In The Kitchen: Smoking salmon

Co-worker Tonya East was craving fish. Her request for a simple fish recipe seemed a good excuse to get my nephew Robbie to fire up the smoker. Robbie is always more than happy to get the smoker going, and he is often experimenting with different kinds of wood chips for different flavors.

For this recipe, we used cherry wood chips, which was a good choice. If you don’t have a smoker, you can cook this on the grill or bake it in the oven. Salmon is best grilled or smoked, but you can cook it in the oven at 350 degrees until it flakes easily.

A good side dish for the salmon -- or any main dish -- is roasted potatoes.

Smoked salmon

2 1/2 lbs. salmon, cut into 4 large pieces
Melted butter
Lemon juice
Seasonings

Brush each salmon piece with melted butter and lemon juice. Just before grilling or smoking, season each piece. Easy options include: fresh dill; freshly ground black pepper; Lawry’s Red Louisiana Pepper Sauce or just the lemon juice and butter.
Bake or smoke until done. A good rule of thumb is five minutes per inch of thickness.

Roasted Potatoes

10 to 12 medium potatoes, cut into bite size chunks
1/2 package Roasted Potato Seasoning Mix
Vegetable oil

Add 1 tablespoon salt to pan of water. Bring to a boil and boil potatoes in water for approximately 5 minutes. Drain.
Place potatoes on foil-lined baking pan that has been lightly coated with vegetable oil. Sprinkle with seasoning mix, which can be found in the produce department of most grocery stores near the potatoes. I prefer the "original recipe" seasoning.
Bake at 350 for 15 to 20 minutes.