Yesterday, we took a hike
along the Elwha River Trail.
We
didn't get really far, but we did get to our favorite overlook between
the two canyons on the route to Lilian Camp. This might not have been
much of a hike by some people's standards, but we were tired enough
after two and a half hours on the trail and an overall climb of about
950 feet.
Needless to say, by we
were hungry on the drive home, so we planned to drop by the Safeway and
get ourselves the fixings for a steak hash. We turned down Lincoln and
there we saw our answer, right in the Rite Aid / Goodwill parking lot.
The Rite Aid and the Goodwill thrift shop share a huge parking lot, and
often there will be someone in a van or pickup truck selling stuff at
the far end. Sometimes they are selling firewood. Others sell flowers
or
fruit, today, there was a group selling salmon.
"SALMON", the sign screamed at us. We slammed on the brakes and turned
in.
"What kind of salmon do you have?", we asked.
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The blue and green light of the Elwha River Trail is something special.
It's like an Impressionist painting.
We decided to experiment with our Sebsoft
Impressionist special effect for iMovie. Click on the picture
above for the Quicktime
movie.
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"We've got some silvers and
also some king."
"King salmon, we'll take some of that."
"We caught them yesterday out near Neah Bay."
The next thing you know we were poking around in the ice chest on the
back of the truck and breathing in the salty scent of the sea. Fresh
fish doesn't smell like fish. It smells like the sea.
"Wow, that's a big one", we remarked pointing at what seemed the Moby
Dick of salmon.
"That's the one everybody is asking what it weighs."
"Let's find out."
It weighed in at 13 1/2 pounds. It was quite a fish. We paid up and
raced home. Safeway could wait.
While the grill heated up we took the last three of Nash Huber's
nectarines we had on the counter, all eight of our Shiro plums from our
dwarf trees, a few of our pie cherries, two medium onions, chopped, a
whole bunch of Nash's coriander, some salt, some pepper and a couple of
teaspoons a five spice powder, and we stuffed them into the boned fish.
(We removed the spine and most of the bones ourself. It's hard to bone
a fish on the back of a truck).
We wrapped the fish in aluminum foil and popped it on a hot fire. We
were worried that the fire might be too hot, but the fish could take
it. The skin and flesh merged to form a sort of crackling layer which
was absolutely scrumptious.
We flipped the fish over after 25 minutes. It was quite a struggle. It
weighed at least ten pounds without the head and tail, but we did it.
The fire was cooler now, so we let the fish cook another 40 minutes. It
was perfectly done. Even the onions in the middle were cooked. It was
amazingly good. There is nothing quite like fresh salmon and a tart
fruit based stuffing.
We had it with New Zealand spinach from the Farmer's Market, but that's
another story. |
