culinary flights of fancy

Home Cooking Adventures in Berkeley Heights


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Wild Caught Alaskan Salmon Poached In Vinho Verde with Garlic Scapes

A good piece of fish should really be celebrated by using simple seasoning and cooking methods so that the beauty of the fish shines through!

A good piece of fish should really be celebrated by using simple seasoning and cooking methods so that the beauty of the fish shines through!

Salmon.Poached.2

Wild Alaskan Salmon Poached In Vinho Verde with Garlic Scapes:

When you have a beautiful piece of fish, you really don’t need to do a whole lot to it.  Rather, restraint is really the rule of the day so that the subtle flavors really shine.  As such, poaching is a great way to cook a special piece of fish.  There’s no browning, crisping the skin, etc.  It’s just a very simple and fairly quick way to prepare the fish, imparting slight flavors from the poaching liquid but really still keeping things simple.  Here, I chose to poach the salmon in a Vinho Verde and I chose it for a couple of reasons.  First, this type of Portuguese wine is relatively inexpensive, which makes it a great choice to use as a cooking wine.  Secondly, it is a young wine that doesn’t have too much complexity in terms of taste.  It just has a nice straight forward taste that has nice acidity.  It’s easy to drink and, when cooking it adds just enough flavor to a dish without completely overpowering the dish.

Garlic scapes, also called garlic shoots, are pretty great.  They look interesting in that they are bright green and have a curly shape.  They possess a garlic flavor that I think is slightly less dramatic than regular garlic cloves.  Scapes can be found right around this time and for a few more weeks moving forward at farmer’s markets and certain specialty stores.  Here, I kept them whole but you can chop them up as finely or as coarsely as you like and you use them just as you would a regular clove of garlic.  Since they are only available for a few weeks, if you find them, I’d suggest stocking up…they freeze pretty well!  Recipe follows after the jump… Continue reading


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Slowly Scrambled Eggs with Spring Onions and Parmesan Reggiano over Wilted Spinach

Creamy scrambled eggs over wilted greens is a quick and easy way to have a meal that tastes great and is easy on the budget.

Creamy scrambled eggs over wilted greens is a quick and easy way to have a meal that tastes great and is easy on the budget.

People often ask me what we normally have for dinner.  We do eat some special meals at home as I experiment around in the kitchen in order to write this column, etc.  However, usually a day to day meal for us really is something simple.  Vegetables, salads, beans, lentils, roasted chicken, and simple egg dishes are all pretty common dinner components during the week.  I love making eggs and breakfast dishes in general for dinner.  It’s usually rather quick from a time perspective and if you purchase good quality eggs from the farmer’s market or the grocery store, they are also quite tasty.  Eggs are also one of the few foods that contain a complete protein.  As an extra bonus, even if you purchase pricier eggs at the farmer’s market, they are still one of the most economical sources of protein available given a dozen eggs will likely yield at least two meals for most and, even if your family is larger and a dozen only works for one meal, $6-$7 for protein is still less than almost any other meal you can make.  Further, there are literally tons of different things you can do with them.

I make eggs for dinner in a number of different ways.  Usually I will fry or poach them.  However, every once in a while, I will slowly cook the eggs, scrambling them as they slowly simmer until they are just a little underdone and still creamy.  Sometimes I leave them as is with just a touch of salt while other times I will add in cheese and other vegetables.  In this case, I added a bit of spring onion at the end of cooking and grated just a touch of parmesan reggiano over the top to finish.  I spooned the eggs over freshly wilted spinach from the farm.  If you wish, you could spoon the eggs and spinach over toasted or grilled bread.  We enjoyed this simple dinner just as pictured.  Recipe follows after the jump… Continue reading