
I also learned something about my "dry-roasting" cooking technique. I first tried it when I did the jerk chicken , and again when I did the pseudo-Indian chicken. The basic idea is that a dutch oven cooks by trapping the steam and the heat. The heavy lid traps all the moisture in. That's great with almost everything you cook, but once in a while, you want to cook something that's a bit dryer, something that sets seasonings in a glaze or something like that. You don't want to trap the moisture. I don't know what to call it, so I'm calling it "dry-roasting".
To make it work, you put something under the lid to lift it up. I found a thin metal grill that I could place under the lid. It lifted the lid, but not much. That way, the moisture escaped. I found, however, that a lot of the heat did, too. I'm sure that the fact that it was a windy and cold day today didn't help much, either.
But in order to make it work, you have to up the coals SIGNIFICANTLY. I put a thermometer in the bottom of the dutch oven while I was cooking the potatoes, and found that I needed to almost double the coals in order to get the kind of heat needed. I liked the results of cooking that way. It does lose a lot of heat that would have normally been trapped, however.
Dutch Oven Salmon with Potatoes and Asparagus
12" dutch oven
In the dry-roasting phase: 25 + coals each above and below
In the final baking phase: 10-12 coals below, 18-20 coals above.
- 4-5 medium to large potatoes
- Olive oil
- parsley
- salt
- Pepper
- 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced
- Fresh Asparagus, about 4-5 sprigs per serving
- Olive Oil
- Salt
- Lemon pepper or lemon zest and pepper
- 1 fresh Salmon fillet
- 1 bundle green onions, chopped
- dill
- 1 lemon, sliced
I started out by lighting up the fire. That was a bit of a challenge as windy as it was, but eventually I had coals getting white. While those got ready, I got to cleaning the potatoes. The original recipe I drew this from called for baby potatoes. That would have been yummy. But I didn't have any. So, I used regular potatoes, quartered and then sliced in the cube-like chunks.
I put them in a bowl, and dashed over some olive oil, then all of the other seasonings and flavorings. I shook it in the bowl and mixed them all up.
Then I went out and put the oven on the coals to pre-heat some. I spritzed a little extra oil in the bottom. I don't know that I needed to, but I did. Once the oven was a bit hot, I put in the potatoes. I let those cook for a while, using the dry-roasting technique described above, until they got good and seared on all sides, and the seasonings were clinging to them. Since I was playing with the temperature, it took a little longer, but I think in normal conditions, it should take about 30 minutes or so, with a couple of stirrings.
While that was happening, I was preparing the asparagus and the salmon.
The asparagus was easy enough. I cut off about the bottom third of the asparagus, 'cause I remembered the bottom being the nastiest part when I was a kid. I put the sprigs into a bag with just a splash of oil and the salt and lemon stuff. I didn't have any lemons today, so I just used lemon pepper. I shook it up to coat the asparagus sprigs.
Then, I cut the salmon fillet into four big pieces (that's how many would be eating). I sprinkled on the dill, scattered over the chopped green onions, and put a lemon slice on each one. Actually, today I used lime slices, 'cause that's what I had handy instead.
I took all that out to the ovens. I took off the lid and the grill separator, and added the asparagus to the now delicious looking potatoes. and stirred them together. I laid the salmon fillet pieces in on top of those, and put the lid on solid. I readjusted the coals as above, and began baking the salmon and asparagus with the potatoes.

This meal really turned out four-star, if I do say so myself.
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