Grilled Salmon with Thai Vegetable Salad
Serves 6
This is a bright, attractive and flavorful dish from Restaurant Biga back in the early 90s. The salad isn't actually Thai in any discernable way, but it is crunchy and delicious. With the tangy grilled salmon, it makes a beautiful entree for a summer dinner.
The final dish comes together in a snap, but make sure you’ve done your prep work: blanch the asparagus, julienne the vegetables, make the dressing, fry the won-tons and noodles, etc.
Ingredients #
- 1 recipe Sesame Ginger Dressing
- 6 (4 oz) salmon filets
- 1 cup julienned shiitake mushrooms
- 6 cups shredded fresh spinach
- 1 cup chopped roasted cashews
- 1/2 cup chopped shallots
- 1/2 cup julienned red bell pepper
- 1/2 cup julienned yellow bell pepper
- 1 cup julienned carrots
- 1 cup julienned English cucumber
- 1 cup julienned asparagus, lightly blanched
- 1/4 package wonton skins, cut into 1/4-inch strips and fried in hot oil until crispy, drained carefully
- 1 1/2 ounces (1/6th of a 10 ounce package) rice stick noodles fried in hot oil until crispy and puffed, drained carefully
Instructions #
In a glass baking dish or large resealable plastic bag, marinate the salmon in 2/3 cup of the Sesame Ginger Dressing for 1 hour (but no more — acid marinades can ruin fish).
Remove fish from marinade and cook on a grill or sear in a heavy skillet over high heat until barely soft to the touch, about 4 minutes per side. Set aside and keep warm.
In a small skillet, sautee the shiitakes over medium heat in 2 tbsp of the dressing until warmed through. In a large bowl, combine the mushrooms with spinach, cashews, shallots, bell peppers, carrots, cucumber and asparagus. Toss with 1 cup of dressing until everything is well-coated.
Right before serving, toss in the wonton crisps and rice noodles (these will get soggy if you do this ahead of time).Arrange the salad on 6 plates and top with the salmon. Drizzle a spoonful of dressing over each salmon piece and serve.