For today's Fit Friday, I'm using up my last Alaskan salmon filet. I absolutely love the color of this salmon. Such a deep, rich red. They are starting to carry Pacific salmon more and more in the grocery stores, I know even right now Costco has Copper River salmon in stock. To me, it smells less fishy, it's more dense, and THAT COLOR! Bright foods just make me happy.
I've really been craving some sushi lately, but this is not sushi grade fish. So I had to improvise. I knew I had to cook it. And one of my favorite sushi rolls has a small slice of lemon on top of it. Yes, you eat the lemon! It is so refreshing. So I cut up the salmon into nice big chunks, placed a small, thin wedge of lemon in between each piece of fish. But, it was missing something - a vegi. Asparagus! Bright colors! I took half a bunch, chopped it up into 1 inch pieces and blanched them, then threw them in between each section of fish and lemon. Oh holy smokes.
To finish off the kabobs, Eel Sauce. And sushi rice! Sushi rice is really simple to make. I just cooked it in my rice cooker, then threw a few tablespoons of rice vinegar in with it and tossed it. One thing, make sure you add an extra 1/4-1/2 cup of water to the rice to make sure it's sticky. And the Eel Sauce was the finishing touch. While I was cooking it, K1 came running down the stairs yelling, "Sushi! Sushi!"
Grilled Salmon Sushi Kabobs
with Eel Sauce
Ingredients:
Kabobs:
1 large salmon filet, about 2 pounds, cut into 1" cubes
2 lemons
1/2 bunch asparagus spears, cut into 1 inch pieces
Salt
Rice
Rice Vinegar
Eel Sauce:
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup mirin
1/2 cup sugar
Directions:
1. Soak 8-10 kabob skewers in cold water for 1 hour to prevent skewers from burning.
2. Make the eel sauce. Combine the soy sauce, mirin, and sugar in a small saucepan. Whisk to combine and dissolve the sugar. Cook over medium heat for 20 minutes, whisking frequently, then remove from heat. Set aside to cool off.
3. Make rice according to package instructions, adding another 1/2 cup of water. When all water has cooked off, remove rice from heat and add 1-2 Tbs. of rice vinegar. Fluff with a fork to incorporate vinegar.
4. Blanch asparagus - bring a pot of water to a boil, add asparagus to water and leave for 1-2 minutes, then immediately place in ice water to stop cooking.
5. Cut one of the lemons into quarters and thinly slice each quarter. Thread kabobs - salmon, lemon slice, asparagus piece, and repeat. Repeat with remaining skewers until all ingredients are used.
6. Preheat grill over medium high heat. Sprinkle salt and squeeze juice from remaining lemon onto kabobs and place onto greased, hot grill. Cook for 5 minutes, then turn kabobs and cook for another 5 minutes. Rotate again if needed in order to cook salmon through.
7. Serve kabobs with rice and drizzled with eel sauce.
Serves 4
