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Recipe: homemade salmon lox

It’s my favorite month, you know… birthdays, autumn colors, potential snow storms, fleece weather. A three-day weekend saw August off and welcomed September with sweaty open arms. It always gets hot in early September which merely increases my anticipation of the first frost in the mountains. For the most part, we remained at home and worked through the holiday weekend to avoid the throngs of people flooding into the mountains. Except we did venture down to Denver at the last minute to score a great deal on some season passes for Crested Butte this winter.

sweeeeeeeeeeeeeet

Granted, it is technically summer until September 22nd and I accept this. If summer didn’t have such a bounty of wonderful foods, I’d be a lot less tolerant of the heat. Wild-caught Alaskan salmon graces my fishmonger’s display these days. It’s downright distracting when I’m swinging by to pick up some scallops or shrimp and then these jewel-colored filets or steaks draw my attention to the “sale” sign. Sometimes, I can’t help myself.

salmon, dill, tarragon, bay leaves, shallots, black pepper, green peppercorns, vodka, kosher salt, sugar

I’ve been wanting to cure my own lox for several years now. I’m not sure if I should be happy about finally getting around to doing it or if I should be sad that it took me this long. Part of the problem is that I wanted to use wild salmon rather than farmed salmon. Farmed salmon is available year-round while wild salmon is seasonal. Summers kept slipping past me before I remembered to make lox, and farmed salmon doesn’t really appeal to me these days.

the filet will have pin bones

remove those with some (clean) pliers

What I love about making lox is how easy it is. Aside from finding space in my refrigerator, it was just a bit of chopping, mixing, smothering, and wrapping. Most of the work doesn’t involve you at all.

mix the sugar and salt together

chop the dill

slice shallots

mix the herbs and spices and aromatics together

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Recipe: porcini mushroom quiche

I’m running on fumes here, logging a handful of hours of sleep a night. I think summer is Crazy Time, because there is Just.Too.Much going on. Oh, it’s all good stuff, but it never lets up… until autumn. Early morning is our favorite time to get outside for hiking, biking, trail running. The sun is low and the air is nice and cool (or cold if we’re lucky) and very few people are out and about in the mountains. It’s a great time to see wildlife too, because they tend to be morning types.

cross a lovely mountain stream

visit a nice, cold alpine lake

spot some pretty rose crown (or queen’s crown) blooming in the high country

Afternoons of late have been solely dedicated to food. Some of it is shooting food and most of it is processing the gems of summer for Future Me to cook with and enjoy from October through June.

15 pounds of tomatoes: sauced and diced

You’d think I’d catch a break at night, but that’s the time to catch up on emails, photo processing, computer stuff and other work. But wait! We’ve had a string of awesome nighttime lightning storms marching overhead, dumping rain, and lighting up our skies. Jeremy and I were admiring one such storm Monday night from our deck door (because it’s fun to watch when danger of death is low). I had my camera running on timed, long exposures and caught a few nice strikes.

i just love the squigglies

As the strikes became more frequent and drew closer, I pointed the camera at our local ridge. A few more lightning bolts fired out of my field of view and I questioned my decision to move the camera. Then a giant column of blinding light struck repeatedly for several seconds on the ridge in front of us. It caused us to jump and we both involuntarily closed our eyes because it was so bloody bright! We heard cracking and popping in addition to multiple thunderous booms. I couldn’t see for several seconds, but when I blinked, I could see the negative image of the bolt across my field of view. It saturated my exposure, so I had to crank the processing to tease it out. It was really effing cool.

mother nature, you win

As tired as I am, I’m sad to report that my early mornings spent foraging in the mountains are coming to an end until next summer (I think). I’ll be grateful for the sleep, but will surely miss those treasure hunts with my pal Wendy.

especially when we find beauties like this

So let’s do one last fresh porcini mushroom recipe, shall we? I’ve been wanting to make a quiche with fresh porcinis ever since last summer. The delicate flavor of a fresh porcini profiles nicely with cheeses, dairy, eggs, butter – always with the butter. The majority of you probably don’t have access to fresh porcini and that’s okay. Feel free to substitute another fresh mushroom here. Personally, I’d go for something more exciting than a white button mushroom if you can find it. Just don’t be picking random mushrooms from the ground without knowing 100% for sure 1) what it is and 2) that it is edible and non-poisonous. I’m serious – don’t be stupid or I’ll have to come over and slap you.

the filling: milk, cream, onion, eggs, mushrooms, gruyère, butter, flour, salt, prosciutto

let’s make the crust first: butter, ice water, flour, sugar, salt

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Recipe: green chile sauce

Spring cleaning never happens as it should in the springtime, because I’m busy skiing. Neglected sections of the house are taken care of in fits and spurts of inspiration or at the breaking point of tolerance. Our microwave handle broke off last winter, so we’ve managed by pushing the door up and out without a handle. The gutters need cleaning. Obsolete electronics, #6 styrofoam pieces, and used cooking oil all await the day they will be driven to Boulder to be responsibly recycled. Oh, but I cleaned my refrigerator and freezer this week. That is like a Christmas horror movie of sorts… finding forgotten gems and then finding the REALLY forgotten gems that have evolved hair and legs and personalities of their own. All this to tell you that I unearthed a jar of matcha green tea powder in the freezer. It’s a lovely shade of green and has a wonderfully nutty herbal aroma. It was buried behind the frozen passion fruit pulp and hunks of frozen Virginia ham. I intended to use this instead of the old, tired, faded matcha that was in the cupboards – the one that I used in the green tea crème brûlée recipe. So, sorry about that.

In other news, Kaweah is back to her quirky self aside from what I call her random hot flashes. I think one of the meds gets her pretty hopped up such that she experiences panting episodes from time to time. She behaves the same way when there is raw beef in the kitchen (or anywhere, really).

kaweah checks out the dinner table to see what’s what

Passing storms are a regular occurrence around here in summer and early fall. With our big sky views, we usually see sunshine and rain simultaneously… and that can mean rainbows. I caught this one a couple of weeks ago in Crested Butte that I forgot to share. I swear I’ve seen more rainbows in Crested Butte than anyplace else.

the sky looked like it was glowing

The end of summer becomes of frenzy of favorites. Our local tomatoes are at their peak and the freestone varieties of Colorado peaches arrive at the farmer’s market. I can’t get enough of the sweet corn ears from Olathe, Colorado. For the past few years, Hatch green chiles have found their way from New Mexico into our markets and of course, our hearts (and mouths). It’s to the point where I am turning down offers from various family members to score me several pounds of roasted New Mexico green chiles because I can pick the fresh ones and roast them myself each August. We love them on burgers, in stews, on pizza, and in sandwiches, and so much more.

my first batch of the season

roasting to char the skins

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