Grilled Salmon with Melted Tomatoes

We are still avoiding that “first frost”, and I am still harvesting tomatoes from my garden.

Another beautiful fall day here, and I spent the whole day outside cleaning the birdbaths and other miscellaneous garden statuary and putting things away for the winter. I bought a salmon fillet the other day and decided that we should have it for dinner. There were some beautiful tomatoes finishing ripening on the patio table, and I remembered a recipe which I have wanted to try but hadn’t, yet.

I came across this recipe from Food and Wine while flipping through their August issue recently. It seems as though I didn’t have a lot of time this summer to look at my magazines, since there is a rather large pile of them waiting to be read. I should be reading about Thanksgiving recipes, though, so I have to start reading faster I suppose. :)

I first noticed the recipe because of the photo—a large salmon fillet on top of a bed of cooked tomatoes and covered with jalapeno slices. It was beautiful. I have a ton of jalapeno peppers in the garden, lost of fresh tomatoes, and a salmon fillet just waiting to be turned into something wonderful. Sounded like a perfect idea for dinner!

Salmon and tomatoes are a great combination, and this recipe did not disappoint. I did expect much more heat from the jalapenos, but I figure that I took out too many seeds (actually, I took out all of the seeds!). Next time, I will remove maybe half of the seeds and see how that turns out.

And a note to anyone out there who do not like tomato skins (and you know who you are!!!), this is not the recipe for you unless you take the time to skin the tomatoes first. The slow simmering of the tomato chunks separated many of the skins and although I don’t mind the texture it didn’t look particularly appetizing (I picked some out before I took the photo below. Jack is so patient!).

I served with garlic mashed potatoes and green beans (alas, not from the garden).

* Exported from MasterCook *


Grilled Salmon with Melted Tomatoes


Recipe By : adapted slightly from Marcia Kiesel
Serving Size : 5


Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
3 tablespoons olive oil
5 whole jalapenos
2 pounds red ripe tomatoes -- coarsely chopped
32 ounces salmon fillet -- cut into two pieces


Remove stem from jalapenos and slice thinly. For a mild dish, remove all seeds and transfer the pepper "circles" to a plate. The more seeds that are left with the peppers, the hotter the finished dish will be.


In a large, deep skillet heat olive oil. Add the jalapenos in a single layer and cook over moderately low heat without stirring until softened, about 6 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the jalapenos to a small plate and set aside.


Preheat a grill or grill pan.


Add the chopped tomatoes to the skillet and cook over high heat until they release their juices, about 4 minutes. Using a slotted spoon transfer the tomatoes to a bowl, the boil the remaining tomato juices in the pan over high heat or until thickened, adding any additional accumulated juices from the bowl. * Return the tomatoes to the skillet and season with salt.


Rub the salmon on both sides with olive oil, and grill over moderate heat for about 5 minutes, turn carefully with a wide spatula, season with s & p and continue to grill until the salmon is opaque in the center (3-6 minutes, depending on the thickness of the fish).


Toward the end of the grilling time, reheat the tomatoes gently in the pan. Spoon the tomatoes and their juices onto a serving platter, place the salmon fillets on top, and cover the fish with the jalapenos.


Source:
"Food & Wine, August 2010"

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Per serving: 321 Calories (kcal); 15g Total Fat (2g Saturated); (42% calories from fat); 38g Protein; 8g Carbohydrate; 94mg Cholesterol; 137mg Sodium



NOTES : *- I must have used "meatier" tomatoes than the person who developed the recipe because I didn't have a lot of excess tomato juices. The was so little that I decided that they would probably burn in the pan if I tried to reduce them. So I killed that entire step of removing the tomatoes from the pan and reducing the excess juices.