Add a little sweetness to your fresh wild-caught sockeye salmon

Image by drurydrama (Len Radin) via Flickr

Wild-caught pollock  is a cheaper alternative to cod.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The culinary fireworks didn't go off in my kitchen until after the long July Fourth weekend was over.


On Tuesday, I made an early trip to Costco Wholesale in Hackensack, picking up boxes of peaches and beefsteak tomatoes, organic spring mix and another fillet of fresh, wild sockeye salmon ($7.99 a pound).


I can't get enough of this wonderfully oily fish. Except for a 10-day break, I've eaten a pound or more weekly since it first appeared at Costco in late May.


For dinner Tuesday, I went out to my garden for rosemary, oregano, mint and basil, and washed and chopped them coarsely. From the refrigerator, I took a lemon and a container of Aleppo red pepper.

Fish with peaches

The fillet weighed under 1.5 pounds, so I cut it into seven small portions, squeezing on some lemon juice and then adding ground Aleppo pepper and herbs.


The large peaches were on the counter, and a light went off. The peaches were ripe and had a nice aroma, so I sliced one and put the pieces here and there in the roasting pan with the salmon.


I cooked the fillets in a pre-heated, 350-degree oven for 15 minutes, longer than usual, because my wife likes her salmon cooked through. 


I took out one portion after 10 minutes for my dinner, along with two peach slices, which were hot and had softened further in the oven. I had a second portion, with more peach slices and a salad. Delicious.


The fruit and the fish -- sweet and savory -- are nice foils for each other.


For breakfast this morning, I had another portion of fish and two peach slices right out of the fridge, over red-leaf lettuce from my garden, tomato, cucumber and olives.

Kosher Costco

From the refrigerated case in Costco's kosher section, I bought Meal Mart Hungarian-style Beef Stuffed Cabbage for my wife. 

Four large rolls with beef and mashed potatoes in sweetened tomato sauce weigh 2.5 pounds.


They are fully cooked and not just kosher, but Glatt kosher. Don't ask. The price, $8.99, seems a lot, because there's nothing on the package about how the beef was raised. 


It probably was raised conventionally with antibiotics and growth hormones.

Salt fish

At Costco last week, I bought more salted, wild-caught pollock from Canada -- 2 pounds for $7.29, up from $6.39. That's still a couple of dollars less than a single pound of salted cod at ShopRite, Fairway Market in Paramus and other stores.


On Tuesday, I picked up more Pasta Prima lobster ravioli -- 30 ounces for $11.99 -- but couldn't find lobster bisque, corn-and-chicken chowder, and other  refrigerated soups.


I was told they've been discontinued for the summer.

Lobster ravioli, crab cakes and other delights at Costco Wholesale

Image via Wikipedia

You don't have to go to a seafood restaurant to dine on premium lobster ravioli, crab cakes, lobster bisque and other briny delights. All are available at Costco Wholesale, along with fresh, wild-caught fish and farmed prawns, and frozen sockeye salmon and mahi-mahi.


The wide selection at the Hackensack, N.J., warehouse store has helped me stick with a non-meat diet for the past eight months.


The lobster ravioli with parmesan and ricotta cheese from Pasta Prima are outstanding ($11.99). They actually taste of lobster, which is the first ingredient listed. 

When thawed, they take only five minutes to prepare and need only a drizzle of olive oil, cracked black pepper and grated cheese. You get two portions, each enough for three people.

The Maryland-style crab cakes from Phillips Seafood Restaurants list crab as the first ingredient and contain no breadcrumbs. You get six crab cakes for $13.69 at Costco, and $11.99 at BJ's Wholesale Club.

Blount Lobster Bisque ($10.89) and Legal Sea Foods Sweet Corn and Crab Chowder ($9.79) are two of the great seafood soups available.

Four pounds of prawns from Vietnam were $37.99 (U-15 or 15 to the pound). 

They have been cleaned, so all you have to do is shell them, marinate them in the juice of two or three lemons, along with dried or powdered garlic, red-pepper flakes and other seasoning, then sautee them in olive oil until they turn pink and curl up.

Between the bread

Besides giving up meat, I am trying to cut down on pizza and bread -- one of my favorite foods -- to lose weight, and it seems to be working. I lost weight in Italy and I've lost more weight since I returned Sept. 20.

So, it isn't unusual for me to have salad with reduced-fat cheese and smoked wild salmon or enjoy leftover ravioli or fried fish for breakfast.


This morning, I ate leftover haddock from Costco that my wife fried for dinner last night, along with cabbage and salted cod, and boiled green banana -- all doused with Valentina hot sauce. 

Yesterday, I had leftover lobster ravioli and spinach and cheese ravioli, both from Costco.


Leftover spaghetti with sardines made a good side dish for the fried haddock we had for dinner the following night.

UPDATE: So many fish in the seven seas

-- VICTOR E. SASSON

Copper River salmon now at a lower price

Image via Wikipedia

The first wild sockeye salmon fillets from the famed Copper River in Alaska appeared on June 12 at the Costco in Hackensack. The price: $14.99 a pound. A few days later, wild king salmon from Alaska showed up, also $14.99 a pound.


Today, I went looking for king salmon for dinner, but found only the sockeye (photo). The surprise was a lower price: $11.99 a pound. Last year, Copper River salmon was sold for $9.99 a pound at Costco.


I also picked up a pound of Earthbound Farms organic spring mix ($4.49) and two pounds of those beautiful, round Campari tomatoes on the vine ($4.59) that are hot-house grown without herbicides. Pasta Prima-brand lobster ravioli were $11.99, enough to feed three at two meals.