Christmas smoked salmon, pickled cucumber, jalapeno caper cream cheese

Vanessa Lewis

Back in my Masterchef days, I sent someone home for serving salmon with a pin bone in it. It wasn’t long after that, in my restaurant, a portion of salmon was served to an unfortunate female diner who encountered a bone in her dish – she was insistent that I fire the chef right there on the spot. However, needless to say, I couldn’t fire someone for a simple mistake and the next time I encountered a bone on Masterchef I didn’t say anything! Anyway, moral of the story is to take a clean pair of tweezers and carefully remove ALL bones from the salmon before smoking it.

Salmon

1 side	NZ hot smoked salmon (Main)
250 g	Full-fat cream cheese (Main)
2 Tbsp	Green jalapeno Tabasco (Main)
¼ cup	Capers (Main)

Pickled cucumber

1 cup	White wine vinegar
1 cup	Sugar
1 tsp	Finely grated ginger
1	Telegraph cucumber, finely sliced (Main)

Directions

1. To make the pickled cucumber, bring all ingredients to the boil and allow to cool before adding the cucumber.
2. Mix together the cream cheese, Tabasco and capers. Put into a small serving bowl.
3. Arrange the salmon on a large serving platter.
4. Pile the pickled cucumber over the salmon and serve with the jalapeno, caper, cream cheese spread on the side.

For more Christmas inspiration, see Simon'sglazed ham recipe.