27/06/2011

Wild Salmon with Vegetables, Avocado & Eggs

Possibly the perfect paleo meal! Meat, fish, eggs, vegetables, avocado and nuts all on one plate.

Wild salmon has a better omega 3:6 ratio than farmed salmon, the flavour is more intense and the colour much deeper - simply poached, all that flavour and colour is for the most part retained.

Perfect partners to salmon are avocado and green vegetables; intense green vegetables like kale, spinach, broccoli and asparagus. Any, or all, of these can be included in your version of this dish. I used kale.

Perfect partners to kale are bacon and eggs. Eggs should be free range at the very least, woodland reared are best since the chickens are left to roam, peck and scratch for grubs natural to their diet, and the taste difference is evident. The bacon should have been outdoor reared and not artificially plumped with steroids.

Let's put the dish together ...

Begin with a pan of bouillon brought up to the boil and boil any hard vegetables for most of their required cooking time. Lower the heat to below a simmer; just warm. Immerse the fish.

Bring a second pan of water and white distilled vinegar to the boil, lower the heat, swirl and drop in the first egg. Allow it to poach just beyond hardening the white around the edge, retrive and place in a bowl of cold water to cease the cooking. Poach the second egg the same way and place into the cold water.

Using a large frying pan, fry off some chopped streaky bacon - streaky bacon has the best flavour, good fat and the right saltiness to work with the kale. When ready, add a good block of butter to the pan and put in the kale, tossing it in the butter and bacon. Spinach can be treated in the same way, although broccoli and aspragus would be poached in with the fish.

Slice up an avocado and place at one end of the plate. Sprinkle a few pine nuts over and even a little extra virgin olive oil or avocado oil over the top.

Return the eggs to the simmering poaching water and cook through leaving the yolk runny. Retrieve the eggs and dry them on a paper towel. Collect the fish and dry it on a paper towel also.

Place the kale and bacon at the other end of the plate to the middle and place the fish in the middle over the kale. Place the eggs atop the kale towards one side of the plate. Arrange the vegetables in any gaps.

Finally, garnish. Cut some daikon into matchsticks and mix with some soured cream. Add in herbs, like parsley, chive, or whatever takes your fancy at the time and spoon the cream over the top of the salmon. If you have excluded dairy from your paleo diet, simply skip this and sprinlke some chopped herbs over.

This dish is about putting together a whole bunch of paleo goodness on one plate - there can be many variations on the theme.