Cooking Salmon on the River, by Zachary Collier, Best Made Guide to River Rafting
People are always amazed at the meals we can create on a river rafting expedition. We bring a full kitchen complete with a 6 burner stove, firepan and plenty of cast iron Dutch ovens, so we can create delicious meals!
One of my favorite things to cook on a river trip is salmon. Here’s Dale’s recipe for Mustard, Lemon and Dill Salmon to feed 30 people:
Dale’s Recipe:
15 lbs wild Alaskan salmon
4 lemons
2 sticks butter
16 fresh dill sprigs
4 bottles Sierra Nevada Pale Ale Mustard
1 jar mustard seedLay out a large sheet of aluminum foil for each salmon filet. Slice one stick of butter and distribute the slices on each sheet and then put the salmon on top, skin side down. Spread the Sierra Nevada mustard on top of the filets and then sprinkle mustard seeds on top. Add a few slices of butter, then very thin slices of lemon, and top it all off with the fresh dill sprigs.
Wrap the salmon completely in the aluminum foil and then cook over a fire or a camp stove. It typically cooks after 8-15 minutes depending on the thickness of the filet and the temperature of the fire/stove. The salmon is ready when if flakes easily with a fork and the skin is just starting to separate from the fish.
Mike Burke’s Recipe: Sometimes on river trips we lose or forget to bring a key ingredient, which forces us to get creative. A simple recipe that I learned from river legend Mike Burke is to drizzle the salmon with maple syrup and cook. That’s it!
Notes: There are several ways to cook your salmon. To keep it moist, we usually wrap it in aluminum foil. Grilling salmon is always fun, and everyone likes to watch it sizzle, but this method can lead to dry fish. A hybrid method is to wrap the firepan in aluminum foil and let the salmon cook in some of its juices.
There are also many delicious toppings for salmon, and we like to get creative. Try onions, bell peppers, soy sauce, wine, whiskey, garlic, BBQ sauce, or even a simple pesto made with olive oil and herbs.
Zach is the owner/outfitter at Northwest Rafting Company.
Best Made Guide Bio: Zachary Collier, River Rafting
What can I say, I love the outdoors, and I love opening up the wilderness to people that spend most of their time inside. I started rafting and kayaking the rivers of California while in college at UC Davis. Weekend trips on the American, Stanislaus, Merced and Tuolumne Rivers had me hooked. When I could scrape together the funds, I would head to Costa Rica, Honduras, Nepal, or Chile to paddle the amazing rivers of the southern hemisphere. It was while I was attending graduate school at Stanford in 1998 that I began guiding professionally for ECHO River Trips. I guided multi-day trips on the Tuolumne, Rogue and Salmon Rivers for ECHO before embarking on my most challenging test to date: teaching high school math. I loved teaching, (especially having the summers off to continue my explorations of the world), and I learned a lot of skills that have served me well in mentoring and instructing new river guides. But I found my Eagle Scout roots were planted very deep and as the love of outfitting river trips had grown throughout the years, I decided to embrace it as a full-time career.
I took over operations of ECHO River Trips from the retiring owners, Dick Linford and Joe Daly in 2007. I still manage their company and in 2009, I started my own outfitting business, Northwest Rafting Company, on the Rogue River in southern Oregon. I love bringing people out of their comfort zones for a wilderness adventure. Paddling a family through rapids for their first time takes me back to my first trips, and I can only hope that it will plant a seed of appreciation for the amazing natural environments to be found around our planet.
In addition to rafting, I love mountain biking, running, skiing and camping around my home in Hood River, Oregon. I still have a penchant for traveling abroad, and I hope to take more adventurers around the world to experience rivers in unique locales. I just returned from my first rafting tour of Bhutan, which was a huge success for me and my clients! When I’m not on the water, I spend a lot of time developing gear for our guides and managing ECHO and Northwest Rafting Co. I look forward to sharing stories with the Best Made Company!
The TITAN Pathfinder
Expedition: The Kaa-Khem River, Siberia
By Zach Collier, Guide to River RaftingLast summer I embarked on an amazing trip in Siberia through the region of Tuva on the Kaa-Khem River. We started with a 6-hour flight from Moscow to the town of Abakan. From there, we drove for 2 solid days in a four-wheel drive vehicle to reach the put-in near the village of Kungurtuk.
The next 9 days were spent rafting through spectacular Class III/IV rapids in the Melzeysky Cascade and Cheeks Canyon. The whitewater was great, but the most interesting parts of the trip for me were the opportunities to engage in a simpler type of life found only in true wilderness. By fishing for our dinner and visiting isolated villages along the way, we got a chance to live like real outdoorsmen. Our group of 14 caught about 20 fish each day that we ate feasted on each night. One of the Russians in our group had a legendary moment as he was reeling in a small fish and a 4-foot Taimen swallowed his catch and his hook leaving him with two on one hook!
The villages, we visited are home to the Old-Believers; think Amish in America. Their bountiful crops growing in greenhouses and their generosity to complete strangers and foreigners were something that I’ll never forget. Meeting the Old-Believers and seeing their thriving villages in the middle of nowhere reminded me that I was experiencing true wilderness.
Siberia is the kind of place where a good axe is your constant companion. We had two Siberian axes on the trip, which were used to cut firewood, make camp items, and even repair the boat! In one of the rapids in the Melzeysky Cascade, the Russian cataraft (a four-person boat with two pontoons and a wooden frame) hit a big wave, which broke the frame. Anatoly, one of the Russian guides, disappeared into the woods with one of the axes and returned with a piece of wood to make a replacement brace for the frame. After about 30 minutes, the frame was fixed and we were on the river again!
Siberia reminds me of how rafting the American West must have been in the 60s and 70s - most rivers are only run once or twice a year, there are some fun logistical challenges, and many possibilities for first descents. Our trip was an amazing adventure, and I can’t wait to go back. Next summer we’re planning a trip to the Sayanskaya Oka near Lake Baikal! For more information about rafting in Siberia, check out my friend Vlad’s book “Rivers of an Unknown Land”.
Learn more about Zach and his company Northwest River Rafting
The Waylander
What a way to spend a weekend—at a royal wedding. Here’s our full album of exclusive Bhutan wedding photos, taken by Jered Barclay for Condé Nast Traveler.
(Source: condenasttraveler)
