FoodieChat

Soooo sorry for the shameful 2 month absence!  Foodiechat had an unexpected whirlwind of a month at work, no fun  Well it’s over now, and it’s Christmas Eve – I thought I should share what we’re having!  First Christmas lunch was a couple of weeks ago, and thanks to my friends, I got free reign on the menu – yay! Thanks for trusting me guys! I’ve ALWAYS wanted to cook a whole salmon on the BBQ, and yay, 14 people meant there were enough people for it!

First up, I bought this lovely fella – it was $15 a kg and this guy was 3kgs.  He was really gross to touch though

I thought it was great value, as the salmon is already gutted, so you’re really eating pretty much all of it except the head and the spine!  First, wash him and then pat dry with a paper towel.  Next, stuff his belly with fronds of dill and parsley, and some lemon slices.  Then, rub him all over with olive oil and season with salt and pepper.  Wrap tightly in foil – double layers – and oops, I was lazy and didn’t grease the top layer of foil, thinking the oil on the fish was enough to make it non stick. So, the skin came off, oops  Nevermind.  Put the whole wrapped parcel on your barbeque on medium heat.  And cook it for 30 –  40 minutes.  It’s cooked if you stab through it and your skewer or knife goes through easily  This is what he looked like when we unwrapped it.

And after we ate the top layer, between 14 of us, we only ate 3/4 of the fish!  It was totally cooked to perfection.  One second more and it wouldn’t have been so perfect. Thumbs up guys! It was soo silky and delicate.  Highly recommend this for your Christmas table!

As if that wasn’t enough, Cecilia also cooked a pork roast.   Salt the skin and leave it overnight in the fridge to dehydrate and you’ll have the most perfect crackling.

Some vegetable is required – and the grilled capsicum and green zucchinis definitely suited the occasion with their very Christmassy colours!

My plate – a bit piggy? We also had chargrilled prawns and a rocket salad with pear, walnuts and pancetta.

After a couple of hours rolling around the floor in pain from over indulging, our bellies made some room for dessert which came in the form of chocolate tart . The recipe is the Matt Moran one from masterchef.  I added some of the extra roasted walnuts on top, but really I was lazy, I should have made them into praline, but I was in my food induced coma

And the slightly lighter option was creme caramel.  It’s just eggs, sugar and milk – how healthy is that?  I was very pleased with this one, using full cream milk absolutely makes a difference as it makes a more substantial custard.   Loved it!

And to wash it all down – sangria!  I had a few glasses of this, sooo easy to drink!!

Thanks for reading me guys, have a wonderful Christmas! And let me know what’s on your Christmas table this year

Foodiechat xoxo

This entry was posted on Friday, December 24th, 2010 at 8:52 pm and is filed under Recipes, Seafood, Special occasion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.