Don,

I can occasionally buy a fast-frozen salmon down here in Texas, and I take it home, marinate it in a special brine, and smoke it. On a good batch I can rival the $25 a pound stuff down at Pike Street Market. The clerks at the store here in Fort Worth are used to my request to smell the fish before I buy it.

When I lived on San Juan back in the mid-1980's (you were there!) I used to buy fish in Friday Harbor that was sooooooo fresh. The salmon would render one speechless. The halibut had this opalescent sheen, and was such a wonderful consistency. A friend gave me a recipe that involved baking it in a deep pan. Slice an onion and put a few rings on top, some herbs, several dollops of sour cream, and a nice amount of white wine. I can't eat dairy any more, but if ever anything were to tempt me to fall off of the wagon, it's that fresh fish. The slabs of something they call "halibut" that arrive frozen and desciated down here aren't worth the megabucks they charge for it. I can tell them where to throw that stuff, should they be so inclined!

Maggie