Sweet Chili Sauce Salmon

I'm all about easy, fast.... preferably fast AND easy.
We're talking dinner here folks... keep it clean.
This meal was all that, and more.

I pulled together the salad and the BBQ salmon in under 30 minutes, opened a nice bottle of wine, and suddenly, dinner on the deck was ready. It was a fine night to eat outside and get caught up with my honey.

I served this salmon with a simple Sweet & Spicy Asian Coleslaw.

I've decided to start giving a wine pairing with some of my entrees... just to inspire you on what tastes good with what.  We've become really into wine collecting lately. We are not wine snobs, we like cheap wine (can you say under $10) and we DO like expensive too. I'll try to give you some ideas to try, see below!

Serves 2 (easily doubled, or tripled)
Ingredients

2 salmon fillets
1 tsp sesame oil
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 Tbsp Thai Sweet Chili Sauce

Garnish Ideas:
Green onions, chives and/or Sesame seeds

As I always do when I BBQ fish, I make a foil pan to place on top of the grill (see above).  Fish mostly sticks to the grill, and I have noticed that it more prone to dry out if you put it directly on the grates.  Try this trick, it's easy to clean up, keeps moisture near your fish and your grill won't smell of fish for days.

First, rub each filet with a bit of soy sauce. Add a bit of sesame oil to the foil, then add the salmon fillets, making sure that the oil is coated on the bottom of each piece. Sprinkle the rice wine vinegar over and around each filet.  Top with a tablespoon of the Thai sweet chili sauce.  Barbeque on medium high heat for about 8 minutes.  No need to flip it.  It may get a bit brown around the edges due to the sugar content of the sweet chili sauce, but the salmon will have great flavor.  Try not to over cook, you want the salmon to be tender and moist, and not hard and dry, right?

What wine to serve with with an Asian Salmon entree like this?

We served a Stag's Leap Sauvignon Blanc 2009.  It's spicy and fresh with flavors of fruit that go nicely with salmon and any Asian food. This wine is exceedingly food friendly... and I have to say that Sauv Blanc is my new favorite white wine; good on it's own, good with diverse foods with strong flavors. What else do you want???


If you want to know more about Stag's Leap, check here! We went to a wonderful "Wine Makers" dinner in Seattle at El Gaucho with our friends.  One friend went to college with the head wine maker, Nicki Pruss. What fun to meet the winemaker!