 Do you know there's a great way of cooking that doesn't require heat and it doesn't require equipment except for one piece of aluminium foil and a house brick. What is it? Of course it's curing. A great way of preserving foods that goes back for centuries, long before refrigerators were invented. Curing is a great way of making food better even if it hasn't been poorly. And I'm going to demonstrate this with a piece of salmon and the consuming passion's recipe for gravel ax. What I need for about eight people is a philip of salmon. And I cut it in half. This is beautiful fish that's lovingly farmed in the pristine waters of Tasmania. Now I make up a curing mixture which is one part salt to one part sugar and those are the fundamentals of this curing process. I find chunky rock salt or sea salt is best for this purpose. And I also use dill which is chopped up finally. Now I mix the dill in with the salt and the sugar and some pepper, heaps of it, two or three teaspoons. And this is all mixed up well. Now I take a piece of aluminium foil and then place on one piece of the salmon, skin side down. The herb, salt and sugar mixture is now spread on it. Then the other piece of philip is put on top, skin side up. And it's all wrapped up tightly. Place on a tray, sorry that's a bit of equipment, I didn't mention top with a small chopping board and topped with a house brick or two. Salmon is then put in the fridge for 24 hours at least but it could stay in like this for up to three days. Now while it's curing I have plenty of time to make a vegetable salad using potato, beans and carrots which are simply boiled until they're just cooked, quickly drained and put into very cold water to refresh them to keep their colour in and their texture. Then they're drained again. Now I make a lemon unmustard mayonnaise with two egg yolks into a bowl with some dejon style mustard, a tiny pinch of salt and a generous quarter teaspoon of white pepper, a grating of lemon rind and some lemon juice plus just a pinch of sugar. I put a tea towel under the bowl to stop it spinning off the bench when I haven't got a hand free to hold it. And I begin making the mayonnaise which of course isn't emulsion and it relies for its success on adding oil very, very slowly to the mixture, just a drip at a time and once the mixture starts to thicken I can increase the rate. I'm using Australia's own macadamia nut oil for this but you could use any mild and sweet flavoured oil. You could also add dill to this mixture but I think there's enough in the salmon but you can add some capers and fold the mayonnaise into the vegetables. The moment of truth. Now I've never said this on a programme before but this is one I made earlier. I made this 24 hours ago so let's see how it shapes up. It's beautiful. Once unwrapped I wiped the fish dry removing the little pieces of rock salt and some of the dill then cut into individual servings and then I removed the skin by placing a very sharp knife down one end and just taking it back through to the other end. Then I sliced the fish into very fine strips. I'm going to serve and I put some of that delicate vegetable salad in the middle of a plate and drape with the sugar and salt cured salmon which will taste slightly sweet and not at all salty. The degree of difficulty low for the salmon and medium for the mayonnaise. Keepability the salmon keeps for several days in the refrigerator preparation time about half an hour plus the curing process. A final garnish of dill and a few more capers and the dish is complete. It's amazing what you can do with a house brick as equipment isn't it. Now in Northern Europe this will be consumed with passion certainly but probably with a vodka. Instead I'd opt for a very fruity wine, a shenan blare, the dillau possibly a floral reasoning Australian of course. From consuming passions one at a time.