food comas

I had a few friends over for dinner and as usual was looking for a quick recipe to make. I found this on epicurious.com as I do with most recipes. What appealed to me most is how quickly this salmon dish is made. The marinade time is 5 minutes and cooking time less than 10– that’s just incredible! The one disclaimer I have is that if you don’t have the main ingredients traditionally used in Asian cooking – finding them will probably be the most time consuming part of preparing this. Luckily, Jen and I are stocked in everything.

Bulgogi actually means “fire meat” in Korean and refers to cooking marinated beef  (sometimes pork or chicken) over an open flame.  The marinade usually involves soy sauce, sugar, sesame oil, garlic, pepper, etc which are all the ingredients I used to marinate the salmon as well. So while I didn’t grill or cook the salmon over a flame, the marinated essence of the original Korean dish is still there and gave the dish its name.

Salmon “Bulgogi” With Bok Choy and Mushrooms (thanks epicurious.com)

Yields: 4 servings

Ingredients:

• 2 large garlic cloves, peeled, divided
• 1/3 cup chopped green onions
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon Chinese rice wine or dry Sherry
• 1 3/4-inch cube peeled fresh ginger
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 teaspoon Asian sesame oil
• 3/4 teaspoon chili-garlic sauce
• 4 6-ounce center-cut skinless salmon fillets
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 large bok choy, cut crosswise into 1/2-inch-wide strips (about 7 cups)
• 4 ounces fresh shiitake mushrooms, stemmed, caps sliced (couldn’t find shitake, so used another type of mushroom from an Asian market)

Directions:

Blend 1 garlic clove, green onions, soy sauce, rice wine, ginger, sugar, sesame oil, chili-garlic sauce in mini-processor.

Arrange salmon in 11x7x2-inch glass baking dish. Spoon marinade over. Let marinate 5 minutes. Preheat oven to 500°F. Arrange fish, with some marinade still clinging, on rimmed baking sheet. Transfer any marinade in dish to small saucepan. Roast fish until just opaque in center, about 8 minutes. Bring marinade in saucepan to boil; set aside and reserve for glaze.

Meanwhile, heat oil in large nonstick skillet over high heat. Add bok choy and mushrooms; using garlic press, press in 1 garlic clove. Stir-fry until mushrooms are tender and bok choy is wilted, about 4 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. I actually added some sesame-soy marinate just to add a little more flavor and moisture to the vegetables.

Serve salmon over the vegetables and brush with the glaze. Enjoy!