Lockdown Edition Week 6: Hot Smoked Salmon Salad with Gravlax Dressing

The book: The Little Swedish Kitchen (Rachel Khoo)

The recipe: p92, "Hot Smoked Salmon Salad with Gravlax Dressing"

Being the product of a half-British, half-Swedish family, the wave of interest in all things Scandinavian over the past decade has left me curiously conflicted. The TV-propagated idea of the European north as a dark, moody, crime-ridden place scarcely tallies with my summer memories of lazy lakeside days, and "lifestyle choices" like hygge and lagom really are just words, first and foremost. So yes, it's wonderful that all those foods I grew up with, from Kalles Kaviar to filmjölk, can now be obtained simply by visiting the wonderful Scandinavian Kitchen in person or online - but when the mighty meatball is ubiquitous and everyone seems to be knocking out cinnamon buns left, right and centre, the selfish little kid in me feels a bit miffed that, well, it's all a bit less special than it used to be.

Not that I wasn't pleased to be gifted The Little Swedish Kitchen, you understand - it looks like it's got some lovely stuff in it - but reading Khoo's introductory text immediately got my hackles up in quite a similar way. The obligatory mentions of Pippi Longstocking and Abba, midsummer and fika, and several disclaimers ("I did not set out to write a definitive guide to Swedish food", "I'm no expert in Swedish cooking") didn't exactly bode well - and my prejudices threatened to be confirmed when I checked out one of the recipes, for the smörgåsbord staple mysteriously known as Jansson's Temptation, only to find that Khoo's version contains carrots (!) and beetroot (!!).

Now, I'm not saying this "I'll do things my way, not the traditional way" attitude is definitely going to be relevant to this week's blog, but let's say there's a hint of foreshadowing here.

Nevertheless, I can't deny that letting the book just fall open always reveals something I'd like to make, whether in an "improved" version or by digging out an original Swedish recipe, so I'm glad random.org has sent me in this direction. I'll just have to hold my tongue as I navigate my way around yet more patronising interludes about just amazing Swedish bakery culture is (get a grip, woman, it's literally coffee and cake).

The prep: Now, here's a thing. Sometimes you see the name of a recipe and only later realise you're parsing it wrong. So when the finger of fate lands on page 92, I immediately think "oh, warm salmon in a salad sounds interesting!" But no: this is not a salad with "hot | smoked salmon", it is a salad with "hot smoked | salmon". There's a reason the grammar gods invented the hyphen; it would have saved me a misunderstanding here, for a start, and I'll be using it throughout the rest of the blog by means of protest.

Hot-smoked salmon is, as the name (now) suggests, salmon that's been smoked at a higher temperature than normal, giving it a more cooked feel and making it a bit chonkier and flakier, rather than the kind of thing you serve as thin slices. Obviously, getting hold of something truly authentic during lockdown is going to be an issue - Scandinavian Kitchen currently have a backlog of at least two weeks, for a start, and I'm not sufficiently committed to the cause to wait - but the recipe suggests I could replace it with "regular smoked salmon, smoked trout or even cold roast chicken" (ah, chicken, my favourite fish) so I reckon I'll be OK with what the Lewisham Asda can give me on the that front.

I'm actually a little sceptical as to whether the aforementioned supermarket will have fresh dill in stock, but my scepticism proves to be misplaced as there's plenty to go round. Which is good, because dill is fairly central to the Swedish food experience. (I mean, savoury-wise, at least. They don't put it in the prinsesstårta. Although Rachel Khoo might.)

The making: Everything else being fairly standard stuff, it's time to begin! Which I do by first preparing the salad. This involves shredding a cos lettuce - although the accompanying photo suggests more of a "torn leaves" approach, so I split the difference with an approach I call the Chunky Shred (also the name of my next ska-punk band). Eight radishes are thinly sliced and added to the mix, as is a carrot which I do my best to peel into attractive ribbons, or at least attractive bits of what might once have been ribbons.

So far so colourful

Next up, it's time for the "gravlax dressing", and this is where the alarm bells start ringing. I'm asked to mix together two heaped tablespoons of mayonnaise, the zest and juice of a lemon, a healthy quantity of chopped dill, a pinch of salt - and two tablespoons (again, heaped) of grainy mustard.

Bear with me here, because I swear I'm not just hating on Rachel Khoo for the sake of it. But have a quick look at a Google image search to see exactly the kind of thing we're meant to be replicating here. Do you see any mustard grains? I do not see any mustard grains. This is not meant to be made with grainy mustard. And I certainly don't see anything that looks like this:

While not unattractive, this "dressing" turns out to be at least two things: too grainy and too thick. Tasting it also suggests a third issue, namely that it's way too strong to be put anywhere near a light summery salad.

Nevertheless, the recipe is the recipe, so I continue by spreading a tablespoon of the dressing on each plate:

This is a nice way of making sure the flavour is distributed throughout the dish, actually, plus it's fun to do. Score!

I then arrange the salad on top before flaking the smoked salmon over the whole thing, a little haphazardly (just for a change).

That would seem enough, but - joy of joys - I am also to "drizzle over" the rest of the dressing. There's nothing about the consistency of this dressing that would allow it to be drizzled (and even the photo next to the recipe suggests more of a "multiple dollops" approach), but I do my best within the means available to me - this blog has never been about attractive food presentation, after all - and our cold-but-hot-smoked salmon salad is ready to go!

The eating: Let's cut to the chase here. The mustard and lemon content of the dressing makes it absolutely overpowering, and it wrecks the whole thing. Used sparingly alongside some good forkfuls of chunky salmon, it could work quite well - and I'm certainly not averse to strong taste contrasts in general - but when the bulk of this dish is some rather delicate salad vegetables (and it's not like salmon is an especially dominant flavour either), this is basically like forcing horseradish up your nose while chewing on something crunchy. None of the other flavours come through at all - not even the dill, and as you can see from the smeared plate above, there was plenty of dill in there.

It's weird, it's wrong and, worst of all, it's so easily avoidable. These are simple ingredients and they shouldn't go this badly awry, but while the smear of dressing on the plate alone might have been survivable, there's no way back from the extra dollops on top. We grudgingly make our way through about two-thirds of what's before us before picking out the salmon and giving up on the rest

The leftovers, dressing included, get stirred into a much bigger bowl of salad I've already got on the go in the fridge. Duly diluted, the mustard, lemon and mayo are far less offensive to the senses and actually make for quite a nice combo. But that's not really the point. The point is there's already a perfectly good way of making a Swedish-style dressing for salmon that's milder but still punchy, and messing with it only ends up here: in a waste of everyone's time.

Still, I said that dipping into this book has given me inspiration to try out new things, and regardless of this disappointing experience, I would quite like to attempt this again some time only with better salmon - and, obviously, actual gravlaxsås. Ideally made by people who know what they're doing.

Two-word verdict: Woefully misguided.