Cycle 3 – Item 199

22 (Sun) July 2012

Salmon Steak in Aioli

3.5

by me

at home

-Oksu, Seongdong, Seoul, Republic of Korea-

with W and DJ

Aioli is a French/Spanish/Mediterranean sauce.  Consists primarily of garlic and olive oil and salt, sometimes with egg yolk and/or lemon juice and/or mustard.  The name derives from the Latin “allium” (garlic) and “oleum” (oil).

In any case, all the recipes that I’ve seen call for vastly different proportions of the main ingredients, so I doubt that a definitive ratio exists.

Alas, the recipe in Mastering the Art of French Cooking, which also includes lemon juice and, for some unexplained reason, bread crumbs, didn’t turn out so well.  To satisfy the “good olive oil” requirement, I used extra virgin olive oil, but that made the olive oil flavor way too strong – even the color came out a bit green.  I whisked the ingredients by hand in heed of the warning that a blender would make the garlic taste bitter, but it ended up bitter anyway.  A rare failure.

The salmon was perfectly cooked – that grill marks were so even that they looked fake.

(See also FOOD GLOSSARY)

(See also MASTERING THE ART OF FRENCH COOKING)

(See also RESTAURANTS IN KOREA)