The first time I cooked salmon at home (not on a grill) I pan-seared it and lived to regret the clinging stench of fish in the condo for the next 2 days. That put me off for months, but today I turned to my pal shaver who imparted some wisdom that essentially boiled down to “wrap it in something and bake it”. So that’s what I did, cribbing a recipe from notes from the internet, and it turned out perfectly.

Ingredients

• 2 salmon steaks, 1″ thick or so
• 1 can artichoke hearts (you only need 2 or 3, so be prepared to deal with the leftovers)
• 1 fresh vine-ripened tomato, roughly chopped
• 3 sprigs fresh thyme
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• Salt + pepper to taste
• Lemon wedges to serve

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400F.
2. Chop 3 artichoke hearts into quarters. Mix artichoke, tomato, thyme leaves (discard stems), 2 tbsp olive oil, salt + pepper in a small bowl.
3. Lay out two sheets of aluminum foil, large enough to completely, but loosely, wrap the salmon.
4. Use remaining oil to rub down the salmon steaks, and place those on the foil.
5. Top each salmon steak with half of the artichoke/tomato mixture. Fold foil loosely around steaks and seal, so each steak is in its own little foil packet-pod.
6. Place foil pods on a baking sheet, and put in the oven. Bake for 25-30 mins.
7. Unwrap, remove from foil, and plate, serving with lemon wedges.

That’s pretty much it. I served these with steamed snap peas and baked sweet potato.