by Nanette Geller

We’re from New York City. That means Sunday brunch is the most important meal of the week. And the ultimate Sunday brunch is lox and bagels. OK, technically lox is salt-cured not smoked, but both our families preferred Nova Scotia salmon (“novi”) which is smoked. We still called it lox. Mandatory accompaniments included cream cheese, onions, coffee or tea, and the Sunday New York Times. Optional: black olives, capers, various fresh vegetables. We sometimes had other smoked fish as well (sable, whitefish, sturgeon). Bagels had to be purchased, still warm, on Sunday morning. And you ate at home, surrounded by family.

No problem finding smoked salmon in Honolulu. In fact, Costco has a pretty good smoked wild Alaska salmon. Bagels? That’s another story. First of all, these days it’s even hard to find a really good bagel in New York . They’re too big and too soft. A proper bagel should be chewy. And please, don’t even mention the weird flavors. Blueberry bagels? I’d sooner eat anchovy ice cream. There are a couple of places here that make passable bagels – not perfect, but they’ll do in a pinch. But they’re not open Sunday and a reheated bagel just isn’t the same thing. I pretty much gave up on enjoying lox & bagels on Sundays.

Fortunately, I had the idea of trying a dense rye bread, the kind that is often used with gravlax in Scandinavia. Not the same as a bagel, but equally delicious.

My other innovation is to substitute fresh goat cheese for the cream cheese. More flavor, lower fat. Not just “as good” but better.

White plate: smoked salmon, dark rye bread, red onion

Metal plate (ok, it’s a pizza pan): goat cheese, pesto, lime wedges, capers

Here the emphasis is on the fresh veggies.

Japanese cucumber and red onion from Pit, baby romaine from Otsuji, hakurei (Japanese turnips) and French breakfast radishes from MA'O.

On the plate with smoked salmon and goat cheese: key lime from Wailea Ag.

That huge tangerine is a Dekopon we bought at Whole Foods. Good, but we’ll stick to local citrus. Maybe someone will grow it here.

The coffee is an Americano which we prefer to regular brewed coffee. We buy our espresso beans from Koko Crater at KCC.

This is the best brand of dense-style dark rye I’ve found.

It’s imported from Germany and keeps unopened for months, but refrigerate after opening. It’s already sliced – I cut the slices in half for a more convenient serving size.

I used to find it in a couple of places but now the only place I see it is Whole Foods. There are several flavors, all good.

Permalink posted by Nanette @ 4/17/2011 06:04:00 PM