Gravlax with Mustard Sauce

Let me start this off by saying that Ina really missed an opportunity here. She always wants you to use “the good” whatever - the good vanilla, the good olive oil, the good truffle butter, etc. But this gravlax recipe called for “center-cut fresh salmon fillet” with no qualifications - she doesn’t say that it can’t be farmed or that it has to be from Alaska. I mentioned already that I’m not a connoisseur of wine. As a lifelong Alaskan only recently transplanted into the south, I *am*, however, a connoisseur of salmon. I cannot tell you how many times I have made salmon since moving here and had dinner guests be like, “Why is ya’ll’s salmon so red?” And I’m like, “You guys, it is supposed to be red if it’s a red salmon...and the proper way to address a group of people is ‘you guys’.”

Anyway, I one-upped Ina in pretentiousness and pulled out some of my personally-caught Alaskan salmon from the freezer to thaw. I made half of it for dinner (from another Ina recipe, not for the blog, omg I have a problem), set the other half aside for the gravlax and when I needed weight to put on top of the fish, all I could find in the pantry was jars of more salmon. Dan declared this to be “meta”. I’m getting ahead of myself. Before I could start any of this, I had an Item Quest. One would assume that, in this instance, the Item Quest would be palatable salmon. But actually, white peppercorns were the elusive necessity here. After scouring the supposedly alphabetical spice aisles of The Kroger and Fresh Market, I didn’t feel like making any more stops and I one-click ordered them from Amazon Prime while in the queue with whatever else we were buying from Fresh Market. (I think that day it was queso because Dan wanted it, but some organic brand because it was Fresh Market, and it ended up being disgusting so stick to Tostitos brand. Do not attempt to buy The Good Queso.)

Okay, so, this is not a mortar and pestle, nor is it really an adequate spice grinder:

I forged ahead, however, because it was like 10 PM and I was not about to go on a quest for a mortar and pestle, especially not after wasting approximately fifteen minutes in a futile attempt to sweep up the peppercorns that flew everywhere when I opened the 2 oz package. I got them ground up well enough, along with the fennel seed, and mixed them into my salt and sugar. Got all those spices all over that salmon, then told Siri to set a reminder on my phone to “turn my salmon” because you’re supposed to flip it every twelve hours and baste it with the juices that collect. It kinda made me wonder what someone would make of that if I were to die and they were to find my phone. I imagine most people’s reminders are like, “Doctor appointment” and “Child has soccer game”...what did she mean by “turn the salmon”??? Is this some kind of code???

This was all on Monday night, and this morning, I woke up and went over to Fresh Market again for some pumpernickel bread, for serving. I whisked up the accompanying mustard sauce, spread it on the bread, topped it with the salmon, and gave it a try. I was pleasantly surprised at how well the dark, rich pumpernickel accompanied the salmon. The mustard sauce tasted a little odd to me because of the sugar therein, but it wasn’t gross. I guess I’m just used to cream cheese.

If you’ve wondered at all what the difference is between “lox” and “gravlax” is, it’s okay, I did too so I Googled it. “Lox” appears to be a generic term, whereas “gravlax” is particularly Scandinavian, and  the “grav” part is in reference to the fact that it was, at one time, buried for the duration of the curing process. Gravlax, also, is characterized by a saltier flavor rather than a smokey one - gravlax does not involve any smoking.

In preparation of offering this to those who will inevitably be frequent taste-testers of these recipes - my coworkers - I polled most of them to see if they were familiar with this as a food. Only one person I asked in my office had ever eaten salmon this way. I am accustomed to people refusing to eat things they’ve never heard of, particularly if those things are raw, so I wasn’t optimistic when I brought it in. I was pleasantly surprised! Within minutes, my one fellow northerner had been followed by five or six others to my desk in anticipation of a new recipe experiment to try and I had a little Emeril Live thing going on at my desk, spreading bread with mustard sauce and salmon and passing it out on little plates. The verdict from the office is that the gravlax is *delicious*; I underestimated people’s openness to new foods and could have brought at least another pound and it would all have been eaten. Alas, I gave away the rest to a friend who expressed love for lox - I wanted at least one taste taster that was sure to approve. I’m calling this one a win, though Ina really needs to fly to Alaska, dipnet in freezing cold water, and gut and fillet her own salmon because store bought is not fine.