Late Summer Pairing with Rodney Strong Chardonnay

Earlier this month I riffed on a recipe from the book Down Home: Downtown – Seasonal Recipes fromTwo Sonoma Wine Country Restaurants that Robert Larsen of Rodney StrongVineyards had given me at the Wine Bloggers Conference in July.

I got busy with Regional Wine Week and forgot that I had never published my review of the wine and the pairing. It was still late summer-like when I made the dish, a broiled salmon with a Panzanella salad, which is quite different that the weather today after our first snow and with temperatures in the 40’s. I guess this is my subconscious hoping for what is evident to be just a dream, but alas winter is coming.

You can find the original recipe I worked from on page 97 of Down Home: Downtown. One thing to note is that there isn’t a recipe for the drizzle shown on the fish in the book’s pictures so I can’t say what the exact flavors were intended there. Here’s what I did:

For the salmon I used an olive oil rubbed cast iron skillet over medium-high heat to cook it to browned on both sides. I then transferred the salmon to a 400 degree oven to finish the cooking. This takes 2-3 minutes per side. This method is dreadfully easy and ensures your salmon has a bit of crisp on the outside but is gently cooked inside.

For a drizzle I made a poor-mans Aioli with mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, garlic and salt.

The Panzanella salad was absent of the corn from the original recipe, contained white onion and had two kinds of sweet heirloom tomatoes from a local farm.  The dressing was made as it was described using balsamic vinegar, garlic, shallot, olive oil, salt & pepper.

Having recently perfected the above cooking method for salmon there is no way that part of the dish could have been better. The faux-Aioli was excellent and the pairing with the wine really did work. That said, I would have used red onion in the Panzanella salad. White onion was what I had and it just didn’t measure up. There was nothing wrong with the salad, I’m just imagining home much more I would have enjoyed it. The addition of the corn would take it up a notch as well, so do it if you make this dish, or something like it.

The Rodney Strong Chardonnay suggested in the book and that I paired with the dish is from the Sonoma County series and is easily accessible in my local state liquor stores. The nose is spicy with a bit of buttered toast. I also picked up lemon and pear. On the palate the pear came back but with more of a baked slant to it. The oak is nicely balanced to be more on the spicy and not overtly woody side. The acidity of the wine is healthy enough for a clean finish.

The wine and the fish were a great combination, the roasty crust on the outside of the salmon was balanced by the oak and the acidity of the wine helped offset the subtle fatty character typical of salmon.  The wine and the salad weren’t as well made of a match, but there was nothing off-putting when they were combined; there just wasn’t any magic.

If you are dealing with the onset of winter like we here in New England I hope this late summer meal offered a welcome distraction for just a moment. If not, go out and cook something befitting warm weather just because you can.

Cheers!

Jason

Mother’s Day Dinner - Baked Stuffed Salmon

Making dinner for mom can be a challenge. She taught me how to cook when I was very young and since we have enjoyed many years of swapping tips, recipes and cooking together. With years of additional experience and having enjoyed meals in many destinations I have yet to get to, Mom has a broader palate than I do. Figuring out what to make that might offer something new as well as the enjoyment of a well prepared meal can be nerve wracking. But I take that challenge head on as often as I can. Cooking for others who appreciate the nuance of creating in the kitchen is one of life’s true joys for me.

Baked Stuffed Salmon is what I landed for the honor of making dinner for Mother’s Day. I waited until a few days ahead to announce my choice and was so happy to hear it was something she had never had. My challenge was clear. As I often do I searched around on the web for inspiration from what others had done before. If I could even stand on the shoulders of those “giants” for just a few minutes I knew I would feel good about the outcome. I took ingredients and preparation from several different recipes. The recipes that use a whole fish are intriguing and something that is on my list to try another time.

I complimented my main dish with a light version of Scalloped Potatoes and a sautéed asparagus with Garam Masala that has been making me happy of late.

Baked Stuffed Salmon

2 – 1 lb salmon filets, skins on (approx. the same size)
6-8 slices wheat bread, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
2 tbsp capers, drained
2 Tbsp Basil, chopped
2 Tbsp Dill, chopped
2 Tbsp Parsley, chopped
¼ cup melted butter
¼ cup olive oil
Salt & pepper
1 lemon, for zest
Butchers twine
Water

Place the chopped bread in a large bowl, adding water 1 Tbsp at a time till it begins to moisten. Add the onion, capers, herbs and melted butter. Use additional water if necessary. The stuffing should be most, but not liquefied. Lay out one long strand of butcher’s wine that will run along the long side of the fish. Lay out 5 strands of butcher’s twine with about 1 inch between them over top. Exactly how long each is going to depend a lot on how thick your fish is and how much stuffing you make. More is better here. Place 1 salmon filet on an oiled surface, salt and pepper lightly. Place over top the twine. Zest lemon rind over the fish. Mound the stuffing up on the fish. Zest lemon rind over the stuffing. I squeezed some lemon juice over it for more zip and it did work well. Oil the outside of the second filet and place it on top. First tie off the 5 strands of twine, then finishing with the longest and last one. Place the stuffed salmon a foil line baking pan. Add any remaining stuffing over the fish and garnish with a few lemon slices. Bake until the fish flakes and the internal temperature is at least 125 and likely a bit higher to taste. We cooked it about 40 minutes or so and then began taking the temp and it was done not longer after.

I did pair several wines with dinner, including a pre-dinner aperitif of some of my homemade 2010 wild Concord rose. Mom liked that one the best and I left her the bottle to finish over the remainder of her leisurely weekend in VT. I wrote about my wine pairings for The Unreserved earlier in the week with the title “Pinot, but not Noir”. I used a Pinot Blanc and a Pinot Gris from two different parts of the wine world and had good experiences with both. The King Estate Pinot Gris is especially good with salmon, something we found last year when we were visiting the area. We are so excited to be going back, and this time we will be visiting King Estate with local friends.

For dessert I recreated a great closer that Francoise served at our recent trip to Montreal, sorbet with fresh fruit. I used a lemon sorbet from Hagen Daas with fresh cut strawberries that were tossed with a little lime juice and sugar.

With dessert I served a mixed drink from the March/April 2011 issue of Imbibe magazine, the Cheerwine Cocktail #1. Cheerwine is a cherry flavored soda that hails from NC which my parents found for me on their trip back up the East Coast in March. With some gin, lime and over ice the soda really shined. I can see why there is a faithful consumer base for it.

I pretty much figure this challenge worked out splendidly and as good as it could have. We all did enjoy the meal and I heard the leftovers were securely eaten.

Cheers!

Jason

St. Patrick’s Day Dinner

St. Patrick’s Day can be a nightmare for people interested in food blogs. From the deluge of posts on corned beef & cabbage, soda bread, everything being green and all the other non-at-all Irish “traditions” you could easily have a heart attack trying to sort through all of it. What is a food blogger to do?

Do something different, and keep it simple.

What did I come up with? Put Irish whiskey in everything!

I have enjoyed Jameson Irish Whiskey many times in the past, but it had been quite a while since I had had it. So it made sense to use it in my dinner and enjoy a little as I worked.

Jameson Irish Whiskey

Jameson’s pours with a light amber color. The aromas eluded classification for me which I found odd. In the taste I found sweetness with vanilla, caramel and other spice flavors. Honey showed up in the finish. It is as smooth and sweet as I remember and it went down too easy so I am now blogging under the influence!

We opened with a pairing of Kerry Gold Reduced Fat Aged Cheddar with the whiskey. We were both hungry and the creamy aged cheese really provided what we needed. Margot expressed the aged notes like good parmesan. That is definitely a vote of confidence. The whiskey & cheese combination created new savory flavors, with roasted fennel being the one we both picked out. Pretty cool!

For dinner we paired a brown sugar & whiskey broiled salmon with Colcannon, a mash of potatoes, leeks and cabbage.

Colcannon

5 large potatoes
1 head cabbage
3 leeks
1 cup skim milk
2 Tbsp light vegetable oil spread
2 oz Jameson Irish Whiskey
Nutmeg, salt & pepper to taste

Peel, cut and cover the potatoes with water with large pot. Boil for mashing. Slice the leeks and cook them in the milk over medium-low heat for 15 minutes, or until soft. Slice the cabbage and boil in water for 15 minutes. Once all of the ingredients are cooked, mash the potatoes, stirring in the cabbage and leeks. Add the vegetable spread, whiskey, nutmeg, salt and pepper. Allow the vegetable spread to melt and stir to combine all the ingredients.

Broiled Whiskey Salmon

½ pound salmon filet
2 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp Jameson Irish Whiskey
2 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
2 shakes red pepper flakes

This recipe was adapted from the Irish Whiskey Brown Sugar Salmon recipe that fellow food blogger Megan from the Travel, Wine & Dine blog forwarded to me when I put out the call for recipes containing Irish whiskey.

Mix the last four ingredients to create the marinade for the fish. Pour the marinade over the fish and allow it to sit for 15 minutes. Heat a cast iron grill pan under the broiler until hot. Lay the fish on the grill pan and return to the broiler. Broil for 3 minutes and pour the remaining marinade over the fish. Broil until cooked through. After tasting the cooked fish Margot and I both agreed that some additional acid is required in the marinade, with vinegar being the first thing we thought of.

( very simple, with no flair! )

The fish was sweet with a slight hint of heat from the red pepper. The smokiness from the whiskey was found in the molasses flavors produced by the caramelized sugar. The Colcannon was new for us and Margot was definitely unsure of it from my mere mention of it last week. She “hates” cabbage. Cabbage is definitely an acquired taste and one too many times of being around stinky boiled cabbage could create quite an impression. Thankfully the way it is prepared here retains only some of its aroma and flavor, but adds quite a bit of texture to the dish. The leeks add the onion flavor that really brings the whole dish together. I suspect I will be making this again!

For dessert I went simple and baked sliced apples with sugar and spices, topping them with vanilla frozen yogurt and a whiskey caramel sauce. I won’t bother with the instructions on this one, allowing you to use your imagination!

( I used large ramekins and then ended up having too much space, so they weren't pretty. tasty, though! )

Baked Apples with Vanilla Frozen Yogurt & Whiskey Caramel Sauce

2 Fuji apples
2 tsp Demerara sugar
1 tsp of a combo of Nutmeg, cinnamon & allspice
Vanilla frozen yogurt
¼ cup sugar
1/8 cup heavy cream
2 Tbsp Jameson Irish Whiskey
Water to cover sugar in sauce pan
(Makes 2)

The sips of Irish whiskey as I worked definitely stacked up. With that I am definitely participating the familiar (from college) tradition of getting a buzz for St. Patrick’s Day!

No matter whether and how you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day we hope you enjoy it. Raise a glass of something and join in the fun!

Cheers!

Jason

Salmon Burgers – First Attempt

With the summer grilling season upon us I am venturing to try as many different burger styles as I can. I plan to wait until the end to try some beef variations, something I have done many times before.

I saw a recipe two weeks ago for Salmon Burgers at the Ardent Epicure / Magic of Spice blog. Because I hadn’t made burgers from fish before I used this recipe as a guide hoping to get the proportions right and a result worth evaluating. I did veer off when it came to flavors and the final preparation, but that is where the fun comes in. The recipe was a handy guide and the complete preparation from the blog would make a great meal.

The recipe I used can be found below. The process was quite straightforward and did not require any special equipment or a lot of time. They cook quickly which is a bonus when you get home late on a weeknight.

Upon eating the burgers I was immediately sure that that the adornment of the burgers with a fresh salsa certainly enhanced the flavors. The burgers as I prepared them were mild in flavor, but had a wonderful texture and a nice crisp coating on the outside. I considered what I would do the next time.

I would add more salt to the mix and swap out the jalapeno cheese for regular cheddar and some habanero pepper sauce. More flavor there. I would also add some ground cumin and chopped cilantro to the mix also for more flavor. Where I am going is typical for me. I don’t add a lot of stuff on top of my burgers, I like the flavor to be in them. I dress them up with cheese, lettuce and tomato and sometimes some mayonnaise, which would work well here too; although I don’t think it would be a big change.

I did not find a good wine match to go with these burgers and I tried two different wines available the night I cooked the burgers. The first was the Miguel Torres Tormenta 2009 Organically Grown Viognier from Chile. The wine was very dry for a Viognier and the burger accentuated the dryness and made the wine taste a bit tart. I then switched to a bottle of a Chilean Pinot Noir we made with some friends and found a better match, but no sparks.

I will be making these burgers again, applying some of the changes I mentioned above and looking for better beverage pairings to create a super summer meal. The next burger adventure is going to be with ground turkey and some spice ideas culled from some of the new shows on the Cooking Channel.

Recipe for Salmon Burgers
(makes 3 large patties)

9oz boneless salmon filet
12 whole wheat crackers
3 tbsp light mayo
1 tbsp country style Dijon mustard
2 tsp chopped fresh drill
3 oz shredded jalapeno cheddar cheese
½ small onion, finely chopped
1 tsp salt
½ tsp black pepper
1 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp butter
3 small whole wheat pitas, cut open
Sliced tomato and lettuce for garnish

• Pulse crackers in the food processor to small crumbs, set side
• Combine mayo, mustard and dill in a small bowl, set aside
• Shred cheese and set aside
• Finely chop onion, set aside
• Remove the skin from the salmon and cut in medium sized chunks
• Process in the food processor until it has a smooth texture and some pieces still visible
• Scrape into large bowl, mix in mayo/mustard, crackers, cheese, onion, salt, pepper and lime juice
• Form into 3 patties
• Heat a skillet over medium-high heat and melt butter in pan
• Cook patties about 5 minutes on each side until golden brown and pale pink in the middle
• Top with cheese after flipping, if desired
• Use the pitas, tomato and lettuce to make 3 burgers.

Cheers!

--Jason