Salmon Dinner

So we're into our third week of Abundant Harvest produce deliveries and I feel as though I'm on Iron Chef. Our precious little box of organic fruits and veggies, hand-farmed by the modern-day bohemian hipster hippies of the 2000's, has been another thing that I look forward to on the weekend, besides the weekend itself. The box usually has a few items that I rarely/never purchase on my own. Last week the novelty items were chestnuts and radishes; I burned the chestnuts, which smelled incredible on the way to overcooked, and the radishes were so powerfully spicy I had no choice but to pickle them if I was to feed them to Shelese. Speaking of Shelese, my resident resident and wife, check out what she was doing while I made dinner tonight... she did do the dishes so it's all good. I would like to point out that, yes, that is a leopard print Snuggie and Bosley sprawled out trying to camouflage. 

This weeks novelties were sweet potatoes and pomegranates. I don't know why I have not cooked sweet potatoes on a regular basis, they are so good I eat them like I used to eat SweetTarts and sour licorice when I was a wee lad! They are adult candy and they are considered a superfood; not sure why they're not on my shopping list on a regular basis. Now hear me all! From this day forward, I'm gonna buy more sweet potatoes... that's it. I used America's Test Kitchen's recipe as a base for the sweet potatoes.

First peel them. Beautiful color combo, eh?

Chop them up, toss them in veggie oil, salt, and pepper. Bake, covered, then uncovered until brown

Another new item in my kitchen this week was frozen salmon from Costco. Pretty good deal and the fish is wild caught Alaskan Salmon. Normally I steer clear of salmon, neither because of it's gamey-ness, nor because of it's tendency to dry out. I just think there are so many other fish that taste so much better; but that's just me. I'm trying to introduce more healthy fats into our diet and that was the impetus for buying frozen salmon at Costco. Before you turn your nose up at buying frozen fish from a mega-box-mart, waiting angrily for the four people in front of you to greedily grab their sample like it's THE last meal and move their cart from the middle of the damn isle so you can get by, let me explain. First of all, the fish you buy is frozen. Whether or not you buy it frozen, it's frozen. State law mandates that all fish sold must be frozen to eradicate parasites. Unless you catch it yourself, it's frozen. To me that's an argument for buying fish frozen and thawing it yourself; at least you'll know it was thawed properly. And secondly, find me a better deal for wild-caught Alaskan. The color was beautiful and natural, not died neon orange and glowing. Such a fatty and sometimes gamey fish begs for a bright and bold salsa topping. I used the other secret ingredient like a good Iron Chef and made a salsa out of the ingredients below. I forgot to take the picture with the other ingredients: olive oil, parsley, mint, salt, and pepper. As a side carb we had cous cous topped with tomatoes, olive oil, and Hawaiian Sea Salt.

I was very happy with the way the meal turned out and Shelese enjoyed it too. The fish was moist and not even remotely gamey. I rubbed it with olive oil, salt, and pepper about 30 minutes before cooking and rested it in the fridge. It was cooked on a wire wrack in a baking sheet in a 300 degree oven for about 15 minutes. This salmon has most definitely exalted the species way up in my preferred fish list. I'm not sure if it was my not overcooking it or the quality of the fish itself, or both, but I will be buying more in the future. Stay tuned for the next secret ingredient...