Salmon Pizza with Creme Fraiche

I thought a Salmon pizza sounded good, so I looked around and compared some recipes and ingredients. I found this recipe online and made a few tweaks to make it my own. The original called for some things we don't eat. After making it, I wonder if it would be good with caramelized onion or confit d'oignon and just a squeeze of lemon juice. I also saw recipes with cream cheese. So maybe cubes of cream cheese instead of dollops of creme fraiche? I may try it again. I might add some crushed red pepper flakes for heat. This recipe has lots of steps but it is very easy. See below for a link to the original. It may be what you are looking for. :)

Salmon Pizza

INGREDIENTS

10 oz. sockeye salmon (pin bones and skin removed)*
pizza dough
olive oil
1 lemon
1 cup sugar, divided
1 1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1 red onion, sliced thinly
2 Tbsp. salt
1 tsp. each fresh dill, parsley, basil, and thyme
mozzarella cheese
Crème Fraîche**

DIRECTIONS

Make pizza dough. If frozen, defrost salmon. Pre-heat your oven to 475°F. (The original recipe says "as hot as it will go", but I backed off just a little.)

Heat up a skillet on medium high heat with a little olive oil. Slice the 1 lemon thin, coating the slices in about ½ cup sugar and place in the skillet to caramelize. Once some color develops, remove the lemon slices with tongs and let cool (HOT SUGAR makes nasty burns!) on a plate, then finely chop and set aside.

REMOVE AS SOON AS COLOR DEVELOPS! I left mine a little too long and I got caramel with lemon. It wasn't burned, but difficult to handle. 

Next, in a bowl combine 1 ½ cup red wine vinegar, ½ cup sugar and 2 Tbsp salt in a bowl. Add in your thinly sliced red onion and let it marinate. I suggest breaking the rings apart so you get an even marinade on the onion.

Chop up the herbs, When the oven is way hot, drizzle the salmon with olive oil and salt it to taste. Place the fish on a baking dish and place in the oven, baking until medium rare. Remove and tent with tin foil.

While the fish cooks, shape dough and top with mozzarella and dot with crème fraîche, or do what I did: Smear on creme fraiche and top with mozzarella. When you pull the salmon out, put the pizza in and bake until it looks like you want it to. (This will depend on the thickness of your crust and your oven, so check it after 8 to 10 minutes.)

Dollops? oops. I don't follow directions well, do I? 

Once it's done, slice your pizza and then break up the salmon onto the pizza, topping it with the caramelized lemon, freshly ground pepper, and herbs. Drain the red onion and squeeze it to remove excess vinegar and throw it on your pizza and drizzle with some olive oil. ENJOY!

Sorry, it's blurry! I was excited! 

*I used a 10 oz. frozen bag because that's all I could find here in the desert. I baked my salmon with the skin on, skin side down. It is easy to remove from cooked fish.

**Crème fraîche: You could buy it, but it's easy to make it yourself: 1 part buttermilk to 2 parts heavy cream. Let sit covered at room temp for 24 hrs. then refrigerate. If you use "whipping cream" and not "heavy whipping cream" your product will turn out too liquid. It should be the consistency of a soft sour cream. If this is scary to you, I knew a chef that made mock crème fraîche by stirring lemon juice and a pinch of salt into heavy cream. It's quick, it's easy and the health dept. doesn't yell at you for it.☻ 

Cherry Creme Fraiche Ice Cream

So, lucky for those of you who have an ice cream machine, I'm going to translate this recipe for you!

You need:
300 g Cherries (about 2/3 of a pound)
250 g Sugar (roughly 1.5 c.)*
25 cL (1 c.)water
25 cl (1 c.) whole milk
25 cL (1 c) Creme Fraiche*
1 tbsp vanilla extract

Wash and dry your cherries. Remove the pits. In a sauce pan, combine water and 1 c. sugar. Bring to a boil. Add cherries. simmer for 10 min. Allow to cool. Remove half (or more) of the juice, blend partially with blender or stick blender. Leave some chunks for texture.
Combine milk, creme fraiche, vanillla and the rest of the sugar. Put this mixture in your ice cream freezer. When it is almost all the way frozen add your cherry mixture.
If you are impatient like me, and dump it in too early you get pink ice cream. Still yummy....
Enjoy!


*notes:
Sugar: I found this a little sweet. You may want to cut back the sugar a bit depending on the sweetness of your cherries.


Creme Fraiche: You could buy it, but it's easy to make it yourself: 1 part buttermilk to 2 parts heavy cream. Let sit covered at room temp for 24 hrs. in a sterilized jar then refrigerate. :) There I saved you 5 bucks.

UPDATE 7/23/2019: I have since discovered you can get a better produce with much less buttermilk. I use a pint of heavy cream + 3 tbsp buttermilk. Over night on the counter, then 24 hrs in the fridge. Thanks to Chef John!

about 1 pint (2 c.) of pitted cherries

Simmer cherries in syrup about 10 min.

Drain off some of the syrup & blend cherries. Leave chunky. This time, I placed this in the fridge to chill. Then, I made the ice cream.  I thought this would help keep the ice cream white with a pink swirl. Now, I think the only way to keep it from going all pink would be to alternate layers of ice cream and cherry mixture into a freezer container.

It's almost ready! It took about 20 min. to get to this stage in my ice cream freezer.

What I've been up to...

I've made potato farl several times and really enjoyed them. I love sweet potatoes, so I thought "why not a sweet potato farl?" 

You will need: 

2 c. mashed sweet potato

1/4 c. sugar

2 tbsp. melted butter

Salt and pepper to taste

1. c. all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Mix the mashed sweet potato, sugar, salt, pepper, cinnamon, nutmeg, and melted butter. Then, work in the flour to make a pliable dough.

Typically when making potato farl you would divide in two and roll out on a floured surface to form two circles around 1/4 in. thick. Then, cut each circle into quarters (farl) and bake on a hot griddle for about 5 minutes on each side until lightly browned.

For these, dropped scant 1/2 cupfuls onto a hot, buttered skillet. Then, after I flipped them, I pressed them down. It took about 7 min. for them to completely cook. 

Then, my husband made this beautiful Beet Mousse.

http://www.cuisineaz.com/recettes/mousse-de-betteraves-rouges-47363.aspx

Mousse de Betterave: (Translation by Kae JL)

An easy, inexpensive recipe for 6 people. 

You will need:

2 beets, cooked

1 heaping tablespoon of crème fraîche (If you do not have it, and don't want to make it, you can try substituting it with sour cream. No guarantee on the outcome as I have not tried this recipe with sour cream.)

1 red onion, finely chopped

4 basil leaves

olive oil

salt, pepper

50 g de Roquefort (roughly 1.5 oz. blue cheese)

2 slices of pain de campagne (Think a nice crusty artisan loaf)

This recipe is inspired by this blog: http://lacuisinedebabeth.blogspot.com

Directions:

1) Saute onion in a skillet with olive oil. Reserve.

2) In a blender, place the sauteed onion, beets, crème fraîche, basil, 1 tbsp olive oil, salt and pepper.

3) Blend and place in the refrigerator to chill. (When you put it in the fridge, it will be liquid. When it chills completely it will have the texture of a mouse. Give it a few hours. I'm not sure exactly how long as we made it the day before serving.)

4) To serve top with Roquefort crumbles and crusty bread.

Then because there wasn't enough going on. I made some confit d'oignon. The recipe can be found here: http://www.food.com/recipe/confit-d-oignon-french-onion-marmalade-211001

I pretty much followed what she said to the letter. Except I doubled it, and then canned it. Per the Ball Book, I processed for 15 min. in a boiler canner. I used yellow onions and white wine. If you use red onions, I would use a red wine. I did it before, and it looks very pretty. It made what you see in the picture, which are five 8 oz. jelly jars and two 4oz. jars. Also I found that the times she posted where not as accurate. It took mine a lot longer than 30 min. to get soft and sticky. You have to let all the liquid evaporate! This goes great with a variety of meats and pate!! 

after 30 min. it is still not ready!