamy and the rice slightly al dente. If you run out of liquid before the risotto is done, you can add some simmering water. Add the seafood mix together with the last tomato liquid. Let the risotto simmer slowly for about five minutes.
Get the whipped cream from the fridge and stir in egg yolks, soy and cheese. Remove the risotto from the heat and stir in the cream mixture.
Serve immediately.

Daring Cooks August: Viva España!

After last month's daring excursion into the field of molecular gastronomy, the Daring Cooks went back to basics this month with a rustic Spanish dish: Rice with mushrooms, cuttlefish and artichokes by José Andrés. Our host is Olga from Las Cosas de Olga and Olga's Recipes.

José Andrés is one of the most important Spanish chefs at the moment, and has trained under Ferran Andria at El Bulli, named the world's best restaurant. He now lives in Washington DC where he owns several restaurants. The recipe Olga chose for us comes from his US TV show Made in Spain. You can watch André make the dish here.

We made a few changes to the recipe. We couldn't find cuttlefish, so we exchanged that for a frozen seafood mix which had squid, octopus, blue mussels, clams, and shrimp. We didn't have the patience for boiling and cleaning fresh artichokes, so we got canned artichoke hearts. Also, no Spanish rice to be found in Uppsala, so we used Italian arborio rice. It's commonly used in risotto and is very good at soaking up flavors, so it was a good substitute. We halved the recipe, except for the sofregit, which will be used in some future concoction.

The optional part of the challenge was allioli, which I guess is a Spanish version of aioli. We were given two recipes, a traditional one with only garlic, olive oil, salt and lemon juice, and a modern one which also has an egg and uses a different method. We made the traditional recipe, using a mortar and pestle to bash the garlic and then slowly mushing in the oil, drop by drop- it's very cool that you can get something akin to mayonnaise from bashed garlic and olive oil. The allioli was very garlic-y! We are playing our yearly croquet championship with a group of friends tomorrow, and joked that we will only have to breathe on the balls and they will roll off! I liked the allioli and nearly finished the spoonful I put on my plate, but putting only a tiny amount of allioli on each bite. Markus found it way too sharp and didn't finish it.

The dish was easy to make, and we will definitely be making some variation of this in the future - I can see a lot of creativity in terms of ingredients: fish and seafood, chicken, vegetarian or Spanish sausage. We sometimes make paella, normally with a combination of seafood, chicken and chorizo, and we will probably adopt this method of cooking for future paella experiments. To make the vegetables separately as a sofregit was really nice - the flavor was better and the dish didn't get watery from the tomatoes. It was very tasty, and since we for some reason made this at the very last minute (just like last month's Daring Baker's challenge) we were very glad that it was easy and straightforward to make. Thank you Olga for a great challenge!

Wanna see the other Daring Cooks creations (or maybe become a Daring Cook or Baker yourself?!)? Go to the Daring Kitchen and the recipe archive! Our lovely host Olga blogs about the challenge in English and in Spanish.


Dinner is ready! Don't you just love our kitteh table table runner?!

Rice with mushrooms, cuttlefish and artichokes (Arroz marinero con setas, sepia y alcachofas)

4 servings

4 Artichokes (you can use jarred or freezed if fresh are not available)
12 Mushrooms (button or Portobello)
1 or 2 Bay leaves (optional but highly recommended)
1 glass of white wine
2 Cuttlefish (you can use freezed cuttlefish or squid if you don’t find it fresh)
“Sofregit” (see recipe below)
300 gr (2 cups) Short grain rice (Spanish types Calasparra or Montsant are preferred, but you can choose any other short grain. This kind of rice absorbs flavor very well) – about 75 gr per person ( ½ cup per person) Please read this for more info on suitable rices.
Water or Fish Stock (use 1 ½ cup of liquid per ½ cup of rice)
Saffron threads (if you can’t find it or afford to buy it, you can substitute it for turmeric or yellow coloring powder)


Cut the cuttlefish in little strips.
Add 1 or 2 tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan and put the cuttlefish in the pan.
If you use fresh artichokes, clean them as shown in the video in tip #7. Cut artichokes in eights.
Clean the mushrooms and cut them in fourths.
Add a bay leaf to the cuttlefish and add also the artichokes and the mushrooms.
Sauté until we get a golden color in the artichokes.
Put a touch of white wine so all the solids in the bottom of the get mixed, getting a more flavorful dish.
Add a couple or three tablespoons of sofregit and mix to make sure everything gets impregnated with the sofregit.
Add all the liquid and bring it to boil.
Add all the rice. Let boil for about 5 minutes in heavy heat.
Add some saffron thread to enrich the dish with its flavor and color. Stir a little bit so the rice and the other ingredients get the entire flavor. If you’re using turmeric or yellow coloring, use only 1/4 teaspoon.
Turn to low heat and boil for another 8 minutes (or until rice is a little softer than “al dente”)
Put the pan away from heat and let the rice stand a couple of minutes.
Serve with allioli (see below).


Tentacled goodness!

Sofregit

2 tablespoons of olive oil
5 big red ripe tomatoes, chopped
2 small onions, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped (optional)
4 or 5 garlic cloves, chopped
1 cup of button or Portobello mushrooms, chopped (optional)
1 Bay leaf
Salt
Touch of ground cumin
Touch of dried oregano

Put all the ingredients together in a frying pan and sauté slowly until all vegetables are soft.
Taste and salt if necessary (maybe it’s not!)

Allioli - traditional recipe

4 garlic cloves, peeled
Pinch of salt
Fresh lemon juice (some drops)
Extra-virgin olive oil (Spanish preferred but not essential)

Place the garlic in a mortar along with the salt.
Using a pestle, smash the garlic cloves to a smooth paste. (The salt stops the garlic from slipping at the bottom of the mortar as you pound it down.)
Add the lemon juice to the garlic.
Drop by drop; pour the olive oil into the mortar slowly as you continue to crush the paste with your pestle.
Keep turning your pestle in a slow, continuous circular motion in the mortar. The drip needs to be slow and steady. Make sure the paste soaks up the olive oil as you go.
Keep adding the oil, drop by drop, until you have the consistency of a very thick mayonnaise. If your allioli gets too dense, add water to thin it out. This takes time—around 20 minutes of slow motion around the mortar—to create a dense, rich sauce.

José on the allioli recipe:

It's hard to think that, when you start crushing the garlic, it will ever turn into something as dense and smooth as allioli. But don't give up. It's worth the extra time and effort to see the oil and garlic come together before your eyes. Just make sure you're adding the olive oil slowly, drop by drop. Keep moving the pestle around the mortar in a circular motion and keep dreaming of the thick, creamy sauce at the end of it all.

---

Previously completed challenges:
July 2009: Skate, traditional flavors powdered
June 2009: Chinese dumplings (part one and two)
May 2009: Zuni's Ricotta Gnocchi

The Daring Cooks goes Alinea!

Ever since learning about a restaurant in Chicago called Alinea, I've dreamed about eating there. And ever since finding the blog Alinea At Home, I've wanted to make something from Alinea in my home. So you can only imagine my excitement when the host of the July Daring Cooks challenge, Sketchy of Sketchy's Kitchen, announced that we were to make Skate, traditional flavours powdered from page 230 of the Alinea cookbook!

For those of you not familiar with Alinea, an explanation may be in order. The highly acclaimed Alinea restaurant is the creation of the incredibly talented chef Grant Achatz (who's just five years older than me, sigh). Achatz has taken a hypermodern approach to cooking, in what is sometimes referred to as molecular gastronomy (our host Sketchy has some great posts on the subject of MG as well).

The Alinea At Home blog is the creation of the awesome Carol Blymire, who's cooking her way through the Alinea cookbook. She's a talented home cook, and a very funny writer. She has previously done the same with the French Laundry cookbook (ah, The French Laundry, another place I would do a lot to get to eat at...) at French Laundry at Home. Both blogs are highly recommended (the French Laundry one is no longer active, but do read through the archives) – I love how Carol shows that you can actually make stuff from those very intimidating cookbooks, and not only use them as food porn on your coffeetable.

I remember reading Carol's post about Skate, traditional flavors powdered and thinking that hey, that sounds really interesting and highly doable. Well here we are – thanks to Sketchy and the Daring Cooks I have actually made the dish!

So, this dish contains a few elements. First skate, poached in beurre monté. The fish is served on top of green beans, also cooked in beurre monté, and thin slices of banana. But the real interesting part of this dish is the powders. One cilantro/parsley powder, one lemon powder, one capers/onion powder and one “brown butter” powder.

The challenge stated that we didn't have to make these exact powders – as long as we got the techniques we could use our own creativity. We decided to keep the flavors of the original recipe, but skipped the capers/onion powder since hearing that some people had problems making that.

Since skate is hard to get hold of, and not eco-friendly at all, we were also allowed to substitute the fish. Flounder or cod was recommended. I went to the best fish monger in Uppsala, Hambergs, and explained to them what I was going to do (let me tell you, they were definitely intrigued!). After hearing the recommended substitutions, the guy told me that those three fishes – skate, flounder and cod – are completely different in flavor and character, and instead recommended that I should use saithe, but not thin fillets but instead the thick back of the fish.

But now I'm actually getting ahead of myself, because two days earlier we had gotten started on the lemon and the cilantro/parsley powder. They are of course easiest made in a food dehydrator, but that's one kitchen device we don't have and don't really have the space nor economy to purchase. They can also be made using a microwave oven, but we don't have one of those either. So we had to turn on the oven (real low).


Brown butter powder in the making; parsley-cilantro powder;
lemon zest in home-made drying device; a dried twig of parsley; lemon powder.

Remember my nifty lifting devices for the Daring Bakers' April cheesecake challenge? Now it was Markus' turn to play engineer with parchment paper, scissors and string. He built a sort of... cradle, I guess you could call it, to use for drying the lemon zest. The idea was to allow for better air circulation - some other Daring Cooks said to use perforated cookie sheets for drying, but we don't have any of those so this would hopefully work as well. The lemon cradle was tied up under a wire rack using pieces of string. We also decided to dry the parsley and cilantro in a similar manner, by hanging them in bouquets from the wire rack. The recipe was very unclear on whether the cilantro should be blanched like the parsley, but we decided to give it a dip in boiling water as well. After chilling the herb bouquets, they were tied up next to the lemon cradle and the whole deal went into the oven.

The Alinea At Home blog had given us some ideas on how long time the dehydrating process would take: approximately an hour and a half for the herbs, and twice that time for the lemon. After an hour, we checked on the herbs, and decided to abort the bouquet drying experiment. The bouquets were simply holding too much water. So we cut them down, placed a piece of parchment paper on top of the wire rack and spread the herbs out. Back into the oven it went...

After two hours and twenty minutes, we turned off the oven and left the powders-to-be in the cooling oven overnight. I was a bit nervous the next morning, but both the herbs and the lemon had dried beautifully. The only thing was that we hadn't cut the stalks off the herbs after the bouquet experiment, and the cilantro was all tangled up, which gave us some extra work later...

Fast forward two days: time to get cooking! A coffee grinder was recommended for making the powders, but we only have one and didn't want to risk coffee flavored lemon or cilantro flavored coffee. So instead we used Jamie Oliver's flavor shaker, which worked quite well. After a lot of sifting to get rid of the stalks of the cilantro, we had beautiful green – but a bit weird smelling – cilantro and parsley powder. The lemon zest also got bashed up and mixed with half a vitamin C tablet – definitely the first time I have used that in cooking!


Parsley-cilantro powder (not completely stalk free) and lemon powder with extra zing!

Next up was the “brown butter” powder. Spray dried cream powder was impossible to find, so we had to substitute dried skim milk powder. It seemed to work as well, and was mixed with the pulverized dried banana. But maybe we misunderstood the recipe, or maybe dried cream powder has a very different density than dried milk powder, because we made a third of the recipe (=100 g milk powder) and we have now got a ton of the “brown butter” powder sitting in our cupboard. We didn't skimp when putting it on the fish, but there's no way we were supposed to use all that powder! Any ideas on what we can use it for?

We then made the beurre monté - the poaching liquid for both the beans and the fish. Poaching the beans and fish was problem free. Then it was time for plating: Markus swirled the powders in a hurricane pattern (he's the artistic one). Besides the powders we put three thin slices of banana, on top of that a heap of beans in delicious buttery sauce, and then the fish on top of that. And then over the fish, the brown butter powder.


Swirling, swirling towards the future!
(Loads of bonus points if you catch that reference!)



And then, after all that work: time to eat. I'll tell you right away that it was worth it! This was such an interesting flavor and mouth-sensation experience. The parts on their own was not sensational, but together, all the flavors just burst in your mouth and worked in perfect harmony. Markus found himself getting more brown butter powder to put on the fish (but there's still no way we were supposed to use all that powder!) and while we were eating we found ourselves saying stuff like “cool!” and “this is weird, but really delicious!”. A lot of people said that they found the powders overbearing on their own, but we found ourselves using our fingers - and more slices of banana - to get up the last specks of powder from our plates. There was something about the earthy herb flavor, the sweet yet fresh citrus taste and the tangling sensation of the vitamin C tablet that was quite irresistible!

I have no idea how this dish would be at Alinea. By omitting the onion/caper powder and substituting the fish (and not being professional chefs with professional equipment), we've probably steered far from how Achatz has envisaged the dish. But it was still damn good, and and I don't think Achatz would make any gagging noises about our interpretation of his creation.

Thank you so much Sketchy! This was such a great experience: a definite challenge both in terms of technique, presentation and flavors. And as an extra bonus, I have now convinced Markus that we need to buy the Alinea cookbook. Now for that trip to Chicago...



For the recipe, go to Sketchy's Kitchen or the Daring Kitchen recipe archive. There you can also see the other Daring Cooks' creations.

Wine pairing: We had this dish with a Grüner Veltiner: Leth (Austria, 2008). This fresh wine worked really well with the dish. For Swedes, it has number 4200 at Systembolaget.

..............................................................................
Previously completed challenges:
May 2009: Zuni's Ricotta Gnocchi
June 2009: Chinese dumplings (part one and two)

Paper Chef 41: Gravad Tuna

It's time for Paper Chef again, the monthly cook-with-four-chosen-ingredients food blog competition! Last month, we were all winners - Bron Marshall gave out awards to all the competitors and we were awarded the finest of all: the Mmm…Now That’s Terrifically Tasty Award for our Thyme Scented Prosciutto-Potato Swirls with Chèvre.

There was also an overall winner: Alison of Local Lemons who got to pick the ingredients for this installation of Paper Chef. She spent some time in Las Vegas, and took the opportunity to use the roulette wheel to pick: Asparagus, Artichokes, and Tuna. Keeping with the Las Vegas theme, Alison picked Vodka as her ingredient of choice.

As our faithful readers might have noted, we're no strangers to using liquor in our cooking, so this was right up our alley! We decided to do a starter, inspired by the traditional Swedish dish gravlax. The "grav" comes from the "cooking" process, and "lax" is just Swedish for salmon. Visitors to IKEA might be familiar with this dish. But it's possible to use the same process on other types of fish, and as this month's Paper Chef called for tuna, that's what we "gravade". (And here we treat you to a free lesson in Swedish verb conjugation!)

Normally the process of "gravning" takes two days, but it's possible to use alcohol as a catalyst, speeding up the process. Luckily for us, one of the ingredients was alcohol! The 2 day process is for a whole side of salmon, but we used carpaccio style tuna slices, speeding up the process to a mere three hours.

For the other ingredients we kept it quite simple, using the artichoke as a flavoring for an aioli, and just steamed the asparagus to keep its fresh taste. We also made grilled bread to go with the dish. This made a quite hefty starter, kind of halfway to a full main course.

The gravad tuna was just lovely - flavorful and translucent. The asparagus complemented the dish well with its fresh and springy taste. The artichoke aioli was a hit with the tuna, and we'll definitely make that one again as a dipping sauce or together with grilled meat.

~~~
Gravad Tuna
with Asparagus
and Artichoke Aioli
~~~

Gravad tuna
225 g tuna fish in very thin slices (we had three slices)
1 tbsp salt
1 tbsp sugar
½ tsp white pepper
2 cl vodka
2 tbsp dill (we used frozen)

Mix the salt, sugar and pepper. Rub the mixture into both sides of the tuna slices. Place them on a big plate, pour over the vodka and put the dill on top. Cover with plastic film and place in the fridge for at least three hours, turning the slices over halfway through.

Artichoke Aioli
2 artichoke hearts, grilled and stored in oil and garlic
2 tbsp mayonnaise

Mix the ingredients into a paste. This had enough garlic in it to qualify as an aioli, but if not add more garlic.

Assembly:
Steam the asparagus for about 10 minutes. If you don't have a steamer, you could also boil it in lightly salted water.

Cut some Italian style bread in 1" slices and cut each slice in half lengthtwise. Pour some oil on top (we used cold pressed rape seed oil) and add some coarse sea salt. Grill in the oven at 175°C until the bread is golden brown (we grilled it at 225°C which was too much, so 175°C is our best guess...).

Place a slice of tuna on a plate, and put some asparagus on top. Serve with the artichoke aioli in a glass on the side with the bread on top.

Summer seafood salad

We have a heat wave in Sweden at the moment, with temperatures of around 25-30°C. With weather this lovely, and the vegetable section of the grocery store filling up with fresh and beautiful produce, you just have to make salad. I invented this one last week and made it for lunch for myself. It turned out so good we ate it for dinner as well the same night. Making it is super quick, ten minutes and your done. You could use shrimp if you can't get crayfish tails. I won't give you any exact measurements, just adapt the recipe for your hunger level.



Salad with spicy crayfish and sweet chili dressing

Put some mixed greens, whatever kind you want, on a plate. I used a ready-made salad mix. Add a couple of centimeters of cucumber, cut in smaller pieces. Throw in some diced melon, I took a variety of cantaluope , but honeydew would also work (not watermelon though).

Heat some oil in a pan, take a little bit more than you normally would - it's used for dressing later. Add some paprika powder and chili powder to the oil and let the spices fry for a while. I used ancho chili which I think has a warmer, more subtle heat, but use whatever kind of chili powder you want. Throw some crayfish tails in the pan. In Sweden they are sold in brine and flavored with dill. If you use those, strain and dry them carefully before frying. Fry the crayfish tails quickly, otherwise they will get tough and stringy.

When the crayfish are done, simply place them on top of the salad-cucumber-melon, and pour the warm spicy oil over them.

For the sweet chili dressing, simply mix some sweet-chili sauce and crème fraîche. I used about 2/3 crème fraîche and 1/3 sweet chili sauce, but you have to taste your way forward. Serve immediately.

BBQ mussels

We had the BBQ premier for this season at a friend's place this weekend. It was nice but cold, as BBQ night usually are in Sweden, at least prior to July. Everybody brought what they wanted to BBQ and being who we are, we of course couldn't come with some plain ol' meat. Instead we ate these lovely blue mussels that we baked in foil over the BBQ.

The recipe comes from the lovely book Citrusköket by Caroline Hoffberg, which I'm sure I have raved about before. We made some minor changes, as usual.


Mussels pre BBQ-ing. I took an after picture as well, but it's too blurry - it was so cold I couldn't keep the camera still...

Mussels with chorizo and saffron

For 2

500 g fresh blue (common) mussels
1 dl dry vermouth

For the chorizo butter (which will melt into a lovely sauce...):
1 small shallot
50 g chorizo
75 g butter, at room temperature
Zest from ½ lemon
1 garlic clove
0,25 g saffron (½ "envelope" in Sweden)
2 tbsp chives
3 drops tabasco
Pinch of salt

Clean and sort the mussels, discard those not alive. Finely chop the shallot, chorizo, garlic and chives. Mix with the rest of the ingredients for the butter.

Place two large pieces of foil on top of each other. Place half of the mussels in the middle, pour half of the vermouth over them (fold the foil around the mussels first, to avoid alcohol abuse!) and top with half of the garlic butter. Fold the foil around the mussels into a package (keep the opening on top for easy eating later) and repeat the procedure with the remaining mussels, vermouth and butter.

Place over the BBQ (we used a "normal" one with coals), or bake in the oven at 250°C, for about 20 minutes. By that time, all the mussels should have opened - discard those that haven't. Serve with bread to soak up the tasty sauce.

Räkmacka

The “räckmacka” holds a special place among the Swedish traditional dishes. It is frequently associated with the high-but-not-top life, and has of late slipped into the not-quite-every-day luxury segment of the middle class. The word “räckmacka” is decomposed into “räk-” and “macka” which means “shrimp“ (as first element in a compound, otherwise it's “räka”) and “open top sandwich” respectively. This pretty much says it all, without giving away the vast quantities of mayonnaise that's usually associated with it. There's also usually some egg on it, but since I don't like egg, we tend to keep it simple.

So, for this you need:
2 rounds of semi-sweet Wheat Bread
Mayonnaise
~750g Shrimp (unpeeled)
2 slices of Lemon
4 small paper-and-toothpick Swedish flags (optional)
6 twigs of Dill

Our rounds of bread were a bit to large, so we had to cut them down. They should be about the size of a side plate. Peel the shrimps (or buy them peeled, but since they are the main source of flavor, I went for the masochistic path). Use a pastry bag to cover the whole of the bread with mayonnaise, and then arrange the shrimps so that they form a mountain and hide the mayonnaise pastry bag work. Cut two slices of lemon and arrange them artistically on top of the shrimp mountain. decorate with the flags and the dill.

The beauty of a räkmacka is fairly well measured by the height, and no ones going to notice if there's some extra mayo in the middle (wink, wink)...

If the directions were unclear, just look at the picture... I haven't got time to write a thousand words... :-)


Two beautiful räckmackor (plural form). Probably the best way to enjoy shrimp!

P.S. Oh, this was really written by me (Markus), but Jenny started the post by uploading the pictures, so she's probably listed as author. D.S.

Paper Chef 39: Salmon and bulgur falafel with artichokes and blackberry butter

This is our first time ever participating in the food blog event called Paper Chef! The rules are simple: you are given four ingredients, and out of those you have to create something delicious. Three ingredients are randomly chosen from a suggested ingredient list, and the fourth is picked by last month's winner. In addition to picking the ingredients, last month's winner also gets to be the judge of this month's Paper Chef. Sounds cool, huh?! For all the details, and to read up on past Paper Chef challenges, go to the Paper Chef blog.

I have looked at some past months' ingredient picks, and compared to some of them - fig, mint, anchovy, and polenta or dried chili pepper, barley, vanilla pod and beef, this month looked very easy to me! Last month's winner Adrienne of Hungry Bruno picked artichokes, blackberries, bulgur (bulgar) and salmon (the first three being random and the salmon being her pick).

It didn't take us long to figure out what to do with these four ingredients. Our recipe isn't the healthiest (it's deep fried stuff with a butter dipping sauce, people...!), but if we may say so ourselves it turned out really well. Yeah, we know it's not real falafel, but we had to call it something and it sounds better than "salmon balls", right?!

It has been great fun doing the Paper Chef challenge for the first time and I hope that we will participate often in the future!



Salmon and bulgur falafel with artichokes and blackberry butter

Makes about 15 "falafels"

For the salmon and bulgur falafel:
2 dl water
Pinch of salt
1 dl bulgur
500 g salmon
1 egg
Pinch of salt
Pinch of black pepper

For deep frying:
Flour
Eggs
Breadcrumbs
Neutral cooking oil

For the blackberry butter:
4 dl frozen blackberries
½ dl water
1 tbsp sugar
100 g butter

For the artichokes:
Artichokes (one per person)
Salt
Water for boiling

Making it all:

1. Bring the salted water for the bulgur to a boil. Add the bulgur, lower the heat and cook for approximately 8 minutes. Set aside.
2. Clean and dice the salmon. Put it in a food processor and mix using the pulse button until it's coarsely chopped. Mix salmon, bulgur and egg in a bowl, season with salt and pepper and put it in the fridge.
3. Bring salted water to a boil in a pot big enough for the artichokes. Boil for 40-50 minutes depending on size. Strain and rinse immediately with cold water. Set aside for later.
   
4. Bring the blackberries, water and sugar to a boil. Let it reduce for 5-10 minutes. Pass it through a strainer and set the puré aside for later.
   
5. Melt the butter and put it aside.
6. Prepare three plates, one with flour, one with lighly whisked egg and one with breadcrumbs. Keep these ingredients at hand because you will probably run out before having done all the salmon falafels.
   
7. Heat the oil to 190°C.
   
8. Get the salmon-bulgar mix out of the fridge and roll it into meatball sized balls. Roll them first in flour, then in egg and last in breadcrumbs. Deep fry a couple at the time until they are golden brown.
   
9. Clarify the butter. Put the blackberry puré in a bowl and layer the butter on top. This is purely for show - when you dip it will mix together anyway, but it looks nice!
10. Serve the salmon-bulgur falafel and artichokes as finger food with the blackberry butter as dipping sauce.

Creamy seafood soup

I just love it when you have stuff sitting around in the freezer/fridge/pantry that needs to be used up, so you start experimenting, and the result is something as delicious as this evening's seafood soup. The base is the stock left over from making Moules à Marinière a while ago, so this recipe depends on that you have made that, strained the liquid and saved it in the freezer. If you have some other seafood-based stock (crayfish, lobster, shrimp) that would also work, I'm sure.

I feel kind of bad about the ridiculous amounts of cream that went into the soup, but the open carton had expired yesterday and needed to go into something, so it was either this or a desert (ok, desert is coming up in a later post). You can of course exchange the cream for a low fat equivalent. For the seafood part, we used shrimp and seithe, but feel free to play around. Just make sure to use a firm fish that won't fall apart when cooking, and please try to think of sustainability when choosing your fish! WWF (as in wildlife conservation, not wrestling!) has lists of which fish has healthy populations and can be eaten with a good conscience - for the US see here, in Swedish see here.


Hey, the soup kind of matches our kitchen cabinet doors!

Creamy seafood soup

1 small yellow onion
1 fennel
½ tbsp butter
3 dl blue mussel stock from this recipe
1 tbsp tomato puré
½ dl dry vermouth
2½ dl cream
Pinch of ancho chili powder
300 g saithe (coley)
750 g unpeeled shrimp (about 3 dl peeled)

Chop up the onion and fennel. Melt the butter in a big pot, throw in the vegetables and fry on rather low heat until they are getting soft but not any colour. Add the mussel stock, tomato puré and vermouth, bring to a boil and let it reduce for a little while. Whip the cream lightly and stir it in together with a pinch of ancho chili. Bring to a slow simmer. Add the saithe and let it simmer for a minute or two, then add the peeled shrimp. Cook for another 4-5 minutes (we cooked everything for about six minutes, then the saithe was perfect but the shrimp a slight bit overcooked so add those after the fish). We served with the green stuff from the fennel on top, it adds nice colour but no real taste. For colour and flavour, decorate with dill instead. We didn't think it needed any salt or pepper, but let your taste decide.

Salmon burgers without bread

I love salmon - it's so versatile, good for your health, and here in Sweden we are lucky to get it relatively cheap. Tonight we decided to turn salmon into burgers with a bit of Asian flavour. However, we found that our bread had gone too old so we served the salmon patties without bread but with oven-roasted potatoes instead. On the side we also had some green salad, a slice of grilled fresh pineapple and a sweet chili dressing (sweet chili sauce mixed with crème fraiche and some salt and pepper). You could easily turn these into burgers with those elements (bread, salmon patty, salad, pineapple, dressing) but it was really good this way too. The salmon, the sweet and spicy dressing, and the juicy pineapple works very well together. Sorry about the bad photo, I was hungry...!



Asian-flavoured salmon burgers

Serves 2 + 1 lunchbox

500 g salmon
½ dried red chili fruit (substitute ground chili powder if you want to)
3 stalks spring onions (scallions)
1 egg
3 tbsp bread crumbs (very fine)
Salt
Butter to fry in

Cut the salmon into smaller pieces and place them in a food processor. Cut the chili fruit very finely. Chop the spring onions (scallions) and place them and the chili in the food processor. Using the pulse button, grind the salmon coarsly. You don't want it too mushy so be careful! Add the egg, the bread crumbs and some salt. Using a spoon, mix everything around. If the mixture is way too loose, you can add some more bread crumbs. Place it in the fridge to firm up while heating some butter in a large frying pan. To fry, take a big spoonful of salmon mixture and place in the skillet. Use a spatula to flatten it out and shape it into a roundish shape. You want it to be about ½ cm thick. Fry for about 2-3 minutes on each side, until the salmon is cooked through.

For serving:
Grilled French bread if you want to make burgers (please don't use hamburger buns!)
Sweet chili dressing
Mixed greens
A slice of grilled fresh pineapple

Spicy, fruity salmon

This recipe originally comes from a really nice book on food and wine pairings (Kombinera mat och vin by Jens Dolk and Mette Ankarloo.) It pairs this dish with a dry German Riesling, and let me tell you from experience that the acidity in that wine works really well together with the spicy and sweet flavours, and with the fattiness of the salmon.

The original recipe uses Jerusalem artichokes and says to serve with rice or couscous, but we usually substitute potatoes, oven-roasted in the same dish as everything else, and then skip the rice/couscous. The potatoes works really well with his, and less pots and pans to clean is a good thing in my book! This time we added some carrots too; they get wonderfully sweet when roasted in the oven. The original spice mix contains cayenne pepper which makes it quite hot. This time we used ancho chili instead which made it less in-your-face spicy and gave it a more subtle, but still noticeable, heat. The original also adds curry powder (1 tsp) so chuck that in there if you want to. (And sorry, no pic of this - we were too hungry!)

Spicy oven-roasted salmon with mango

Serves 2

200 g salmon
1 mango
6 potatoes (or more if you're really hungry)
4 carrots
Olive oil
Salt

For the spice mix (you should only use dry, ground spices):
1 tsp each of ancho chili, turmeric and cinnamon
2 tsp each of cumin and ginger

Put the oven to 200 degrees C. Mix the spices together. Peel the potatoes and carrots, cut the potatoes into wedges and halve the carrots lengthwise. Put them in a roasting pan, drizzle with olive oil, season with salt and add about half of the spice mix. Using your hands, mix everything around. Put in the oven for about 15 minutes.
Peel and slice the mango. Cut the salmon into portion-sized pieces and rub the rest of the spice mix on the salmon.
So, when 15 minutes have passed on the carrots and potatoes, you get the dish out and add the mango. Mix it around with the the carrots and potatoes, and then place the salmon on top of the whole deal. Cook for about 10 more minutes or until the salmon is done. (If your mango is a bit unripe, like ours was today, you might want to get it in the oven a bit earlier, say when 10 minutes or so have passed on the potatoes and carrots.)
We served it with some plain greek yoghurt as a sauce. It's also nice to add some freshly squeezed lime juice on top of the salmon. Just get some acidity in there.

Couscous and crayfish

Dishes based on couscous, bulgur or quinoa mixed with veggies and some kind of meat is somewhat of a staple in our kitchen. They are so simple to make: just chop, fry, boil and mix and dinner is done. Tonight's version had crayfish tails and fennel, two things that go really well together. The apple adds a nice acidity and fruitiness. We served it with a lemon yoghurt sauce made of Turkish yoghurt, lemon zest, lemon juice, salt and black pepper.

Couscous with fennel and crayfish tails in garlic butter

4 large portions

1 small fennel
1 small red pepper
1 tart apple
Olive oil

3 dl couscous
3 dl water
½ tsp turmeric
Salt

400 g crayfish tails in water (strained weight)
1 tbsp butter, at room temperature
1 garlic clove
2 tbsp dry white wine
Salt to taste

Dice the fennel, red pepper and apple. Heat up the olive oil and fry the veggies for about 5 minutes, you still want them slightly crunchy. Set aside for later.
Bring salted water to a boil. Remove from heat, add couscous and turmeric, stir and let stand under a lid for about 5 minutes or until the water is absorbed.
While waiting for that, you chop the garlic clove very finely and mix with the butter. Put the crayfish tails in a hot pan, add the garlic butter and let it melt. It will smell quite heavenly. Add the white wine and let simmer for a minute or two on medium heat (don't overcook the crayfish, they will get dry and stringy). Now the couscous will be ready, so pour that into the pan with the crayfish, add the veggies and stir around so that the couscous absorbs the butter-wine sauce. You might want to add some more salt, but remember that the crayfish tails are quite salty. Serve with lemon-yoghurt sauce.

Mussels from Brussels

Friday nights dinner was blue mussels (also know as common mussels) cooked in white wine and served with aioli and bread. It's super easy to make, just be sure to sort the mussels before cooking them (throw away the ones with broken shells, open ones that doesn't close when you knock them against something, and those that feel much heavier than normal). Also, after cooking, throw away those that haven't opened.

White wine does of course work with this, but we like a white beer such as Hoegaarden better. Eat the mussels dipped in aioli and the bread dipped in the tasty broth. If you want this Belgian dish to be even more Belgian, serve it with french fries as well. The leftover broth can be frosen (be sure to strain it first) and used as stock in a seafood soup.

Moules à Marinière

5 dl dry white wine
½ onion, finely chopped
1 bayleaf
½ tsp dried thyme
Dash of black pepper
75 grams butter
1 kilo blue (common) mussels, cleaned and sorted

Pour the wine in to a big pot, add the onion, spices and butter and bring to a lively boil under a lid. Throw in the mussels and boil with the lid on for about 5 minutes until they have opened. Shake the pot often so that all mussels are equally cooked. Do not overcook! Serve with bread and aioli.

Salmon and salad

So, time for a post not involving cheese or chocolate! The original idea here was to recreate a salad that I had at a Thai restaurant in Hong Kong when we lived there this fall (yes, you can be sure that there will be attempts at Chinese cooking here in the future). The restaurant, Thai Basil, had these incredibly tasty, but very spicy, salads involving green mango or papaya, cucumber, a few thinly julienned carrots, fresh herbs (I think one of them was mint which was kind of surprising in Thai food but worked really well), chopped chilies, maybe some peanuts, and dressing. The salad was then topped with pan seared tuna or salmon.

When I found a recipe for blackened salmon at another food blog, I decided to combine the two recipes and make a Thai Basil inpired salad to serve with the salmon. The original recipe called for a strawberry-feta cheese salad to be served with the salmon, which I am sure would be totally tasty, but it ain't happening in Sweden in January...

When I started to make the spice rub for the salmon, I realized that I didn't have many of the called for ingredients at hand (a lot of our stuff is still in boxes after living abroad) so I had to improvise with what I had. And for the salad, well, it bore no resemblance at all to the Thai Basil salads (I didn't even use dressing since the one I made got too oily and we had no more limes and I couldn't find the white wine vinegar). But the whole shebang became incredibly tasty - the salmon was extremely juicy and "buttery" and the flavors worked very well together. And it's also healthy: salmon contains good fat, it was fried without any fat or oil what so ever, the salad was served without dressing, and there was no carbs at all (okey, besides the sugar in the rub). It also looked very nice and hey, did I mention how good it was?!



Blackened salmon with mango-cucumber salad

serves 2

2 pieces of salmon fillet
For the rub:
2 tbsp raw demerara sugar (or muscovado)
1 tbsp flaky sea salt
1½ tsp ground ginger (not fresh this time)
1 tsp chili powder (I used ancho chili, since that was all I had)

Ground the ingredients for the rub together in a pestle, and rub it into both sides of the salmon. Fry in a dry pan on quite high heat until the salmon is just cooked through and the rub has blackened.

For the salad: Cut 1 mango and 1 small cucumber in thin slices. I also added some sunflower sprouts. I'm sure a bit of julienned carrot would work as well (but not too much). As I said, no dressing here, but I started experimenting with lime, a few drops of fish sauce and some rape seed oil, and it was promising before I splashed too much oil into it and couldn't find anything sour to balance it with.