Atomic Nerds

Sorry folks, but if you’re looking for deep thoughts and heavy science here today, you’re out of luck. Kang went into heat today, they’re still doing controlled “prescribed” burns in Bandelier, which is dumping all sorts of pollen, smoke, and other assorted crap into the air to make our noses threaten to abandon body in favor of a nice cleanroom, and the various forces of bad luck, Murphy, and coincidence are conspiring to keep us from getting a good night’s sleep for the past few days. On top of all that, it’s homecoming so our one venture out for errands and supplies was met with fierce resistance and utterly clogged streets filled with pointlessly reveling demons, more commonly known as teenagers. Honestly, I didn’t get what the big deal about homecoming was when I attended the school, and I sure as hell don’t get it now. “Rah rah, our jocks are dumber than your jocks, whoopee. Trying to get a handle on Maxwell’s equations here.” Anyway. So today you get a recipe. This is one of our favorites, but being locked on a mesa in the middle of the desert, coming by decent fish is a tricky proposition and we can’t make it as often as we’d like. At least not without a better-than-average risk of becoming rather fond of the room with extra porcelan.

Five Spice Orange Salmon, serves two
1/4 cup orange juice (fresh prefered)
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 Tbs sherry (remember, don’t cook with anything you couldn’t drink on its own)
1 Tbs orange marmalade
1.5 tsp five-spice seasoning
~1/2-1 tsp ginger powder, depending on your taste
1 tsp dark sesame oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 salmon fillets, roughly 1/2lb-3/4lb each, skin on
1 cinnamon stick

In a gallon-size ziplock bag, combine the first 11 ingredients and shake to combine. Place the salmon fillets in the bag, squeeze out as much air as possible, and marinate for 15 minutes, turning once. Don’t let this go longer than 20 minutes or the acid in the OJ will start to “cook” the fish.

Preheat your broiler.

After the 15 minutes are up, pour the marinade into a small saucepan. Add the cinnamon stick, bring up to a rapid boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 10 minutes. Toss the cinammon stick, and you now have a glaze for the salmon.

Put the salmon on a grill rack coated with cooking spray, skin side up and broil for 4-6 minutes. Turn the fillets and baste well with the glaze (but save a bit for later). Broil another 4-6 minutes (and hit it with a little more glaze if necessary during this time).

Serve over a bed of brown rice and drizzle (fo shizzle) any remaining glaze into the grains.

Posted Food |