Soy-free weekly menu crossing Japanese teriyaki, Mediterranean sides and American comfort plates

Soy is the hard part of a menu like this. It hides in teriyaki, in most bottled chili sauces and in half the noodle aisle, so the sweet chili dip for the crispy baked cauliflower is made from scratch and the soba gets its label read every time. Cooking around one allergen is mostly reading, not clever substitution. The pork chops and the Sockeye salmon were never going to be a problem.

Carrots twice on one menu sounds lazy until you taste them side by side. The honey roasted carrots go in whole at 425°F for about 35 minutes, long enough for the sugars to char at the tips and the thin ends to go chewy. The ones folded through the basmati rice are cut fine and cooked only to the point where they still hold their shape. Same vegetable, two jobs.

For reheating, the panko Sockeye salmon wants 10 minutes at 400°F in a toaster oven, uncovered — a microwave turns that crust to paste. The crispy baked cauliflower takes 12 minutes at the same heat. Everything else is happy at 350°F for 15 minutes with foil over the top.

Sockeye is worth buying only in season, and July is it. The fish comes in bright red and firm enough that it needs nothing beyond herbs and panko, which is why it is on the menu now and not in February. The blueberry, charred corn and quinoa salad is the same piece of timing, with the corn charred dry in a hot pan and the blueberries folded in off the heat so they stay whole.