Toast (or Cucumber Slabs) with Dilled Cream Cheese and Smoked Salmon (With or Without Avocado)

This is not so much a recipe as it is a whole around a few ingredients. These are variations of a favorite breakfast/lunch/snack/light dinner with salad, party appetizer of mine. The core of this “dish” is a sushi roll called the Norway Roll from when I had a sushi bar which was cucumber sticks, thin slices of smoked salmon and Meyer lemon, the dill cream cheese, and dill scattered on the outside of the roll.

INGREDIENTS:

4 slices of light rye toast, ¼ inch thin

-OR-

8 slices English cucumber sliced diagonally ¼-inch thick and 4 inches long

8-12 slices cold smoked salmon or gravlax

-OR-

1-2 ripe avocadoes, halved and pitted

1 cup Dilled Cream Cheese (See recipe)

2 tablespoons fluffy dill sprig tips for garnish

1 Meyer lemon, halved lengthwise, seeded, sliced into very thin half moons

Mildly flavorful olive oil if desired

Flaky salt and Pepper to taste

METHOD:

Smear either the toasts or cucumber slices with the Dilled Cream Cheese. Not too thin or you won’t taste it, and not thick that the texture overwhelms.

Pave the cream cheese with nice slices of lemon.

Lay on salmon or avocado slices (or mash the avocado if you wish) evenly amongst the toasts/cucumber slabs. If the idea appeals to you, anoint lightly with olive oil.

Scatter with salt and pepper, place small dill tufts on top, and serve quickly.

Chef’s Notes: Capers are nice here, but go lightly or they conflict with the dill. Same with doing avocado and salmon with the cream cheese-too much of the same texture. The cucumber iteration can be done with rounds and garnished as above and used as an appetizer quite handily. I like the toasts as breakfast, or with a salad with sturdy greens and beets or quickles for a dinner. Speaking of quickles, quickled shallots or onions would be a wonderful addition to the stack. Just remember to go lightly if the flavor is strong.

Serves: 4

Source: Chef Andrew E Cohen