RED CHILE-HONEY GLAZED SALMON WITH BLACK BEAN SAUCE AND JALAPENO CREMA

I’m always looking for new recipes, so I borrowed a cookbook from my daughter, Beth. It’s Bobby Flay’s Mesa Grill Cookbook – Explosive Flavors from the Southwestern Kitchen. Whoa! I cannot wait to try the recipes in this book. And you get to go along for the ride – you just have to cook the food for yourself. But that’s not a bad thing! We can all learn together. So here goes:

We’ve heard over and over that fish is good for us. Well, we live in the landlocked west and it’s hard to get fresh fish, especially any kind of variety. But we can get salmon. And salmon is Good For You. Now we also know that salmon can be pricey so we want to make the most of any meal with salmon. And this recipe fits that description perfectly.

I even happened to have most of the ingredients for this, either on a shelf (dried black beans) or in the freezer (roasted jalapeños, and chiles in adobo sauce). The only thing I didn’t have was the ancho chile powder, which is relatively mild. So I improvised with some chipotle powder, just used a lot less, because it’s relatively spicy. But I love the smoky flavor to the chipotle powder – it’s smoked and dried jalapeño chiles. The salmon can take it.

RED CHILE-HONEY GLAZED SALMON WITH BLACK BEAN SAUCE AND JALAPENO CREMA

These titles to the recipes are a mouthful in themselves. Anyway, this is what Bobby Flay says about this recipe: This dish is a Mesa Grill classic. The rich salmon holds its own beautifully against the big spicy and sweet flavor of the glaze as well as that of the savory black bean sauce. Crema spiked with jalapeños provides the perfect cool finishing touch. 

Black Bean Sauce: Just this alone made the kitchen smell heavenly! In fact, if you used chicken broth, it would be a great soup or black bean burritos!
1 ½ c. dried black beans
1 small red onion, coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled
2 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce, chopped (since these were frozen in a baggie, I just mashed what was in the baggie all to pieces – no sense getting your fingers all messy)
1 tsp. ground cumin (if you don’t have any cumin – get some; this is one of the best smells ever)
Kosher salt

The night before – pick over the beans and discard any stones. Put in a bowl, cover with water, and let soak overnight.

Drain the beans and combine with the onion,

garlic, chipotles, and cumin in a medium saucepan and add just enough cold water to cover by an inch.

Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat and simmer, adding more water if the beans appear dry, until the beans are tender – 1 to 1 ½ hours.

Transfer the mixture to a food processor or blender (in batches if necessary, or use a hand held blender) with a slotted spoon.

Add 1 cup of the cooking liquid and process until almost smooth; the sauce should be a little chunky.

Season with salt. If the sauce is too thick, thin with more of the cooking liquid or water. This can be made up to 4 hours in advance and refrigerated. Reheat before serving.

While the beans are cooking, make:
Jalapeño Crema
½ c. crema, crème fraiche, or sour cream
1 large, or 2 small, jalapeño chiles, roasted, peeled , seeded and chopped (now, I would never disagree with a famous chef’s instructions, but I’m going to now. I never peel a roasted chile. The peel has all sorts of wonderful flavor after being roasted – why throw it away?)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Note: it’s easy to roast a jalapeño or any fresh chile. You can put it on your grill and roast until the skin starts to blacken. Turn occasionally. You can put the chile in a frying pan over high heat, no oil though. It will sizzle and pop and is done when the skin starts to blacken. Turn occasionally. Or you can use tongs and hold the chile over an open gas flame till the skin starts to blacken. Let it cool a bit, then cut in half lengthwise. Scrape out the seeds and proceed.

Combine the crema, sour cream, whatever, and jalapeños in a food processor

and process until smooth. Or you can chop the jalapeños and just stir them into the crema. Season with salt and pepper and refrigerate for 30 minutes before serving. This can be made and refrigerated up to 1 day in advance.

When you’re ready, make:
Red Chile-Honey Glazed Salmon
1/3 c. honey
1 tbs. ancho chile powder
1 tbs. Dijon mustard
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 (8 oz.) salmon fillets, skin on
2 tbs. canola oil
Thinly sliced green onions for garnish

For glaze: whisk together honey, ancho powder and mustard in a small bowl and season with salt and pepper.

Preheat a grill pan or large nonstick sauté pan over high heat. Brush the salmon with oil on both sides and season with salt and pepper. Place the salmon in the pan, skin side down (but mine didn’t have skin on and it was fine) and cook until golden brown and a crust has formed, 3-4 minutes. Brush the top of the salmon with some of the glaze, flip over, and continue cooking until a crust has formed and the salmon is cooked to medium, about 2 minutes more. The salmon will be pink in the center.

Finally: spoon some of the black bean sauce onto 4 plates and drizzle with some of the jalapeño crema. Set the salmon in the center, glazed side up, brush with more of the glaze, and garnish with green onion. And cilantro if you have it, but I didn’t.

Oh, this was good. It's all gone; that's why I say was. I know there are lots of ingredients in this and lots of steps, but it goes together easily. It is WAY delicious. Was way delicious.