Christmas in Bondi, hell yeah!
Alright welcome to a Bondi Harvest Aussie Christmas
There's no silly sweaters, there's no snow, it's all sun, salt, ocean and sea food.
Man what a day!
Lunch is going to be hot smoked salmon
on the rocks
win, win, win and win.
Alright Food Tube welcome to Bondi and welcome to a Bondi Harvest Christmas.
I mean look at this, white sand, there's no silly sweaters, there's no snow, you name it this is all about the ocean.
So we're doing a hot smoked salmon so that's going to be cured first
we are going to serve it for lunch but it's actually perfect to be served in the middle of your dining table
for Christmas dinner so it is really simple, it's really tasty. If I can do it on a beach you'll have no problems doing
it at home.
That's local Arthur, he's a mad spear fisherman, forager.
Merry Christmas, ho ho ho!
So we've cured our salmon, and we've cured them in our Christmas spices.
So I've gone half sugar, half salt, then we've gone some cinnamon, vanilla, star anise , cloves, nutmeg and
some orange. So all those beautiful Christmas spices, a celebration.
So we mix them together in a mortar and pestle
and then we'll rub that curing mixture over the salmon and put it in the fridge for 12 hours.
Then you'll wash it off and get rid of all that salt and all that sugar and it's just about flavour
and all that flavour is imparted in to this awesome salmon.
So what happens when you cure things like salmon, it's not just about the flavour it's also
it sort of kind of cooks it, so the sugar and the salt actually draw liquid out of the proteins which
in return dries them out and cooks them.
So that liquid has been drawn out and the flavours gone in to it.
It's just an amazing process.
Ok look I know what you're thinking, smoking is quite hard, I can't do smoking
so I'm going to show you a really easy way, we're doing it on the beach, it's just a camp stove
you can use your stove at home, you don't need a proper bbq, you don't need proper equipment
it's a little bit make shift but it works so well and smells and tastes amazing.
I've got 2 trays, one tray for the wood chips
that goes on the stove
I've got another tray / a bit of mesh that you sit on top
fish goes on, wrap it in foil and cook it
so that's another mate Dane, he's got an epic blog, facebook, youtube, a chef
just an all round nice bloke, basically the better looking version of me
Merry Christmas guys!
well I'm going to cook this up
you guys want to come over for a fee when it's ready?
it will be done in about 20 minutes, I'll give you a holla
I'm gonna slice my salmon up and we're gonna get it smoking
so I'm just gonna top and tail it just to clean it up
so just a nice big slice, this has been cured so you can actually eat this raw right now
this would be just an awesome sort of gravlax or cured salmon dish
slice it and splay it out with some squeeze of lemon and capers
oh my god
these recipes are just getting better and better
so i've kept the skin on and you put skin side down towards the smoke so that skin will be cupping all that heat
and it means that the skin protects it a little bit so that you still have like a tender, opaque, beautiful smoke and balanced flavours
you don't want to over cook it, you don't want to kill it and it won't stick in the tray then
see it's starting to smoke now
straight up okay, so once it starts to smoke just turn it down a little bit
and then wrap it up in foil and catch that smoke okay
you wanna catch it so just rap it up in foil or just put your lid on from your wok
if you're using like wood chips, a wire wrack and a wok
just put your lid on and that's it, it's doing its thing now, I don't have to worry about that it's ready to go
it's that simple
so that's going to take about 20 minutes okay so what I do is as soon as it comes to a heat
as soon as it starts to smoke, salmon goes in, I turn it down, leave it for 20 minutes
and this is about a kilo worth of salmon there and then after 20 minutes I turn it off
and just let it sit and let it rest and let it take in a little bit more of that smoke before I eat it
Okay so while that's doing its thing we're going to make an awesome salsa, so it's going to be like
summer mangos, I'm going to do some chargrilled corn, it's going to have some mint
so it's going to be a mix of again that smokey, sweet, acidic flavour
we're going to do a really quick pickled cucumber as well so let's get doing that
we're going to g with some apple cider vinegar, a little bit of honey and then we're going to infuse that with some ginger
and some star anise
so what you're gonna want to do is melt your honey and your vinegar over a little bit of heat so you're just warming it up
and then you dice up the cucumbers and dump it in, it's that simple
so that's what we're after, just nice lightly charred
okay so always working on a flat surface, we're going to cut this in half just so I can get back into the kitchen at home with all my fingers
and just run your knife down those colonels and then just follow that line, use it as a guide
get them all off and into a bowl
now all we need to do is finish off and put the salsa together
so we got our corn, got our pickled cucumbers, we're going to add some avocado, some mint and some mango
we're going to dice these up and throw them in, mix them together and then we're going to eat that salmon because that's ready to go
avocado, just going to run our knife around it, twist it open, I might just use half an avocado
I'm going to cut him in half again into quarters and then just peel that skin off
How good is a good avocado
it's the best
run your knife down, put them back together and then just dice him
whole mint leaves, 1 cheeky mango
just run your knife down there
flat surface, I like to skin it
if you've got a spoon you can spoon it out too
but I like to do it this way, just seem to get more flesh
okay so these pickled cucumbers have macerated, I suppose they're not fully pickled
so they're not preserved, it's more about getting that acid and that flavour in there which is going to dress the salad
with the dressing get some in on top of the mango and then mix this up
with that acid, the lemon and the honey from the pickled cucumbers
okay so what we're going to do is, we're going to serve this salsa and this awesome smoke salmon with some lettuce cups
like a sanctuary bali style theme
if you were at home with a big sort of dinner table for christmas, I'd just leave the whole salmon whole
and I'd let people make their own way with it, you know pull it apart, serve it with bread, eat it with their turkey
it's like make your own story
so we'll just turn that heat off and that's pretty much all the cooking done
oh yeah!
this looks so good
it smells great doesn't it, very carefully into a board like that
some lettuce cups on the side, so I'm just going to slice the end off that
and pick off the sweet, center bits of this
look at that, bit of salsa in the lettuce cup, mango, mint
here you are bud have a go of that
oh my god
go on go for it, grab mine
there we go hot smoked salmon, Bondi Harvest, Bondi Aussie style Christmas
it doesn't get much better does it?
not at all
alright we're just winning, yea I know right
alright guys thanks for watching, make sure you check out all the other epic Food Tube christmas recipes
and make sure you check out Bondi Harvest
go for a swim, thanks for watching and we'll see you next year!
Whoo! Merry Christmas!