Culinary Escapade

I bought myself a new grill pan a couple of weeks ago and was looking for an occasion to try it out. There was some left over salmon from my Gravlax experiment (more to come in a couple of days) and wanted a simple lunch.

Originally, I was going to be boring and make it the way I normally did by baking it off in the oven in a thick dill sauce. However, a thick mayo sauce was not exactly good for my bid to lose some weight to fit into a nice dress for my friend’s wedding in September.

There was a tub of miso paste in the fridge that I never put to use and it was high time that it was used for something other than miso soup. Miso has a nice salty flavor that I felt would lend itself well to an Asian-flavored marinade. There are three types of miso: light, red and dark. I went with the red one because it is the most versatile.

On another note, I don’t know about anyone else in the world, but here in Montreal salmon prices have jumped since the last time I bought some. I went to Noref, a fishmonger that supplies some restaurants in the city and the salmon was $11 a pound. My purchase of 4 fillets came out to over $23. Good thing my husband hates fish or else I would go broke from buying it. Ok, back to regularly schedule programming….

Fish is delicate, so it won’t require a long period of marinade, and you probably should not as the acid in marinades would cook your seafood. Great of ceviche, not so good for a grilled application. I find half an hour to an hour is plenty for fish and seafood.

This recipe came out great. The fish was nice and moist, not overcooked as a lot of people like to do. I had it with a plain green salad instead of my usual serving of rice. Yay for me! My doc would be proud of me for curbing my carb intake.

Grilled Orange Miso-Glazed Salmon

2 salmon fillets
2 tbsp miso paste
1/4 cup orange juice (fresh squeezed if you can, if not unsweetened please)
1 tsp light soy sauce
1 tbsp sake
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp grated ginger
black pepper to taste

Method:

- Add the ingredients with the exception of the salmon into a bowl and mix until the ingredients are well combined.

- Make sure there are no pin bones in your salmon, if so remove with tweezers. Put the salmon in marinade and allow to marinade at least a half hour. Try not to go over an hour.

- Preheat oven to 375F.

- Lightly oil your oven-safe grill pan and grill your salmon 2 minutes on each side on medium high heat.

- Move your fish into the oven, skin side down and bake 10 to 15 minutes or until the fish is cooked.