surf & turf with chimichurri

Chimichurri is a salsa (a sauce) originally from Argentina, and is used widely in South America on grilled meats. It consists of different things depending on the region and the cook, but the most basic version is a mixture of fresh parsley, cilantro, green onion, olive oil, vinegar, and garlic.

I had some salmon I wanted to cook, and some leftover sirloin steak tips from the night before, so I figured I'd try to combine them for a bit of a surf & turf. I seared the salmon in my cast iron pan in some melted bacon fat - it took about 5 minutes per side because the filets were quite thick. This was actually my first time doing salmon in the frying pan, and I'm a convert. The skin comes out so wonderfully crispy...yum! My steak tips were already cooked from the night before, so I just threw them in the still-hot pan with the fish and let them warm through.

The sauce itself is ridiculously easy....if you have a blender or food processor that works. I found out the hard way that my blender doesn't like to whiz up parsley, so I had to scoop everything out onto a chopping board and go at it the old-fashioned way with a big knife. It was good for stress relief, at the very least!

When the sauce was done, I plated everything up and spooned it over the salmon:

It was a very yummy combination. The acid and herbal brightness of the chimichurri cuts through the fattiness of the salmon very nicely Even my husband, who is not generally a fan of salmon, said he liked it and would eat it again, so we'll add this one to the repertoire. :)

Here's a quick listing of what I put in the chimichurri - you can just chuck it all in a food processor or (dependable) blender, or chop it by hand, or even mortar-and-pestle it if you want to go really old-school:

1 1/2 cups fresh parsley
1/2 cup fresh cilantro
3 green onions, chopped
2 cloves of garlic
3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
pinch of salt
pinch of black pepper