Recipe from 'A River Rules My Kitchen', a cookbook by Tony Smith.
Food Styling and Photography by Deborah Aspray.
This dish came from my years in Whanganui where I was keen to come up with new dishes that used local products. Passionfruit grows well there. One of the earlier 'cottage' industries I had a great relationship with was developed by Gay Pederson, who supplied frozen pure pulp to many parts of the country year-round. I was shown by a local lady how to simply preserve passionfruit in bottles by mixing the raw passionfruit pulp with an equal amount of sugar.
Serves 4
INGREDIENTS
4 x 160g salmon fillets
2 shallots, finely diced
a small walnut-sized piece of fresh ginger, finely diced
1 clove garlic, finely diced
1/2 teaspoon ground fenugreek
1 level teaspoon whole cumin seeds
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/4 cup Riesling
a pinch of saffron
3 whole passionfruits, sieved
1/2 Granny Smith apple, finely diced
3 tablespoons fresh cream
10g butter
pulp from 1 extra passionfruit
METHOD
Fry the shallots, ginger, garlic, fenugreek and cumin in the olive oil. Add the wine and saffron, let it reduce a little, then add the passionfruit and apple. Simmer for 10 minutes, then add the cream, and reduce it to a nice consistency. Swirl in the butter to finish, then strain through a sieve, pushing the solids to extract all the flavour.
Grill the salmon fillets, skin side up, or pan-fry them gently in a little olive oil. Spoon over a good tablespoon of the sauce and spoon over a little more passionfruit pulp to garnish.
As an alternative, make a salsa by dry-roasting the spices in a pan and then grind in a mortar and pestle. Dice the apple and 1 shallot really finely. Add the spices, as well as 1 teaspoon grated ginger, passionfruit, and a little olive oil. Mix well and serve with the salmon.
Serve with rice, or potatoes as pictured.
