Salmon with Morel Vinaigrette

Patricia here… taking over John’s post for a couple of minutes to write an introduction, since he’s off getting social media-ified with SMC Seattle. For our second morel week recipe, we wanted something that paired morels and salmon. We (or at least I) wanted a bit of a lighter dish, since we were pairing the dish with yesterday’s Pasta with Morel Sauce that I knew would be substantial. This was a very simple recipe and you can certainly serve it with the Pasta with Morel Sauce for an extra morel-y meal. We bought a grand total of 1/3 of a pound of morels at the market and had enough for two people of both dishes. We’ll now return you to your regularly scheduled John.

So sure, we’re blessed to have those mushroom options, but, hey, we’re pretty blessed with seafood here too. Shrimp and crab in the winter, halibut in the spring and summer and, of course, salmon.

Lovely, pink, rich. … errm…. Salmony?

Annnnnyways. Wilson Fish, as always, is one of our favorite vendors, especially since they have all that fresh salmon. And when it’s fresh, we tend to pick up a nice little slab every week and, just like kale in the winter, we occasionally struggle to come up with something new.

Sure, even just a simple grilling with a little rub (we’re partial to Tom Douglas’ Spicy Tokyo rub) is great, but occasionally you want something new.

We’ve tried quite a few options, and this was definitely a good one. As we were buying the morels, I was looking at the Illustrated Wild Foods Recipe Calendar where this months recipe was for morels, and it talked about  how morels paired up so well with salmon.

Let’s go down that rabbit hole then, shall we?

I’ll admit, I was thinking something like a creamy morel sauce or something a little more beefy… Vinaigrette tho, just sounds a little weird. Morels and vinaigrette just didn’t seem like it’d go together.

Of course, I was a little wrong.

The taste was… odd. Not bad in any way. There’s the bite of vinegar, the lightness of the chervil, and the meat of the morels.

Now, while we had this and the Pasta with Morel Sauce side by side, and it really worked well. Heck, make both of them and bring the left-overs to work.

Just don’t go heating up the salmon in the microwave. Everyone hates the guy who does that.

Salmon with Morel Vinaigrette (serves 2), adapted from Bobby Flay

• Salmon fillet, ~.3 lb per person
• Morels, 1.5 ounce fresh, cleaned, coarsely chopped (see notes)
• Champagne vinegar, 1/4 cup
• Shallot, 1/4 small, thinly sliced
• Dijon mustard, 1 teaspoon
• Salt
• Pepper
• Olive oil, 1/2 cup (plus extra)
• Fresh parsley, 1.5 tablespoons coarsely chopped

1. In a medium bowl add vinegar, shallot, mustard and salt and pepper and whisk.
2. Gently mix in the morels and parsley and set aside.
3. Brush salmon with olive oil and crack some salt and pepper on both sides.
4. Fire up a grill (gas or charcoal) to high heat and grill salmon to your liking.
5. When the salmon has finished, steadily drip the 1/2 cup of olive oil into the vinaigrette preparation, while slowly whisking.
6. When finished adding the olive oil, drizzle the mixture over the salmon fillets and serve.

Notes: First, about the morels. Here in Seattle, we’re blessed to regularly get fresh morels pretty easily. If you happen to not be able to get fresh, but are able to get dried, it’s still pretty easy to make this dish.

First, take the dried morels and put them into a bowl and cover the with boiling water. Let that sit for 30 minutes at which point they should be soft. Strain them, reserving the liquid, and chop them coarsely. Easy peasy.

When grilling salmon, technically, it’s pretty much done to medium when the white goo (the albumen) starts leaking out of the sides. The inside may be too under cooked for some, but, there you have it.

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Tagged as: morels, salmon