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Garlic Salmon and Roasted Spuds
Garlic Salmon and Roasted Spuds
There’s no denying it, fish is good for you. Even the fish you buy from the fishmonger in your local supermarket. Although their cuts and selection might not offer the nicest pieces, it is still super healthy for you.
I do prefer freshly caught fish, either from the local pier or caught myself. The latter unfortunately does not happen too often – I hope to change that soon.
There’s a reason us…
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A Proper Viking Loaf
A Proper Viking Loaf
For months I have tried to find a good recipe for a nice loaf of bread. I’ve tested many recipes, only to find that they didn’t meet my demands for a soft and fluffy white bread.
A bread that allows you to cut a perfect slice, spread butter on it, and enjoy a nice slice of Danish cheese on top
A bread worthy of Danish cheese, boiled shrimp, or in the toaster
A bread that can be used for melted…
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Pork – one of the most common meats used by my ancestors, and by my people to this day. It is an important part of our diet. It is not red/red meat, which cardiologists do not recommendBurnt ends. But, it is still part of the red meat family and it does contain higher levels of fats, and not good fats.
Some might argue the Chinese “invented” pork belly, but I will argue that the Vikings introduced it to the Chinese during our exploration of the Far East.
You can enjoy this meat in moderations, and not slabs at a time. In my fatty past, I could easily have consumed a nice sized pork belly within 1-2 days. Not healthy.
My dietician who visited my house when I was at my lowest during my heart failure, confirmed that I should avoid this kind of white meat. This was not something that I accepted too well but felt it was better for my overall recovery if I listened to my dietician.
Removing pork from a Dane’s menu is close enough to a death sentence. Imagine no bacon, no sausages, no pork rinds, no pork belly and not to mention no Christmas pork roast. What had life gotten me into?
This was not easy to swallow, so I started to do some serious research into the healthiness of pork meat. And, to my joys, I found that pork meat can indeed be considered in a healthy diet.
Being high in protein and rich in many vitamins and minerals, lean pork can be an excellent addition to a healthy diet.
It apparently contains all nine essential amino acids necessary for your body’s growth and maintenance. Eating pork may be particularly beneficial for bodybuilders, recovering athletes, people post-surgery, or others who need to build up or repair muscles. The heart is considered a muscle, right?
SUMMARY – Pork is an excellent source of many vitamins and minerals, including thiamine, zinc, vitamin B12, vitamin B6, niacin, phosphorus, and iron.
To help my heart recover, I wanted to prepare one of my favorite snacks, Pork Belly. And, making this an even better experience, I created this on my newly acquired Traeger Pro series.
Making pork belly is actually not too difficult. It just takes time and patience.
So, let’s get started, and here’s what you need.
1 slab of pork belly, roughly 4lbs
Dry rub of your choice
4 tablespoons of brown sugar
2 tablespoons of honey
4 tablespoons of butter
1 cup of BBQ sauce
BBQ spray
1 cup of coffee
1 cup of apple vinegar
1 can of beer
Simple steps to pork delight
Cut the pork into 1 inch squares
Place the pork pieces in a bowl
Massge the dry rub all over the pork pieces
Place the pork pieces on a fine grate
Heat up your Traeger, or any other smoker, to 275F
Once preheating has finished, place the pork belly on the main grate
Smoke / cook the pork belly for roughly three hours, spraying it with your homemade BBQ spray, keeping it moist
When the internal temperature reaches 190F, take out the pork belly
Transfer the pieces to a tinfoil tray, and sprinkle over the brown sugar
Strategically place the butter on top of the pork
Sprinkle the honey over the pork
Cover the pork with a good layer of BBQ sauce
Mix it all together, and place it back in the Traeger
Cook it for another hour
Take it out of the Traeger and let it rest (cool off) a little
That’s it. You’ve done it. It was not hard, right?
The biggest challenge is the time it takes to prepare and cook. You spend more time vooking these bites than actually eating. I guess that is a good sign!
Word of caution – pork belly is a very addictive dish. You need to practice extreme willpower not to eat all the burnt ends all at once. The challenge is, they are so delicious and soft, especially when served warm.
BBQ time
Final result
Sweeten it up
Still roasting
The Spray
Slow roasting
The Rub
Spice up the pork
Pork Cubes
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The Adventures of Burnt Ends Pork - one of the most common meats used by my ancestors, and by my people to this day.
Bread Rolls, as the Vikings made them
Bread Rolls, as the Vikings made them
Again, perhaps a slight exaggeration as the Vikings are not know to be great bakers. We mainly plundered what we needed, ate burnt meats, drank mead and slept in our clothes. Cooking and baking was not our strongest skills.
Nevertheless, as we evolved since 900 AC, our culinary abilities equally improved. Perhaps not to Michelin levels, but certainly above charcoal burned meat level. We…
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Grilling, More Than a Hobby
Grilling, More Than a Hobby
Since man tamed fire, we have been obsessed with burning/grilling food, with enthusiasm, passion and perhaps alcohol.
The fascination of cooking over the fire, under the open sky, may have been rather simple in the early days, with meat being thrown casually on the open fire and burned to a crisp. Not much preparation was needed, limited use of spices and most pieces of the animals were consumed.
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Look, Mum! I Made Foccacia on the Grill!
Look, Mum! I Made Foccacia on the Grill!
Remember sitting at an Italian restaurant, eating antipasti while enjoying a nice slice of Foccacia bread, dipping it in olive oil?
Foccacia bread is just as important to the Italians as pizza, if not more. They tend to eat it throughout the year, and will serve it with different dishes, as antipasti, a snack with olive oil and some are even sweet to be consumed with coffee.
There are no real…
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We love shellfish and fish!
Yes, even the kids dig into these delicious creatures and will happily ask for seconds and thirds. In fact, if it wasn’t so bloody expensive, we would eat fish more often. It’s healthy, it provides natural salts and certain fish have excellent oils for your body. Many fish do not require many herbs or spices and are fairly simple to prepare.
Perhaps it is a good reason to start fishing with the family. Catching our own fish, bring them home, clean them, and prepare them. That would really teach the kids some valuable life lessons.
Unfortunately we live far from the ocean, but we can still catch great fish in local lakes and rivers. We just need to plan our fishing trips in advance and explore the maps and local fishing sites to see where we can go.
Simple shrimp on bread
In Denmark, we eat shrimp throughout the summer. Some families go to great lengths to catch shrimps themselves, but I think it is better (and easier) to support your local fishermen and fishmonger, and buy locally caught shrimps.
I remember sitting on the porch with my family and neighbors, boiling shrimps, and then peel the shrimps you wanted to eat. You simply peeled a handful, which takes patience and plenty of time, and put them on a slice of white bread, on top of a slice of fresh lettuce. We would sprinkle a little lemon juice, grinds of pepper and top it off with some mayo.
Delicious! Nothing beats eating shellfish on a nice warm summer afternoon and evening. It brings me back fond memories of my childhood. I want to share these experiences with our kids and create their own childhood memories of great foods.
Last weekend, while celebrating Memorial Day, we substituted the traditional burgers, ribs, and coleslaw with a light shellfish dinner; scallops and clams served with white wine and garlic sauce, and quinoa pasta.
Yes, we are riding the healthy train and reducing the intake of regular pasta.
Please remember, you do not need to add salt to any shellfish or fish meal. These creatures contain plenty of natural salts, which get added during the cooking process.
We purchased a large bag of clams and about a pound of scallops at the local fishmonger, and a cheap bottle of white wine. We already have the rest of the ingredients.
So, how do you prepare this dish?
I’m glad you asked and will share our approach here, including the additional ingredients. It is not complicated at all, and you can cook this on your stovetop or your pellet grill. Today, we are using the latter.
For the clams:
1 large bag of clams, roughly 2lbs – washed
Juice from half a lemon
4 tablespoons of unsalted butter
2 cups of white wine (your choice)
1/2 cup of chopped parsley
2 cups of water
4 teaspoons of crushed garlic (glass)
A few grinds of black pepper
For the scallops:
1lb of fresh scallops – should yield 3-4 per person
4 tablespoons of unsalted butter
Juice from half a lemon
2 teaspoons of crushed garlic (glass)
A few grinds of black pepper
1/4 cup of fresh parsley
Let’s get cooking
The beauty of using a pellet grill is that your pots and pans will not get charred.
Now, to actually prepare the smoked clam dish in your Traeger, simply put all the ingredients in a large Dutch oven.
I like to start with the clams, placing them in the Dutch oven
Sprinkle the dry spices and precut ingredients over the clams
Pour over the wine, lemon juice, and water so they mix all ingredients into the clams naturally
Preheat your Traeger (or another pellet grill) to 400F
Place the Dutch oven on the grill, in the center
It should bake/cook for about 40-50 minutes
As we are cooking the scallops as well set the timer to about 30 minutes
The scallops need a lot less cook time
Place them on a cast iron pan, again, with all the ingredients.
When the 30-minute timer goes off, put the scallops into the Traeger next to the clams. You may need to adjust the placing a little, to make room for both Dutch oven and cast iron pan.
Check on the scallops after 7-8 minutes, and flip them on the pan.
While both shellfish dishes are cooking, boil some pasta of your choice, and set aside.
When the clams are ready, which you can determine if they are all open, then you remove them from the pot – do NOT discard the sauce!
For the sauce
In a large pan, with high sides, put:
4 tablespoons of butter
Mixed with a small handful of freshly chopped parsley
Add 2 cloves of crushed garlic
Add two tablespoons of flour
Gently heat up the butter and start mixing it so it becomes a paste
Add a little sauce from the clams, 2-3 tablespoons
Add 1/2 cup of white wine
Add more liquids as you see fit
Do not overdue the liquids as you want the sauce thick enough so it sticks to the pasta
Once at the right consistency, add the pasta and mix it with the sauce
Serve the pasta on plates or bowls, then add some open clams and a few scallops on top.
Voila! A lovely fresh summer dish
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Scallops and Clams – smoked of course We love shellfish and fish! Yes, even the kids dig into these delicious creatures and will happily ask for seconds and thirds.
When I was a wee lad back home in Denmark, my mum would sometimes buy a smoked chicken from the local butcher. Yes, she did not nurture, kill, butcher, and then smoke the chicken herself as some of you might think. It is not that many years ago since I was a little rascal, and it was just more convenient to buy it already smoked.
I do believe that the butcher smoked the meat in large ovens, and not using wood or pellet techniques.
My sister and I would eat this chicken with our fingers, and I just remember it being overly delicious. The taste and texture of the meat were so soft, and I have this vague recollection that it ‘melted’ in my mouth. Hot or cold, it did not matter.
When I left the nest, I never tried to make it and I never bought it at the butchers. It was a mum thing, and something I felt was best preserved as a childhood memory.
I will admit that I ordered smoke chicken in the last few years when visiting the local smoke and BBQ joint while sampling their homemade BBQ sauces and cornbreads.
Smoked chicken on the wood or pellet grills have a very unique flavor, depending on the woods or pellets used.
With the latest addition to the family, the Traeger Pro 780, I had to test my abilities and excel at my pitmaster level to at least novice.
I deemed it time to smoke my first whole chicken. A challenge that I had been contemplating for years, ever since my childhood in fact, and something that would put me into a league of cool dads.
Making a perfect smoked chicken takes time, love, and patience. You can’t just throw the naked cold bird into the oven, crank it up to 250F, and slow roast it. Well, you could, but where’s the fun int that and I’m sure the flavors wouldn’t be great.
We have to do it right, and slow. To start off with, I placed the chicken in a salt and beer brine and let it soak up the flavors overnight. I left it on the stovetop, but others put it in the fridge to cool as well … I did not have room in my fridge!
To do the brine
Large pot, big enough for at least a gallon of water
Lukewarm water, enough to submerge the chicken
1/2 cup of salt
1 can of beer of your choice
1/2 cup of Worcestershire sauce
1 small onion, quartered
4 bay leaves
4 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup of Juniper berries
1/2 cup of sugar
I’m not going to write out the steps in details, but there are four key steps.
Fill the pot with lukewarm water
Throw in all the ingredients and stir until sugar and salt have dissolved
Submerge the chicken and cover the pot
Let it rest overnight, either on the kitchen counter or in the fridge
The next day, you need to calculate when you want to have dinner or eat the chicken. This will determine when you start the smoking process.
You need to give yourself at around 4 hours headstart, as the bird needs to smoke for 3-4 hours depending on the size. Once it reaches an inside temperature of 165F, then it is done.
Preparing the bird
Drain the bird from the brine and pad it dry
Massage some vegetable oil on the bird, getting into the little corners too
Use your preferred dry rub. I used the “Dia de la Fajita” rub from Meat Church.
Place the prepared chicken in a tinfoil tray, and let soak up the spices
Preheat your Traeger (or another pellet grill) to 225F, and let it sit about 10 minutes once it reaches the designated altitude.
Place the chicken in the center of your Traeger, and now it’s just a waiting game
If you have a wireless or wired cooking thermometer, insert it into your bird, around the thickest part
Set the target temprature to 165F
Once the chicken reaches a temperature of 165F, inside, take out the chicken and let it sit 10-15 minutes on the kitchen counter
Serve the chicken with your preferred sides. We used regular salad and my Viking-slaw, and the adults enjoyed a nice Flat Tire beer.
I have to admit, and without bragging, this was the best smoked chicken I ever had – sorry mum!
We can rarely finish a full chicken, but we were pretty darn close to achieving that goal. All the kids went back to the bird multiple times, and even then wings were amazing. I mean finger liking delicious.
The leftover smoked chicken breast was used on sandwiches the next day for lunch, and it was still soft, juicy, and full of flavors.
I will absolutely make this again. Here’s a before and after picture!
Before chicken meets the Viking family
After the Viking dinner
Stay in touch with me through social media!
Tried this recipe? Snap a picture and tag #vikingheartwithin on Instagram.
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Smoked Chicken Delight When I was a wee lad back home in Denmark, my mum would sometimes buy a smoked chicken from the local butcher.
