no need to worry about flaking fish...

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gravey

Smoke Blower
Original poster
Oct 5, 2009
118
10
Northeast Nebraska
Ever grill a salmon steak, only to ruin gorgious sear marks when it came time to flip? Worry no more, as I have a solution for you!! Read on...

So a co-worker of mine recently returned from an alaskan fishing outing with his dad and his son. He returned a rich and heavy laden man, toting a box full of dried ice and 90 lbs of silver and king salmon. Knowing that I enjoy cooking and grilling, he brought me a bag of a couple of steaks and filets which I promptly took to the grill when I got home.

While running cold water over these puppies, I filled my chimney to the brim and got those coals red hot. Right before I constructed my fiery hill, I hit my grill grate with several shots of olive oil Pam, then let the grill heat (lid on, vents wide open) for about 5 minutes.

I went inside, unsealed my vacuum packed fishies, rinsed and patted them dry. I also created a compound butter using a couple large spoons of Country Crock, and a crap load of old bay!

Having never grilled salmon (let alone any fish) before, I did a little homework and found out this trick.

As soon as you lift your grill lid, be prepared for a jet blast! Don't worry about those eyebrows, because they'll grow back! That heat on the other hand will never return. Slap those salmon steaks flesh side down on after spritzing the grate with pam again. Plop that lid on and wait 2 minutes.

DO NOT OPEN THE LID OR MOVE YOUR FISH!!! You'll ruin your sear marks by moving your fish and you'll lose that heat that creates that beautiful char!

After two minutes, take off your grill lid, and flip your fishies skin side down, right above the coals for 3 minutes. After about 2 minutes, open your lid, and drop a spoonfull of your compound butter on your steaks. Spread it around a bit until it all melts and then replace your lid for 30 seconds.

Now here's the secret. If you'll look at the corners of your filet where the skin meets the flesh you will see that they have seperated. You see, the fatty layer between sking and flesh has rendered out allowing you to slip your spatula **carefully!!** between and easily get your fish from the grill.

If you like the skin, peel it off and put it on another platter. If you don't, feed it to Fluffy or Spike. Here's what you get...
 
Clean, hot, oiled grates and don't move the fish until ready to flip... No sticky... Clean and hot are the keys here and you have no skin stuck to the grate to scrape off later.
 
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