Spicy Salmon Ratatouille Wraps



Ingredients

• 350g salmon
• 1/2 C soy sauce
• 1/4 C olive oil
• 1/4 tsp sesame oil
• 1/4 C brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp rosemary
• 2/3 C rice
• 1 medium zucchini
• 1 large onion
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 lime
• 2 tsp paprika
• 2 tsp oregano
• 1 Tbsp basil
• 1/2 tsp celery seed
• 1 tsp thyme
• 1/2 tsp chili flakes
• 1 1/2 tsp ancho chili powder
• 3 medium tomatoes
• 1 green bell pepper
• 2 tsp peri peri sauce
• 8 tortillas
• 1/2 C cream cheese
• 1/4 C baby dill
• salt
• pepper

Procedure

1. In a small bowl, whisk together the soy sauce, half (2 Tbsp) the olive oil, the sesame oil (a little goes a long way), brown sugar and rosemary to make a marinade for the salmon. If you have fresh rosemary, just dump it in; if dried, then grind it up a little first with a mortar & pestle. Place the salmon in a deep dish, pour the marinade over top, and let sit. As with any marinade, longer is better, so if you have a couple of hours beforehand, that would be best. But if not, 10 minutes is better than nothing. Other than ensuring the taste doesn't clash with the rest of the dish, the marinade is a rather separate component, so feel free to substitute your own. I like this one, but have used others with this dish with equal success.
2. Start about 2/3 C of rice in a rice cooker (or pot, or however you normally make your rice). Any kind will work, but I find it's better if it's just a little on the sticky side, so I use about half-and-half long and short grain rice.
3. Preheat the oven to 400°. Chop up the zucchini into roughly 1 cm³ pieces. All the veggies will end up being chopped to this size, so I refer to it as the "standard" size. Add the remaining olive oil to a large (10") frying pan (make sure it has a lid) over high heat. When the oil begins to smoke, add the zucchini. Season the zucchini with salt & pepper, and stir. Keep stirring over high heat until the zucchini starts getting a golden brown crust (see image) – this should take no more than about 2, maybe 3 minutes. Be careful here, because over-cooked zucchini will turn to mush, and you will have to start over. When the zucchini is done, remove it to a large (~ 4qt) bowl. There will be a lot of olive oil left over; leave it in the pan.
4. By now, the oven should be hot. Line a baking pan with a sheet of tinfoil, dump the marinade from the salmon, and place the salmon on the tray. Place in the oven, and set a timer for about 12 minutes (depending on the salmon – a good rule of thumb is 10 minutes for every 1" of thickness). Continue with the following steps; when the timer goes off, just remove the salmon from the oven and set aside.
5. Set the burner to medium, and place the pan with the leftover oil on it. Chop the onion to the standard (1 cm³) size, and mince the garlic. Add the onion and garlic to the pan, and stir for about a minute until the onion starts getting translucent (see image). Turn the heat down to medium-low, and throw in the remaining herbs and spices (except for the dill). Wash the lime to get rid of any wax, then zest about 1/4 tsp of the lime skin into the pan. Stir a few times (it should be a little on the dry side; this is ok for now), then cover.
6. Chop the first of the three tomatoes into standard size pieces, add them to the pan, stir a bit more and re-cover.
7. Remove the ends, core and seeds from the bell pepper, chop the rest into standard size pieces. Add them to the pan, and re-cover. Chop the second tomato into standard size pieces, add them to the pan along with the peri-peri sauce, and stir a few times, to ensure everything is mixed together. Re-cover.
8. Finally, chop the last tomato. Un-cover the pan, turn the heat up to medium, add the tomato and stir, until most of the liquid is gone (about 1 or 2 minutes). Remove from the heat, and add the zucchini pieces back into the pan from the bowl. Stir until mixed. If you want, you can just stop at this point, and you will have a very acceptable spicy ratatouille (albeit without any eggplant). Taste it and you will see! Note it may be a bit too spicy (depending on your taste). The cream cheese in the wraps will temper that, so don't panic yet. But by the same token, if you are planning on skipping the cream cheese for any reason, you may want to tone down the spice a bit.
9. By now, the rice should be done (indeed should have been finished for quite a while now). Put the rice in the bowl where the zucchini was, and add the ratatouille back in, then stir together.
10. All that's left is the assembly. First, remove the salmon from the tray to a cutting board. If you can remove the skin at the same time, great; otherwise remove skin from each piece as you put them in the wraps. Cut the salmon lengthwise into 8 strips, each should be roughly 5"-6" long. Mince the baby dill as finely as possible. Cut the lime into quarters.
11. Now, take a tortilla. Zap it in the microwave for about 10-15 seconds to make it soft and pliable. Take 1 Tbsp of cream cheese, and spread it in a strip in the middle of the tortilla. Add 1 C of the rice/ratatouille mixture, covering the cheese evenly. Squeeze one of the lime quarters over it, to add about 1/4 tsp of lime juice. Take one of the salmon strips, nestle it in the rice mix, and sprinkle a little bit of the minced dill over top (see image). Fold in the sides, then roll up. Repeat with 7 remaining tortillas.

Makes 8 wraps. Total cooking/prep time: 90 minutes (not including salmon marinading time).