Summer Grilling: Pork Belly and Rainbow Trout

Since it took us about four frustrating hours of assemblage to put together the grill we bought back in the day, I think it's justified that we break out the grill as soon as the snow begins to melt outside (or even sooner). Here are two delightful dinners we've charred, seared, and crackled so far this season, along with the seasonal veggies we've either grown ourselves or purchased from our local farmers.

The first was a grilled pork belly with peaches and arugula.

As soon as our garden yielded its first full leaves of arugula. For this, we bought a pound of pork belly from our wonderful butcher, and marinated it for a few hours in the fridge (for ideas on marinades: here and here). If I remember correctly, this involved some honey, soy sauce, pepper flakes, and other spices, as well as minced shallot and garlic. This combination made it especially nice with the peaches, but so would a sort of Southwest, cumin-y sort of blend with a nice salsa on the side (pineapple, anybody?)

Make sure you get the grill nice and hot, because the fantastic thing about grilled pork belly is the crackling--the crispy, seared skin that pops and bubbles when you put it directly on the heat. We didn't achieve this as much as I would have liked this time around, thanks to a debate about how much charcoal we should put in the grill -- but next time...!

For the salad, we simply cut up a peach, placed the slices on a bed of arugula, cracked some pepper on top and drizzled with a bit of olive oil and sweet balsamic. The result: sweet, juicy peaches and balsamic, with savory, crunchy pork and the peppery taste of arugula!

Our second memorable grill feast so far was just the other night, when Mark biked down to the market and returned with a one-pound fillet of rainbow trout, tomatoes and corn in his bag.

For this meal, we decided to go with pretty simple flavors, letting the grill and the natural flavors of our herbs and veggies do all the work. We seasoned the fish with pepper, salt and fresh thyme from the garden, placed the whole thing on a piece of aluminum foil and set it on the grill for about 10 minutes (until the meat started to flake). The nice thing about this was that when it was time to serve up, the fish came away from the skin very nicely.

We also grilled up some tomato halves, garnished with strips of fresh garden basil...


Grilled garlic scapes...

Fresh corn on the cob...
...and potatoes tossed together with a little cheddar cheese, spring onion, and salt and pepper and packaged in aluminum foil to finish off on the grill (par-boiled first for faster cooking).

I would highly recommend doing a simple fish grill in the summer sun. While the fish may seem pricey, it's well worth it (especially if you can find it on sale like Mark did), especially when served up with the sweet, seasonal vegetables around right now. And, if you are restrained enough to have left over fish afterwards, you can treat yourself to a nice trout (or salmon, whatever) hash breakfast the next day!