Walking the Plank

As we mentioned last week, Pam and I recently joined a cult. By this, of course, I mean that we purchased a Big Green Egg, which is the modern, expensive version of the ancient kamado ceramic oven. We can justify the purchase in a couple of ways. First, we treat our regular grills like crap, so they do not last all that long. This egg cost only a little bit more than a lifetime of cheap grills. So we are being thrifty and saving resources. Plus, we can cook outside with better results than our electric oven inside, avoiding the cost of both a convection oven and central air. Finally -- and this is the only excuse that makes any sense -- we will amortize this purchase over the creation of many meals. In one week, we have completed three meals, with a fourth planned tomorrow.

For today's effort, we ventured into a couple of new areas, the most important one being planking. This is the somewhat trendy notion of cooking one's food on a piece of wood over an open fire. Apparently, if the wood itself is expensive, it works fine. And since it all happens inside a ceramic egg, it can be done without actually holding a fire extinguisher.

The recipe we chose was Cedar-Planked Salmon with Honey Glaze, available in our new Big Green Egg Cookbook (told you it was a cult) or conveniently on the web site. There is nothing much to report here by way of recipe innovation -- we are still new to this creature and tend to do exactly what we are told. So even the marinade is exactly as described.

I did have some fun with the pre-flame show, though. Of course one soaks the planks in water (or perhaps beer or wine), but I had some concerns, which I shared with the world on Facebook.

Submerge for one hour before use. 
Btw, they float. #bluesclues #sinkfloat#whalinghouse

I thought of trying to find a #rockorsomething (that is an old MRE joke), but instead found a heavyish little bowl, with character.

Problem solved#planksitter

The results compare favorably with the publisher's photograph, I think. Dappled late-afternoon light certainly helped. Caveat: this was my first time planking, and I pulled out just a bit prematurely, so we had to microwave for 45-60 seconds.

Shown with the salmon is Pam's caprese salad (aka, tomato, mozz, olive oil, balsamic, helping us to look forward to many more capreses as the summer brings ever-better tomatoes.

We loved this meal and were lucky enough to pair it with this blackberry wine from Plymouth Bay Winery.

The vintner lists salmon as one of this fruit wine's pairings, made even more appropriate by the one recipe modification we did make. Pam recommended a blackberry-ginger balsamic in the glaze; otherwise, we might never have chosen such a sweet wine.