Just before the Chinese New Year, mom had an acute kidney failure. Upon diagnoses, it was actually a chronic kidney failure that turned acute. It is something that’s genetic – Immunoglobulin A Nephropathy (IgA in short). Basically a protein prevents the body from filtering out waste water. One of the treatment for prevention is high fluid intake, which I have kept telling mom to drink more water over the decades and which she refused to do all these time. Don’t need a specialist to add them up.
Well, now that it has become a daily thing with twice a week of a 5 hour kidney dialysis, she also need to skip green vegetables, potatoes, citrus fruits, mushrooms… among other things. Low sodium, low potassium, and low phosphorus and careful measurement of about 1L of daily fluid in take. Which equates to pretty well a whole lot of very little bit of a limited number of anything that could eat.
To get back to the main theme, the dish.
Mushrooms – for dad. Salmon, as fish is part of the allowed diet and that is something one does not find in a Chinese market, so they would not have cooked salmon enough to become boring. Linguine, something thicker and just more substance than Cappelinni that I used to make. So…
mushrooms,
salmon,
Linguine,
Parmesan cheese flakes,
basil – minced,
garlic – sliced,
lemon – juice,
sea salt,
black pepper,
white pepper,
olive oil.
Put the mushrooms in a dry hot pot in high heat and just let the water out, evaporated and brown the mushroom a bit then stir in a pinch of sea salt, some black pepper to taste and a dash of olive oil (or butter if you like but not for mom though). Take the mushrooms out of the pot for later use.
Skin the salmon and remove all gray meat from the salmon. Put about 1/2 cm of olive oil in a non-stick frying pan in medium low heat. Put the salmon in the pan and sprinkle some sea salt, white pepper, a generous splash of lemon juice, and then sprinkle some basil on top. Let it simmer until the side has startted turning white and slowly rise to the middle before flipping them around. After flipping, add some more (less this time) sea salt, white pepper, and basil but no more lemon juice as the oil already has some. As the white starts to rise toward the middle of the side of the salmon but not quite all the way, while the middle is still a bit pink, take the salmon out of the pan and drain all the excess oil from the salmon. Separate the Salmon along the threads of the meat and remove the bones so that the chunk of meat become slices. Keep the oil in the pan for later use. If cooked just right, there should be a gradient shade of light orange in the middle to pink on the side of the slices of salmon.
While doing the salmon, bring a pot of water to boil, add some sea salt, and put the Linguine in. I measure one hand grip full of Linginni for every 2 servings. Boil until just not more hardness to the bite and drain quickly. Bring a frying pan to medium low heat and add some olive oil with slices of garlic. Quickly put the Linguine into the frying pan and stir. Add the oil from the salmon pan, some sea salt and cheese flakes to taste but not salty as the salmon and the mushroom will be slightly more salty than the Linguine. Stir in the salmon and mushroom and then sprinkle some more basil to serve.
WhaUSay?!