Crispy salmon with speckled kale, tomatoes, garlic and aioli with asparagus

Dinner with my flatmate and good friend Johnny, had to run outside to shoot and just caught the end of day light and dinner wasn't so cold! The photo has some orange toes in it, a bit quirky I liked the contrast. (that's what food photographer joshua dasey has taught me and helped me with understanding the art of food styling :)

We have just started watching the organic food special on Insight, what a bummer they don't have any cutting edge interesting farmers/ producers on board and it's disappointing and boring. Let's talk about sustainable and local produce, I wonder what Alice Waters would have to say ?


This is basically everything I had left in the fridge and I'm lucky because the dish just came together and was very yummy!


300g Australian salmon
1 bunch kale ( i got this unusual bunch from the farmers markets it is light green flecked with white, very stunning)
2 cloves garlic, finely diced
1 tablespoon clarified butter
1 packet baby tomatoes
1 bunch asparagus
Aioli to serve


Heat butter in fry pan or saute garlic, add tomatoes cook for 2 minutes add kale and cook for further 2 minutes,

Set aside

Season skin of salmon with sea salt and pepper, cook quick and on a high temperature to crisp up skin, turn over cook for another 5, best to serve med - rare.

Blanch asparagus and serve on a plate with salmon and vegetables

Bon apetite

Clarified butter

2 sticks butter (organic I used a NZ brand organic valley, not bad produces a quality ghee/clarified butter)

Put butter in saucepan, turn the heat up to bring to a slight bubble, then turn down for 20 minutes, you can thrown in garlic, leek, chili, cinnamon if you want something different which is how the Ethiopians make there ghee.

Clarified butter and ghee is really the same thing just different names for different cultures.

It is super healthy and keep food at a stable temperature when cooking, it adds a delicate flavour to a dish.

Simple Ingredients part two the meal.

The finished simple ingredients.

Ten minutes is all it took for this yummy lunch

Simple Ingredients

Saturday lunch before work.


Bunch asparagus (currently in season and great deals around, I got 3 bunches for $10)

Angus beef scotch fillet (grass fed, so delicious - look at that fat marbling)

Mushrooms

Worcestershire sauce

Cream

Clarified butter

Sea salt and pepper


Ok so this is how I like to cook, 3-4 simple ingredients, let the food speak for itself.

Take fry pan and put in a tablespoon clarified butter.

Saute mushrooms for 3 minutes

Add scotch fillet 2 minutes each side (should be blood)

Pour in 3-4 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce and some cream

Season with salt and pepper

Blanch asparagus 30 seconds.

Serve on a white plate, make it look beautiful.

Who would believe I was a vegetarian for ten years! this is what happens when you have butchers in your family, you go back to your roots.

Please use only excellent quality meat, make friends with your local butcher, try unusual cuts. Don't buy your meat from Woolworths or Coles, buy it fresh if preferable just killed and carved.

Check out Grassroots Butcher if your on the Eastside of Sydney (Vaucluse)