Fruit and fish may not be at the forefront of our minds as we approach the midway point between summer and autumn, but it is a combination worth exploring. The Japanese are expert at using fruit for its acidity effect, combining mackerel, tuna, sea bream and salmon with a variety of fruits such as nashi (pear), kaki (persimmon), mikan (mandarin orange) and, of course, the all-expensive yuzu.
Yuzu are sour, lemony fruits that have a distinctive and highly sought-after fragrance. How to describe it? It tastes like a lime, lemon and grapefruit all mixed together. Many chefs love its complex flavour, though others rail against its faux popularity. Writing in the Guardian, Morwenna Ferrier described it as “a bit like a lime that fell off a lorry and in fact tastes a bit like that”.
I love this description, as the high price of yuzu often means that you find it on expensive menus because of its supposed status. Often people will use it to impress you, not really knowing how or why they are using it.
For me, yuzu resides somewhere in the same realm as gold, beluga caviar and Italian white truffles. Of course they are nice and they signify luxury, but what do they really tell us about ourselves and our own food culture? For my money, an Irish sour cherry, salted for a week or two, beats yuzu any day.
Salmon with salted cherry salsa
To make the salsa, you’ll need to prepare the cherries a week in advance. Place 500g of cherries in a Kilner jar with 25g of sea salt, a bay leaf and some fresh thyme. Shake the jar and leave in the fridge for a week. After a week, remove the cherries from the solution. Pit them and dice finely. Season with some cold-pressed rapeseed oil. You can add a green herb if you want, such as chives. Place a few fillets of salmon on a tray lined with grease-proof paper. Oil and salt and transfer into a 100 degrees oven for 12 minutes. Serve immediately with the salted cherry salsa.
