{"id":1757,"date":"2014-07-04T23:53:42","date_gmt":"2014-07-04T23:53:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=1757"},"modified":"2014-07-04T23:53:42","modified_gmt":"2014-07-04T23:53:42","slug":"smoked-trout-potato-and-cucumber-salads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=1757","title":{"rendered":"smoked trout, potato and cucumber salads"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"five_cucumbers\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0five different cucumber cultivars<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Last Wednesday, thinking to avoid a hot kitchen when we sat down to dinner, and craving\u00a0a meal which would show off a good German-isch<\/em> wine, I decided to assemble\u00a0a meal of smoked trout\u00a0with\u00a0classical accompaniments, all of\u00a0which could be\u00a0served at room temperature. I\u00a0headed for\u00a0the Union Square Greenmarket<\/a> to land the trout\u00a0and to pick\u00a0the vegetables and herbs I’d need for\u00a0cold potato and cucumber salads.<\/p>\n

Finding the trout was easy: \u00a0David Harris of\u00a0Max Creek\u00a0Hatchery<\/a> brings\u00a0some wonderful whole Rainbow and Brook (both fresh and applewood-smoked) into our town every Wednesday. \u00a0I already had some red-skin new potatoes at home, purchased \u00a0only days before from Eckerton Hill Farms<\/a>, but, needing\u00a0cucumbers, I returned to their stand\u00a0and spotted some beauties in – as I soon found out – five varieties. I\u00a0asked the cheerful vender\u00a0which of them might be best\u00a0for a German cucumber salad in particular; without any hesitation, she suggested\u00a0I should use a mix (That would probably never have occurred to me;\u00a0\u00a0I’m so literal when it comes to traditional cookery). \u00a0I picked one of each, but that\u00a0evening, in the interest of portion control,\u00a0our salad included only\u00a0a mix of three. \u00a0They nevertheless made for a\u00a0complex mix of flavors and textures in a Gurkensalat<\/em>\u00a0as good or or better as\u00a0any\u00a0I’ve ever tasted.<\/p>\n

The relatively simple recipes for the cucumber and potato salads came from my trusty old copy<\/a> of Mimi Sheraton’s classic “German Cookbook”. \u00a0 I added lovage to the cucumbers\u00a0(my innovation this time, because I had it, and because it too is one of my favorite things), then parsley and chive to the potatoes. \u00a0All the herbs came from the Greenmarket. \u00a0 In addition to the fresh herbs, the cucumber salad involved white wine vinegar, white pepper, and \u00a0bit\u00a0of sugar, while the potato salad included shallot (in lieu of\u00a0onion, which I strangely didn’t have), beef stock, white wine vinegar, and white pepper\u00a0there too.<\/p>\n

The condiment for the trout was my own improvisation: I used\u00a0softened cream cheese,\u00a0a bit of softened butter and a small amount of @<\/span>ronnybrookfarm<\/span><\/a>‘s terrific plain yoghurt, together with grated horseradish from John D. Madura Farm<\/a> (that stuff keeps forever in the crisper), a taste of\u00a0L’ekama<\/a>,\u00a0which had shown up in a ‘goody bag’ a while back, to spice it up. some ground white pepper, and dill. I also sprinkled\u00a0chopped dill directly\u00a0on the trout fillet itself.<\/p>\n

The wine? \u00a0We lingered long over this meal, partly because\u00a0we didn’t have to worry about the food getting cold (or, of course, warm), so we were able to sample a bit from\u00a0two very different bottles. \u00a0The first was a very pleasant\u00a0Sylvaner\/Riesling blend\u00a0from Rheinland-Pfalz, an der\u00a0Nahe, produced by\u00a0Weingut Rapp<\/a>; \u00a0the second was an outstanding\u00a0Nieder\u00f6sterreich Gr\u00fcner Veltliner from Landhaus Mayer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We expect to be eating with a German accent more often.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"smoked_trout_cukes_pot_salad\"<\/a><\/p>\n

very cool on a hot night<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0five different cucumber cultivars   Last Wednesday, thinking to avoid a hot kitchen when we sat down to dinner, and craving\u00a0a meal which would show off a good German-isch wine, I decided to assemble\u00a0a meal of smoked trout\u00a0with\u00a0classical accompaniments, all of\u00a0which could be\u00a0served at room temperature. I\u00a0headed for\u00a0the Union Square Greenmarket to land the trout\u00a0and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meals-at-home"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1757","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1757\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}