Treats to come

My son Jonathan has been visiting over the last two weeks, so posting here has been dislodged by quite a lot more shopping, cooking and eating than usual. It's been interesting seeing what he fancies eating. He's been working and living in China for some years now, so when he comes home it's the basics he craves - bread, butter, New Zealand fruit and veges. And his favourite dinner - we had it, with variations, several times - is fish, potatoes and salad. Here's what I cooked for his last night here.  The yellow evening light has given this photo a strange retro look. 

The salmon was done with a variation of a recipe I found in the paper a while ago. Mix a tablespoon of salt and a tablespoon of sugar in a shallow dish. Coat the salmon in it at least half an hour, and up to 1 hour, before you want to cook it. (Best to take off the skin first, but if you're rushed, don't bother.) Then wash off the salt and sugar and dry the salmon. Grill it (I used the fan grill, which works brilliantly) at 220C for around 10 minutes - but it depends on the size and thickness of the pieces. To see if it's done, stick a knife into the middle of the thickest part, hold it there for 10 seconds, then pull it out and hold it against your lip. If it's warm, the salmon is done.

         The salad was celery, red pepper and cucumber, with a  lemony dressing, and the potatoes were those lovely red-skinned yellow ones whose correct name is, I think, Laura. All that's needed is to cut them in half lengthwise, put a bit of oil in a baking tray and on top of them, sprinkle them with salt and bake them for about 3/4 of an hour at 180C. Jonathan was very happy.

        Tomorrow I'm off to the food bloggers' conference, at the new Cordon Bleu school in Wellington, so next week there'll be a lot to write about - and I'll also have some very exciting news about my own writing. (Thanks to the lovely organisers, I get to announce this at the conference, so I'm not going to spill the beans here just yet.) Thank you, too, to my sister bloggers who've put such nice comments up on earlier posts this week - I'm looking forward to meeting you all.