A Reel-ly Simple Salmon Recipe, I'm Back On (the) Line

Hey all. I know I've gone AWOL for far too long. It's been over a year since my last post, but I honestly needed the hiatus. I'd begun to actively avoid cooking, honestly the idea of having to write a blog post had become exhausting at some point, and so I decided to take some time to cook simple, clean food that didn't require a 60 minute long writing marathon. BUT, I always intended to get back to this, sooner or later, and today's dish is the perfect way to set the tone going forward. 

For the next year, most of my posts will be dishes you can cook quickly, cleanly and easily...the type of food that looks and tastes phenomenal, but doesn't need you to plan a whole evening around cooking. And because I believe that looks and taste are both critical in a good dish, I'll be leaving plating instructions at the end. 

Cooking Instructions: 

The recipe today is Pan-Seared Salmon with a lemon-dill yogurt, seared bell peppers, and an admiral sauce. If you're cooking along, we'll start with the fish. The goal with a good piece of salmon is to balance the crispiness on the skin with the tenderness of the meat. So, temperature and preparation are both key. First and foremost, try to avoid pieces of salmon which are significantly uneven. You want a rectangular piece, and one which is more or less flat when placed on a cutting board. Now, sprinkle salt on the skin side, minuscule bit of olive oil in the pan, on medium heat. Place the fish in, let it get going, put a lid on the pan. LEAVE IT. DO NOT PICK IT UP EVERY 20 SECONDS TO CHECK IF IT'S DONE YET. When it starts getting done, you'll see the sides of the fish begin to turn a light white. It'll take between 5 and 8 minutes to get to that point, and your goal is really to reach a point where the insides of the fish are semi translucent, and very soft, but where the skin has browned nicely. Something I do to add a bit more flavour is take a clove of garlic (whole) and toss it into the oil. The flavouring is nice for the salmon, and once you're done, you can easily mince up the garlic and mix it in with the other elements. Herbs and spices are to be saved for the sauce, leave the fish. 

Bell Peppers. Use green in my opinion, it looks nice too, and chop it up into thin strips to be stir fried. You want the thickness and width of the strips to be approximately equal, so cut accordingly. Spice these nicely, you want to toss them in a slurry, something with balsamic vinegar, chilli flakes, a touch of honey, and if you have some, a bit of Woostershire sauce. Toss them into the pan with the salmon, and cook till softened and one side has started to blacken (small spots of black)

While the salmon's going, simple prep for the yogurt. Lemon zest (~1 lemon's worth), Dill (3-5 sprigs, de-stemmed and torn into small bits), Salt, Yogurt. That's it, enough yogurt to cover a regular plate in a layer about 1cm thick, eyeball it to be honest, and KEEP TASTING. Taste the yogurt once you've mixed, you want it to be light and fresh. We are also going to add in that garlic from above once the fish is done. 

Note that at this point, your salmon will be done, so pull it out of the pan along with your bell peppers, and deglaze with a tiny bit of white wine (Since I didn't have any I used a touch of chicken stock). The wine will mostly evaporate, and what's left can be drizzled into the yogurt, it adds another layer of flavour. You're going to rest your salmon for a bit while you finish the admiral sauce off, that's more or less the optimal time.

In the same pan, a knob of butter (around 2 tablespoons). We're going to let it go for a long time, an admiral sauce is basically blackened butter, so we're going till there are bits of black milk solids at the bottom of the pan. Keep moving the butter around constantly, otherwise the black solids will form before the main sauce is ready. Meanwhile, mince 1/4 shallot finely, and mix in a small bowl with thyme, chilli flakes and capers. This is your flavouring, and optionally, you can add a bit of lemon zest here too, although I believe the capers are sufficient. Once the butter's blackened, slowly pour it into the bowl, making sure you hear a sizzle when the ingredients meet the butter. Pour till about 10% of the butter is left in the pan, this is going to contain most of that black sediment, so toss it out. That's barely edible, but the rest of it is DELICIOUS. 

Time to plate: First yogurt on the plate. Easiest way to make it look fancy is spreading it across the bottom of the plate, leaving it thicker towards the edges than in the centre. The centre is where the salmon and other stuff sits. Now, bell peppers in the centre lined up and all facing the same way. Easy way to plate is to put the salmon directly on top of the bell peppers, and then the admiral sauce over the salmon. More delicate but fun option is to put the line of bell peppers a bit off centre and place the salmon perpendicularly, with one of the short edges resting on top of the bell peppers. Same idea with the admiral sauce, though, in that you're just going to drizzle it over. In either case, finish with a bit more fresh dill/lemon zest.

THAT'S IT. It takes 15 minutes, 1 pan, 1 cutting board and good knife skills (25 minutes if you decide to chop the ingredients and prep everything ahead of time). If you don't make this recipe, it's not because it's too expensive (I spent like $11 for enough ingredients to make this twice, and that's with all organic), and it's not because it's too hard or too unclean (including cleaning and eating it took me 35 minutes). So go make the recipe, or don't, it's up to you. But if you do, send me a picture!

FYI...List of Ingredients

• Yogurt
• Lemon
• Dill
• Salmon
• Garlic
• Olive Oil
• Bell Peppers
• Honey
• Balsamic Vinegar
• (Wooster)shire sauce
• Chilli Flakes
• Shallots
• Thyme
• Capers
• Butter