Gravadlax

I love smoked salmon, I could eat it for breakfast - have something else for lunch - and then have some more smoked salmon for dinner, maybe, as part of a bigger meal, you know what I mean! Anyway, I like it, yeah?
I don't have the money or the equipment to actually be able to live the lifestyle described above, but Gravadlax is probably a suitable alternative. I have a great-great-aunt, my oldest relative, but still under 100, who makes the besteset, most melt in the mouth version of it. Who the hell knows what her secret is, for all I know she buys it in, every time I've asked her she replies with a peal of giggles and mumbles something about some salt and sugar and a few days in the fridge. Then she sits back, watches you inhale her creation, has a shot or two of cognac and asks when I'm going to get married. Maybe this is some kind of special fetishistic singles bashing, she'll give me the recipe when I have a man to prepare it for. Bitch. (obviously not!)
There's another bookshop going out of business near my office, it was a real mess in there and all the good cookbooks were gone, but I found this generic looking Fish & Seafood for a few pounds and decided to give it a good home. It looks like a childrens book, there's a hole in the front cover! You can see scales through it, scales like a fish has! Well anyway, that's enough excitement for now, fun is fun but let's be serious for a minute.
I've had to use my imagination to a certain extent with this recipe, I only have half the amount of salmon, and what exactly is white pepper? I've seen it in old ladies houses at the back of the cupboard, reserved for throwing into burglars eyes. So I'm using black, black like my heart.
I halved all the other ingredients, wrapped it up nice and pretty, threw it in the fridge. And now we play the waiting game...
Result:It's three days later, I've felt like a prisoner, tied to the fridge (so you know, not too bad), I had to turn this baby around every 12 hours, so no going out galivanting and painting the town red. Nevermind, here's the big payoff!
The first bite was very salty and seriously peppery, but the fattier pieces near the skin are almost perfect. Yeah, too much salt, foiled again! I'll get you yet, Penguin!

Incidentally, this is what my brother made with some of the leftover pieces of salmon - probably won't make it onto the Christmas table.