Just for the Halibut

Since I have been quite heavy on meat and pork fat for the past few weeks of grilling (and I haven’t even gotten to the pork hocks and pig’s feet in the freezer) I figured I would do something a little different on the weekend and put some halibut on the barbie.  What you see above is the amazing result.  My Grill Girl Ramona and I went to our favourite fish shop in Duncan, Mad Dog Crabs, and picked up a nice boneless, skin-on piece of fresh halibut.  For all the people (nutritionists and sustainable seafood folk) who tell us we should eat more of the right fish, halibut is damn expensive!

I think we paid about $14 a pound, and that was less expensive than some prices I’ve seen elsewhere, such as at supermarket chains.  Anyway, the halibut came home, and while I figured out what to do with it I grilled some eggplant slices.

I sliced the whole eggplant thickly, at least 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch, then brushed on some olive oil, and sprinkled liberally with sea salt and freshly ground pepper.  I turned my Napoleon Grill down to low and only turned the slices once, to preserve some nice grill marks, and to avoid sticking and tearing.  When they were soft, I pulled them off and drizzled on a bit more olive oil and some of my precious Venturi-Schulze balsamic vinegar and some chopped parsley. If you’ve never tried this vinegar, you don’t know what you’re missing.

I had roasted a whole bulb of freshly harvested garlic for one of my upcoming radio shows, and I had most of the head left.  So I squeezed out the remaining cloves into a bowl and put an equal amount of miso paste in with it, along with a splash of toasted sesame oil and a dollop of soy sauce.  Mixed it all together, then slathered it over the fillet and put it on the grill at about 400F for 10-15 minutes, just until the halibut easily flaked.  All the flavours blended together with the heat and made a great counterpoint to the robust white flesh of the halibut, Yummm!  Oh, that stuff you see around the halibut is a sharp mango salsa I made with one diced mango, some sweet white onion, chopped cilantro, a chopped pickled jalapeno, salt, pepper, olive oil and a little red wine vinegar.  Oh, almost forgot, tossed in the rest of a box of boysenberries I picked up at the Duncan Farmer’s Market on Saturday morning.  The weather was great, we sat outside with a crisp white Orvieto Classico and smiled at each other.  Life is good!