17. Smoked Salmon with Cilantro Yogurt Sauce

I came home from work to find my husband watching the Versus channel. Sports, hunting, MMA, sports and more hunting. Not that my husband is a hunter, but aparently it's good tv. Smokee Joe was on cooking up some salmon on his barbecue and suddenly husband was craving it.

Smokee Joe had marinated the salmon in a cilantro yogurt sauce a couple of hours prior to grilling. We love cilantro and thought we'd incorporate the sauce in to our dinner. We took mental note of the ingredients and tweeked it to our taste.

Our meal that night included smoked salmon with cilantro yogurt sauce, grilled red onions, spicy smoked potatoes & steamed asparagus. And a meal it was.

Let's get started! I'll start with the salmon today.

You'll need 4 salmon steaks.

The steaks were put on the Traeger to smoke for an hour. The smoke setting doesn't usually reach a temperature higher than 100 degrees. After the smoke the barbecue will need to be turned up to cook the salmon.

We're lucky enough to live on an island in the Puget Sound with an abundance of fresh seafood.

For the sauce you'll need plain yogurt, olive oil, cumin, cilantro & a lemon.

I've taken a red onion and sliced it in to thick slices. He threw them on the grill with the salmon to smoke.

On to the sauce, you'll need to chop up your cilantro. Make sure to have at least 1/2 cup. I just chopped the top half of my bunch off and called it good. But I love cilantro.

Go ahead and pull out a mixing bowl and start with the yogurt. We picked up a small 6oz container of plain greek yogurt. You could also choose regular yogurt if you don't care for the bite greek has.

Throw in your chopped cilantro.

Squeeze in the juice of half a lemon. Be sure to avoid the seeds!

Husband likes to tweek everything to our specifications. We love things spicy, and he wanted a finely diced jalepeno thrown in with it.

 Last weekend I cooked up jalepeno poppers and had a few halved and seeded jalepenos left over in the fridge and I diced up half of one.

So I threw in the jalepeno. Surprisingly it gave it just a hint of spice. Nothing crazy. It was a nice touch.

Throw in about a teaspoon of cumin.

Also pretend I drizzled olive oil over the top of this, but I didn't.

Skip something in a recipe post. Check!

And you're ready to mix. Yummy, creamy, delicious.

Smoking is done and the salmon was pulled off for the sauce. Husband threw the potatoes on the grill to smoke for 30 minutes white the salmon sat with the sauce to "marinate".

Slather it on. Only use about half of it, you'll want a little left over for when the salmon is done. The flavor really changes then.

Oh, and here is where I added the olive oil. I drizzled it on the fish, then a little in to the rest of the sauce and stirred it again. Thank goodness for second chances, huh?

Look at that. I fell in love with my husband all over again when he bought this barbecue. One of the best investments we've made yet. We have enjoyed cooking together so much. Love the grill lines on the onions.

After an additional 15 minutes on the grill the salmon was cooked through and everything was done. The onions look fabulous. They're tender, yet have just enough crunch. They were sweet & smoky.

Here's our dinner in all it's glory. The fish was just incredible. Smoky & just faintly spicy. We topped it with the left over cilantro yogurt sauce. I've got steamed asparagus & spicy smoked potatoes on the side. There's no way I could have gone out tonight to any restaurant in town and had something that tasted this wonderful. Maybe I'm just biased.

I'll share the recipes to the asparagus & potatoes in an upcoming post. Get to making some salmon & enjoy!

Cilantro Yogurt Sauce

1 cup plain yogurt

1/2 cup chopped cilantro

1 tsp. cumin

Juice of half a lemon

A drizzle of olive oil

In a bowl combine 1 cup plain yogurt, 1/2 cup chopped cilantro, 1 tsp. cumin, the juice of half a lemon, a drizzle of olive oil & mix.