My great friend Jess and her husband came to visit and help ring in the new year this past weekend, and when I get to see her I am guaranteed to eat well, talk a LOT, and be left with a sore belly from laughing so hard.  I think you will get the picture...needless to say, we had a great time and came up with some great recipes! 

Jess really challenges my creativity when it comes to cooking because while I tend to rely on cheese and meat to make things really hit the spot, she is lactose intolerant and a vegetarian!  You would think this would ruin a meal for me, but honestly, I am shocked at how delicious our meals always are when we cook together...

The menu for New Year's Eve was Maple Glazed Salmon accompanied by Local Fixin's (which is her new project of bringing local Illinois farm products to the people of Chicago - it consists of black beans, wheat berries and an incredible seasoning mixture) sided with mixed greens tossed in a dijon vinaigrette.  If the picture doesn't cut it (mine never seem to) do yourself a favor and trust me on this one and make this for yourself sometime...DELICIOUS!

Local Fixin's take a bit longer than your average side dish to make, so we started early.  We soaked the black beans and wheat berries in water for about 6 hours.  This sounds time consuming but it's not at all...just takes some good old memory (or your phone alarm).  Seriously though, how hard is it to wake up, cover the dried stuff with water and then not think about it until 2 hours before dinner - piece of cake.

Once those suckers were good and soaked, we rinsed them off and put them into a 6 quart pot with 3.5 cups of water.  Jess was super smart in creating this little goodie jar because the mason jar has measurement lines on it and doubles as your measuring cup - how convenient!

Then we added the contents of the spice pack and stirred.  After bringing this mixture to a boil, we lowered the heat and simmered for about two hours, or until all the water was absorbed.  Again...cake!

While that simmered we cracked open the bottle of vino that she brought us wrapped up in this hilarious little monkey suit...the monkey got a little tipsy too. 

While sipping our monkey wine, we marinated our salmon by combining all the ingredients below and sitting the salmon skin side up in it for about an hour.  If you make this, you should marinate for at least 10 minutes but not longer than an hour or so just in case the vinegar breaks down the salmon.

Maple Salmon Marinade:1/2 cup balsamic
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup maple syrup (thank you Miranda for my New Hampshire Maple Syrup!!)
Dramatic drizzle of olive oil over top everything
S&P

Now for the mixed greens.  We made a simple vinaigrette by mixing up the ingredients below, tasting along the way until it was what we wanted.  Tossed with a bunch of mixed greens, this made a light and easy side for our dinner.

Dijon Vinaigrette:
Two heavy squirts of Dijon mustard
A large splash of apple cider vinegar
Double the amount of vinegar with olive oil
Season with S&P 
Add a dash of maple syrup 

After a few more laughs and a wine refill, we set the oven to broil and took our salmon out of the fridge.  We put the salmon skin side up in a baking dish with about a 1/4 inch of the marinade in the bottom of the pan and broiled for about 10 minutes.  Then we flipped it over and broiled until the salmon turned from shiny orange to matte peach, about 10 more minutes, depending on the size of your salmon pieces.  The top gets a little candied and is delicious! 

While that broiled, we chopped up some fresh ingredients from the fridge to mix with our Local Fixin's.  Here is what we used...   

Black Bean and Wheat Berries with Veggies:
One Jar Local Fixin's (black beans, wheat berries and seasoning)
Carrots, cut real thin for easy eating
Edamame, steamed and removed from pods
Cherry tomatoes, chopped
Sun-dried tomatoes, just a couple, chopped
Red onion, just a touch, finely chopped
A heavy sprinkle of feta cheese for on top

One bottle of wine and lot of good laughs later...everything is ready, monkey man is happy, and we are ready to dig in!  

Cheers to good friends, good food, and monkeys who hide wine bottles!

NOTE: If you aren't able to get your hands on Local Fixin's for yourself, you can try to recreate them by cooking black beans with wheat berries and a combo of dried basil, oregano, marjoram, parsley, dill, mint, onion, black pepper and mustard.   

Still pregnant, and still eating lots of Salmon....this one is more like a sesame ginger soy, similar ingredients but there's more going on here AND lots of scallions.  I LOVE scallions for dipping sauces with seafood.  This would also work well with tuna steaks and say, coconut basmati rice (which is easy to make: just sub some of the water needed for the rice with coconut milk).  Mmmm...

You'll Need:
1 lb - 1 1/2 lbs of salmon
1/4 cup soy sauce (I use low sodium Kikkoman)
3 Tbs vegetable oil
3 Tbs real maple syrup 
1 tsp sesame oil
3 scallions diced up small
juice from 1/2 a lemon
1/4 tsp ginger powder (or you can use fresh)
1 Tbs sesame seeds

To Make:
Whisk all ingredients together in a medium sized bowl.  Then submerge your rinsed and paper-towel-dried (raw) salmon into the bowl of marinade and cover with plastic wrap.  Refrigerate for 2 hrs or so before dinner, or up to a day in advance before baking/grilling with all the marinade juices. 

Notes: When grilling, sometimes I make a little "boat" with a few layers of foil; curling up the edges of the foil so the marinade stays intact and doesn't spill, causing a grill fire.  Yes, I'm speaking from experience... we've had 2!).  You can also freeze the salmon in the marinade for a quick dinner in the future.  Double up a large zip lock bag or use thicker freezer bags and make sure you let the air out as much as possible.  I would let it thaw for a day in the fridge before cooking.  

My husband, like many men, could eat red meat every day of his life. One of his favorites to order is a Flank Steak which I never had tried at home until now. This recipe I found in a grilling book but altered a little and it turned out really really flavorful. My husband didn't say a word through dinner, and then finally with a mouthful I get a "Wow, you are an amazing chef". (blush) However, a warning to you, our breath was on fire afterwards from the garlic! I did have some really fresh garlic so maybe that made the difference, but if you don't like garlic, you can eliminate it in your preparation or just tone it down to one or two cloves. All night I was popping Tums (but I am 7 months pregnant and it doesn't take much to get heartburn these days). So it's a potent sauce, not for the weak at heart, but we both loved it and I'll make it exactly the same next time.

You'll Need:

Flank Steak or Strip Steak for grilling (enough to feed 2-3 people)
1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil
3/4 c. chopped flat-leaf parsley
3 cloves garlic
1/3 c. minced onion
1/2 tsp dry marjoram
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
13/4 tsp sea salt (you can add more to taste later)
1/2 tsp black pepper

Mix all ingredients above (I used a food processor for these pics, but I have done by hand too) and marinate steak in 1/2 the amount of the sauce, while saving the other 1/2 in a bowl set aside.

Marinate for a couple minutes, hours if possible, before grilling steak. I had no time tonight so I made without marinating for long and it was fine.

Grill steak on a high temp setting on the grill and throw away the used marinade (usually grill flank steak about 5-10 minutes each side, depending on thickness and desired temp). Let the steak sit for 5 minutes before cutting and checking it. Then slice it up and when serving, use small individual dipping bowls on the side of everyone's plate for the Chimichurri sauce, if you have them. Enjoy! (If the sauce is a little dry/lumpy, add some more olive oil to the bowls).

I'm pregnant so my fish of choice these days is salmon because of mercury yadda yadda.... I happened to use Wild Alaskan Sockeye when I came up with this marinade so I'm stuck on getting the same now every time I make it. I'm sure it would taste good with other types of salmon, and even other fish like fresh tuna or swordfish.

You'll need:

For the rub:
1 1/2 lbs of salmon fillets
zest from 1 lemon
garlic salt
pepper

Whisk together:
1/3 c. soy sauce (I like Kikkoman low sodium)
1/3 c. (real) maple syrup (if you don't have maple syrup, you could use brown sugar)
1/4 c. vegetable oil

What to do:
Rub the zest, garlic salt and pepper over the rinsed salmon (no need to dry the fish first).
Pour the whisked sauce over top of salmon with rub, cover and put in the fridge for at least 2 hours. If you can let it marinade longer, of course that's better.

When ready to grill, place salmon piece(s) on top of a sheet of foil and throw away the remaining marinade. Place skin side up and grill for 5-7 minutes, then flip carefully and cook another 5-7 minutes or until opaque or to desired temp. I am not a grilling expert but this method of using foil worked for me to avoid a mess on the grill or in a pan. 

Hope you like it!