Smoked salmon BLTs

 Sitting on a patio in warm sun, with a cooling lake breeze. Fine people watching, really tasty food. Bonus points for a good beer or wine list and a view. That's pretty much my definition of peak travel perfection, the scene that lingers in memory far longer than anything I read on a historic site plaque.

The cautious return to travel means the return of souvenirs, something besides photos to help you place yourself in that spot in memory. Some people who travel collect state tea towels, snowglobes or shot glasses. Most of our souvenirs are consumable, either brewvenirs or readily transportable food. It's ephemeral, but nothing reminds me more of a particular place than a particular meal in that place.

One the way back from Grand Marais, we stopped in Duluth and joined the lunch line at Canal Park Brewing. We greatly enjoyed the smoked salmon BLTs, along with their admirable beers. So when I got home I made this take on the sandwich, using smoked salmon we'd bought at the reopened Dockside Fish Market in Grand Marais and some Thielen's bacon.

Smoked salmon BLTs
Adapted from the menu at Canal Park Brewery.

Ingredients
4 strips bacon
¼ pound smoked salmon, sliced in half into thin slabs
2 brioche buns or bread of your choice
Guacamole
Sun-dried tomato aioli (see recipe)
1 medium tomato, sliced, lightly sprinkled with salt and pepper
½ a small red onion, thinly sliced
Leaf lettuce

Method
Cook bacon until browned and crisp. Remove from pan and drain on paper towels. Cut each slice in half.

Over low heat, sauté onion in bacon fat briefly to just slightly soften. Remove from pan and set aside.

Wipe out most of the remaining bacon fat. Toast cut sides of buns in pan. Remove pan from heat and transfer buns to plates.

Spread cut side of the bottom half of buns with guacamole. Spread cut side of the top half of buns with sun-dried tomato aioli. Place four bacon halves on each bottom bun, then top with salmon, tomatoes, onions and lettuce before capping with top half of bun.

Rating: Fabulous. So, so good. Transported us right back to that meal on the North Shore.

 

Sun-dried tomato aioli
Adapted from “Rustic Joyful Food Meant to Share” by Danielle Kartes

Ingredients
1 cup mayonnaise
⅓ cup sun-dried tomatoes
⅓ cup Parmesan
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic

Method
Mix ingredients well. If you want a smoother mixture, you can mix it briefly in the food processor. It works well either way.

Rating: It was fine as written but I liked it better when I added garlic and reduced the amount of Parmesan involved. I think it’s better when it’s made a day ahead and has more time for the flavors to meld. Very versatile; great on a sliced beef sandwich with pickled onions and arugula.

 

Lake Superior's milder cousin

The view of Lake Michigan out the motel window was just dandy, as was falling asleep listening to the waves.

We just got back from what turned out to be more or less an extended beer run to Wisconsin. We had time for a mini vacation, and opted for Door County, where we'd never been.

We default to Superior's North Shore, for good reason. It's much closer to us, has much more dramatic, spectacular scenery and is a tad cooler and (slightly) fewer bugs. That said, I can see the appeal of Door County if you live closer and Lake Michigan's West Shore is your lake break option. Very different character, though, with more golf courses/wineries/shopping and far fewer aging hippies or adventure-minded hipsters. Dave described it as the Okoboji area writ large. I'm glad we went during the shoulder season gap between the hordes of summer visitors and throngs of fall color season tourists.

We chose our destination and motel at the last minute, an arbitrary decision based on which town seemed to have the brewing company with the most promising beer list and then googling motel and "lake view" in that town. That landed us on the island's quiet side at the Beachfront Inn in Bailey's Harbor, which is like the Shoreline of Door County, so it suited us just fine. Great view, minimal but comfortable accommodations, a nice fire lit every night on the beach where guests make mildly awkward but pleasant conversation and get a fantastic view of the night sky. (Oh, and it's dog friendly, so be prepared to be sniffed and have petting opportunities.)

It was an easy stroll to Door County Brewing, where we happily hung out and added more brewvenirs to the cooler. We bopped over to the other side of the island for lunch (Shipwrecked Brewing) and supper (Wild Tomato's wood-fired pizza, try the Paisano), interspersed by attempts to hike it off.

We came home with a full cooler, with a stop at Red Eye Brewing Co. in Wausau. It's a three-hour drive from the Cities, which makes a good breaking spot on the long trip, and they make quite nice beer and food. With the right road burner, I could see buzzing over for lunch, providing we can get a smallish cooler in the saddlebags for more brewvenirs.

And now reality awaits and I'm just trying not to spend time googling how to retire early. (Short answer: Spend less, save more. It's about as likely to happen as eat less, exercise more. Both are good advice, but no fun.)

And this is the view of the sunrise shot through the window because I didn't wake up quite early enough to run outside.

Three ways to tell it's really spring

1. Rhodie, the great plant barometer, is not only unfurled, but blooming: Yes!

2. All the really gung-ho diligent people have already raked the winter coverings off their gardens, making me feel woefully inadequate and behind: Sadly, yes.

3. Sandcastle is open for the season: Yes, yes, yes!

Fish tacos and a front-row view of Lake Nokomis from the railing. Yep, it's spring. We survived another one!

A popover to end all popovers.

 

I was very lucky and got to have lunch close to the 400-year-old fireplace (relocated from an English manor) on the last day the Oak Grill was open. Now we know it's really not Dayton's anymore ... It was fun while it lasted.

Fish taco quest, taprooms and fall colors road trip

Seed Savers is in a lovely valley in Iowa's Driftless region. Hence all the go Driftless T-shirts for sale in town.

We had a few days of vacation to burn and after a spate of wedding/funeral runs, decided to make a trip to Iowa that didn't involve an officiant. We hadn't been in Decorah in 33 years, and blissfully know no one there, so we booked into the restored Hotel Winnishiek and hit the road.

We made a detour to Lanesboro after Rick Nelson's recommendation in his fall colors food tour. Since we never pass up the opportunity to try out a new-to-us version of fish tacos, that was the obvious choice on the Pedal Pushers' menu. I'm not sure if the fish picked up some bacon flavor from the grill, or where that nice smoky note came from, but the fish was tasty, and guacamole and black bean salsa made for a nice combo. Then we got mildly lost on some really pretty roads before landing in Decorah in time to do some hiking at Dunn Springs waterfall and in Palisades Park along the river. The two restaurants we'd most wanted to go to were closed while we were there, but La Rana was a decent substitute.

The next day amid bouts of museum-going, I had another fish taco opportunity at Ede's The Angry Pickle. This was the winner for sheer size and for the taco wrap itself, a toasted sun-dried tomato version. Tasty, but a tad unwieldly as it was plate-size. Then it was on to Seed Savers for some gawking at exotics, shopping and hiking on their extensive trail network. As a reward, we checked out the taproom of the much-buzzed-about Toppling Goliath, so Dave was happy.

Didn't find the label for this monster at Seed Savers, but it was taller than us.

We wound our way back on some roads that cry out for a motorcycle next time (Hwy. 43 squiggles adorably through cliff-lined valleys.) We took in the newly expanded Minnesota Marine Art Museum in Winona, which now has an even more fabulous collection on exhibit with all the usual suspects in such an unusual spot: Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, Constable, Turner, Corot, Morisot, and oddly my favorite, a Kandinksy. Lovely silk screen exhibit ends soon.

Then our last stop was a two-fer: fish tacos and a taproom. Reeds Landing Brewing Co. has a great setting along the Mississippi, tasty beers (a dark porter with dulche de leche notes was oddly my favorite of those we tried), and most importantly, the best fish tacos we've had in the state of Minnesota, and you know how we keep trying. Nicely minimalist, with a fabulous lime aioli that puts it out in front.

It's possible we might make it back to Decorah before another 33 years pass, if nothing else just to have a place to stay in between the best parts: the trips down and back.

Fish taco quest continues

It's now an official warm-weather vacation because it included fish tacos. We hit Sandcastle for lunch while out on our stroll. These are quite possibly the best fish tacos we've had in the Twin Cities outside of our kitchen. Nice pair of sauces, and the red cabbage is a nice touch. These edge out the ones at Republic, and those weren't bad. A gorgeous day by the lake, and we plan to haunt the new terrace of this place once it opens sometime next month. Plus, I didn't have to do dishes, and if we go out tonight to celebrate our anniversary (32!), the kitchen can stay clean. Now if only the rest of the house could say the same thing.