salmon trim “burgers” with thai basil and chilies

I had planned to write a fat, juicy post about salmon when the season got underway, but now that it has been canceled up most of the West Coast, the wind is out of my sails. Alaskan Chinook is still available (at a eye-popping premium), and some places in Washington are still allowed to fish, but our salmon-lite fish markets look pretty sad.

So here’s a quick primer on West Coast salmon. Cook’s Illustrated devoted a text box to salmon types recently, but spent a disproportionate time discussing Atlantic salmon, which, quite frankly, doesn’t hold a candle to the Westside. We don’t eat Atlantic farmed salmon here in the PNW. And we also wish Cook’s Illustrated would get a West Coast correspondent, because they’re way too Eastside to be helpful for many product articles. Anyhoo.

Here are the major Pacific salmon you can buy at a decent fish market in Eugene:

• Chinook or King. Dark pink, moist, fatty, large flakes. Delicious and mildest.
• Sockeye. Red. Smaller flakes, strong salmony taste, small flakes. Can be dry.
• Coho or Silver. Orange-red. Milder than Sockeye but not as lovely as Chinook.

Each of these salmon have slightly different seasons, and are available frozen or fresh, with corresponding prices, and from a number of different places. There’s also Chum or Dog, which apparently can be like Chinook if you get it from the Yukon River in Alaska; Pink, of which a large proportion is used for canning commercial tuna, and Steelhead, which is not a salmon at all but is red-pink like one and still rather tasty.

But the salmon we’ve been eating, thanks to our budget? Chinook salmon trim from Newman’s, at $5.99 a pound. Trim is the little bits and pieces that are trimmed off when making the fillets look pretty. One can use trim for omelets, quiches, curries, and salmon burgers. Since you can only buy nasty Atlantic farmed salmon at large chain grocery stores that price, it’s quite a deal.

Not being much of a salmon burger person but liking the concept, I transformed one of my favorite salmon recipes into a salmon patty topping. Kasma Loha-Unchit, a Thai cooking instructor and cookbook author, has a beautiful recipe for Wok-tossed Salmon with Chilies and Thai Basil in her seafood cookbook, Dancing Shrimp: Favorite Thai Recipes for Seafood. She cuts the salmon in chunks, then stirfries them with a mix of red and green chilies and a big handful of Thai basil. I still don’t have my kitchen hood installed, so stirfrying is a pain, so I baked the salmon whole instead and it was wonderful (and less fattening). I amended her recipe by adding a few more vegetables: notably arugula, since I didn’t have enough Thai basil, and a handful of winter cherry tomatoes. The arugula and cherry tomatoes worked really well to capture the sauce and add sour, bitter undertones, so I left them in the final recipe. They aren’t in the least bit authentic, but I think they add something to the dish.

If you have the funds and no salmon crisis, the Thai basil and pepper topping works wonderfully on a large fillet of salmon, or on smaller pieces for individual servings. You can grill the salmon or bake it, as I did here. Sockeye works particularly well for this recipe, as it is darker and stronger in flavor than Chinook.

But we have neither funds nor happy salmon. The picture above is an adaptation for salmon burgers. I formed one pound of raw salmon trim into four “burgers” and baked at 425 for about 10 minutes. Served cold the next day over arugula with nothing more but a squeeze of lemon and the basil chili sauce, my “salmon burgers” make a fine summer luncheon dish, too.

The roasted chili paste is crucial for this recipe. You can make your own or buy it in Eugene at Sunrise Asian market. If you can’t find it, you should be able to find Thai red curry paste, which is a completely different flavor, but still good.

Salmon with Thai Basil and Chiles

Serves 2

(adapted from Kasma Loha-Unchit’s recipe)

(A)
1 lb. salmon fillet, either left whole or sliced into two serving portions
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes (crummy winter ones ok)
1/4 cup white wine, chicken stock, or water

(B)
1/4 thinly sliced red onion
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 T. chopped shallots or the white bottoms of scallions
1/2 red and 1/2 green jalapeno, or use 1/4 red and 1/4 green bell pepper, or some combination thereof

(C)
2 t. dark soy sauce
1 T. fish sauce
1 t. roasted chili paste (substitute Thai red curry paste)

(D)
1/2 cup or more chopped Thai basil
1 cup chopped arugula or spinach
1/2 cup scallions, cut in 1/2-inch slices

Brush salmon with oil and sprinkle with a bit of fish sauce and white pepper. Add a 1/4 cup white wine or some stock or water for moisture. Add cherry tomatoes, whole. Roast the salmon at 400 degrees, covered, until center is cooked through.

*For the salmon patty adaptation, use 1 lb. of salmon trim. Form into four patties. Slick Pyrex pan with oil, then place patties in pan and season with white pepper and fish sauce. Add cherry tomatoes. Roast at 425 degrees for about 10 minutes. The time greatly depends on the size and content of fish trim in the patties, so check for doneness after 8 minutes.

While salmon is roasting, prepare prep dishes with ingredients in (B), (C) and (D) separately.

Remove the salmon from the oven when done. Add the tomatoes to the sauce in (C), smushing them into the sauce. They’ll add some texture and bitterness to the final dish.

Quickly stirfry (B). Add (C) and let flavors meld for a moment, then add (D). Wilt the greens, pour over waiting salmon, and serve immediately.

 

purple varnish clams, part deux

I was unprepared for the deep purple insides. These little ladies are stunners. They also taste quite good. In the batch of 36, we had only three that were duds. After soaking them in salt water overnight, I rinsed them and refrigerated them today. They could have used more careful soaking, as they were still sandy. The guide suggested leaving them in a mesh bag in the salt water soak, and flipping the bag every couple of hours. I think I’ll try that next time.

To cook the purple varnish clams, I simply steamed them in about 1/2 cup of local Riesling, a couple of teaspoons of preserved lemon juice (lemon juice would do), a couple healthy shakes of dried thyme, a few garlic cloves and pepper. I removed the clams as they popped open in their bathtub, and we ate the whole bowl for dinner. I accompanied the clams with steamed broccoli, a tossed green salad with garbanzos, local beets, and feta, plus an appetizer of Moroccan carrot purée and pita bread. The clams are absolutely delicious!

 

purple varnish clam-digging

We went clam-digging this morning with our local Slow Food chapter in Siletz Bay on the north Oregon coast. Poor Retrogrouch (his choice of nickname) was not happy about throwing down cold and wet in the early morning, and I was feeling a rather vile case of nausea because of the car ride and an upset tummy, so we weren’t the friendliest companions, but the Slow Food Willamette Valley Convivium was indeed convivial, and our guide showed us how to get our limit (36 apiece) of the taste-invasion invasive species nuttallia obscurata, or purple varnish clam.

The purple varnish clam was introduced on Oregon beaches from Japan, they say, in the 1990s. It is 2-3 inches in diameter, flat, has a soft, thin shell that peels a bit (hence, varnish) and is brownish-mahogany on the outside and purple on the inside. It’s a pretty little creature, and plentiful, since it is doing its devious business invading the coast. Supposedly, they’re almost as delicious as razor clams.

Here are some things you might not know about clam-digging, try as you google might. The people who write information about such things are usually old, seasoned men, so they leave out crucial information for those of us who have less seasoning and the non-mutant gender.

If you decide to go clamming in Oregon, you’ll need a license, and it will cost you $6.50, but each person in your party needs to show their face to the licensing folks, so don’t think you can you pick up licenses for the whole party. They have licenses (and apparently rental tools) at various locations along the coast, and at [G. I.] Joe’s in Eugene.

Buy a clamming shovel (see pics), which has more flexibility than a clam tube from what I can tell. I think that if you’re digging other kinds of clams, such as the fast-moving razor, this advice might change, but it’s still a good idea to have a long, narrow shovel, especially if you’re only going to get one tool.

There’s no “assisted clamming,” which is really a stupid rule. It means that two people can’t help each other dig the same hole and put clams in the same bag/bucket. So you need a bag/bucket for each person. It’s OK to share the same digging tool, as long as you dig separate holes on your own.

They sell small mesh drawstring laundry bags at the dollar store, or, at the four-dollar store (i.e., Walmart). The four-dollar version is a real clamming bag, which resembles the laundry bag but has an approx. 8-in. diameter metal circle that keeps the mouth of the bag open, and a clip that you can use to clip the bag to your belt so you don’t lose it in, say, a sneaker wave. I think mesh bags are the way to go, much easier to use than a bucket, especially if you have to bring one for each member of your family.

I am very, very thankful I brought a small cooler with a couple of ice packs thrown in and some extra plastic bags. We put the sandy, full mesh bags of clams in a plastic bag, then in the cooler. No sand anywhere, and we didn’t worry about the clams in the car. And we’re really glad we had an extra garbage bag for our wet, sandy clothes.

Our friendly guide, Bill Lackner, distributed literature that said that “rubber gloves are optional.” Yeah, if you don’t mind breaking a nail or two (which I did). I located one nitrile garden glove, but a leftie, so I was only half-protected. I think, actually, that nitrile garden gloves are perfect for clamming, since you still can feel with the tips of your fingers. It helps when you’re digging down into the hole if you can feel the clams. Digging with your bare hands makes for some mighty cold hands, and the saltwater did a number on my skin. Beware.

If you have waterproof pants or waders, by all means bring them, because you’ll get wet and from your knees down (and your elbows down).

I’m purging the clams now in saltwater with a couple of cloves of garlic. Will report back on how they taste!