Salmon

WHY IT’S LIGHT Broiling is a fat-free way to cook salmon burgers; these are perked up with lemon, horseradish, and scallions and served on toasted whole-wheat buns. Yogurt flavored with fresh dill makes a very delicious—and low-fat—topping.

FLAVOR BOOSTER Roasting deepens salmon’s naturally mild flavor. Brussels sprouts also take especially well to roasting, becoming tender, slightly sweet, and undeniably delicious when seasoned with little more than salt and pepper.

GOOD TO KNOW Prepare flavorful sides to complement simply prepared fish (or other lean proteins) without introducing too many extra calories to the meal. Here, roasted tomatoes, potatoes, and a green herb sauce do the trick. If you prefer, remove the skin from the fillets before serving.

GOOD TO KNOW The salmon is steamed on a bed of escarole seasoned with onion, garlic, and lemon; lemon slices are also arranged on each fillet. Keep in mind that the escarole—which looks bulky when raw—shrinks substantially when cooked.

Just about any type of fish can be baked, whether whole, cut into steaks, or filleted. Season the fish with salt and place it in an oiled baking dish or on an oiled rimmed baking sheet; the fish may give off some liquid as it bakes so it is best to use something with sides. Bake fillets and steaks in a hot oven, about 425°F. Whole fish, which will take longer to cook, should bake in a 375°F oven. Most fillets are done when they are just cooked through at the center, the flesh opaque but still moist. Some exceptions are tuna, albacore, and salmon, which are much tastier when cooked medium rare with the flesh still translucent in the center. When cooked on the bone, whole or in steaks, all types of fish need to be cooked until the flesh can be lift ed from the bones, but just to this point and no longer. It is important to not overcook fish or it will become dry and tough. Fillets cook fairly quickly: depending on the thickness, they take from 7 to 10 minutes. A good gauge for cooking whole fish is 10 minutes per inch of thickness measured at the thickest part of the fish. Whole fish can be slashed diagonally to the bone to speed up the cooking. These are only rough guides and you should check the fish oft en while it is cooking to judge its doneness. Gauge the doneness by pushing in the flesh with your finger. It will feel soft when underdone; as it cooks and sets it will begin to feel a bit springy. Don’t hesitate to cut into it to know for sure. Besides a basic seasoning of salt, you can add a splash of wine and a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil or a pat of butter for more flavor and moisture. The fish also can be infused with a marinade before baking; marinades can be made from herbs, spices, citrus zest and juice, and olive oil. Fillets and steaks can be painted or smeared with Pesto (page 230), Chermoula (page 233), or other flavorful sauces before they are slipped into the oven. Wrap whole fish or fillets in aromatic fig or grape leaves or in branches of lime, lemon, or fennel so the leaves can perfume the fish and help trap moisture. Fish can also be baked in a juicy sauce such as a tomato sauce, seasoned sautéed onions, or a vegetable ragout. Add 5 minutes or so to the cooking time when baking fish in sauce. Salmon fillets have easy-to-spot pin bones—a row of thin white rib-like bones that extends from behind the gills to the fish’s midsection. Rub your fingers over the flesh to locate these bones; use a pair of needle-nosed pliers to pull them out of the flesh.

Fish is particularly good when poached; its fine flavor and texture are preserved in the gentle heat of the liquid. Submerged until done in hot, but not boiling, liquid, the flesh remains moist, tender, and light. Salmon, halibut, cod, sole, and trout are a few examples of fish that are well suited to poaching, whole or in steaks or fillets. Anything from plain salted water to a flavorful vegetable stock with wine (called a Court Bouillon; see page 335) can be used for the liquid. Because of its delicate flavors, poached fish is best served with a simple sauce such as a butter sauce, a mayonnaise, or a variation of salsa verde. Another way to poach fish, especially for a casual meal, is slightly different from the classic method of completely submerging the fish in the poaching liquid. I call it shallow poaching. There’s no special stock to make, the fish is in and out of the pan and onto the table in a matter of minutes, and a quick delicious sauce can be made from the liquid. Fill a low-sided heavy pan with an inch or two of water, or enough to come about halfway up the sides of the fish. Add a good splash of white wine (or a smaller one of wine vinegar); a sprig or two of parsley, fennel, or thyme—or a combination; and a large pinch of salt. Sometimes I float a slice or two of lemon in the water. Bring this to a boil and immediately turn it down to a barely perceptible simmer. Put in the fish, having seasoned it first with salt. Cook the fish for a few minutes on one side, carefully turn it over, and continue cooking until done. Be sure the water does not come back to a boil during the cooking. A thin fillet about 1/2 inch thick will cook in 5 to 7 minutes; a thick steak may take up to 12 minutes. Probe the fish to monitor the doneness. When done, remove the fish with a slotted spatula to a warm plate. To make a quick pan sauce, raise the heat and reduce the liquid by half. Have ready two generous pats of butter cut into small pieces. Whisk or swirl in the butter, bit by bit. Turn off the heat and remove the pan from the burner when the last bit of butter is added, and finish incorporating it off the heat. Taste the sauce and add, as needed, a squeeze of lemon or a pinch of salt or both. Pour the sauce over the warm fish and serve. Very thin fillets such as sole can be cooked in even less water, with butter already added. Pour 1/4 inch of water into a heavy pan, season with salt, and add a sprig or two of fresh herbs. Pour in a splash of wine or wine vinegar and about 2 tablespoons of butter. Put the pan over medium heat and when the liquid is just below a simmer, add the seasoned fillets and cover the pan. Cook until done, for 4 to 5 minutes, checking occasionally to monitor the heat. Remove the fish, raise the heat, and bring the sauce to a boil to thicken it. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed. Pour the sauce over the fish and serve.

The smoked salmon gives this sauce great texture and is also a wonderful flavor complement to the smokiness of the chile mulato. Try the sauce on pasta or with a char-grilled chicken breast.

The idea for this dish comes from a chef at culinary school who liked to bread salmon with shredded russet potatoes. Sweet potatoes add a whole new dimension to this delicate crust—a perfect counterpoint for the smoky sauce.

Frittatas are the perfect centerpiece for a brunch spread because they can be served warm or at room temperature. This one brings two classic brunch favorites—lox and eggs—together into one very attractive dish. Serving bagels on the side, though decidedly not Italian, is a nice option.

This is my favorite way to eat fish, with a very clean, fresh, and simple preparation. Agave is a natural sweetener from the blue agave plant in South America, and brushed on the salmon it creates a nice caramelized crust. Topped with salsa verde made of citrus zests and herbs, this dish is super-light and perfect on a hot summer day. Jade loves the grilled salmon, too!

When I go to a restaurant and want something light, I immediately look to the carpaccios and crudos, which often feature marinated raw fish. Smoked salmon can deliver the same light, clean flavors but without the worry of serving raw beef or fish at home. I like to arrange the salmon and apples on a platter and let guests pile them onto slices of bread themselves; the color of the salmon is simply stunning next to the green apples, which also contribute crunch and freshness.

Although aquaculture has made fresh salmon a year-round product, wild salmon does have a season, from spring through fall. At those times it’s vastly preferable to the farm-raised fish, because the best salmon—king, sockeye, and coho—has so much flavor of its own that it needs nothing but a sprinkling of salt. But a simple formula of salmon, oil or butter, and a single herb, combined with a near-foolproof oven-roasting technique, gives you many more options and makes even farm-raised salmon taste special. Be sure to preheat the pan in the oven—this allows the fish to brown before it overcooks. (If you start the same fillet in a cold pan, it will simply turn a dull pink and will not brown until it is as dry as chalk.)

Cooking in packages requires a small leap of faith to determine that the food is done, because once you open the packages you want to serve them. This method works well.

It doesn’t take much to cook salmon or to dress it up, and there’s no way simpler than this: cook fillets by any of a number of methods, then finish them with flavored oil. Here I focus on a spicy soy oil that contains slivered garlic, peanut and sesame oils, and soy sauce, but it’s easy enough to change the spirit from Asian to European. Although oil is the basis for this sauce, the quantity is minimal because heating the oil thins it, enabling even a small amount to coat and flavor the fish.

Although this minimalist but infinitely variable technique of herb-coating salmon is about as straightforward as can be, allowing the fillets to sit for a while after coating will encourage the fragrant seasonings to permeate the flesh of the fish; try fifteen minutes or so at room temperature or up to 24 hours in the refrigerator.

The intense orange color, meltingly tender texture, and wonderful flavor of gravlax give it an allure shared by few fish preparations—not bad for a dish whose name means “buried salmon” in Swedish. The curing process intensifies the color, tenderizes the texture, and enhances the flavor. Although most chefs jazz up gravlax with sauces and side dishes, it is brilliant on its own or with just a few drops of lemon or mild vinegar. And the rankest kitchen novice can make it at home. Be sure to check your salmon fillet for pinbones, the long bones that run down the center of the fillet; these are not always removed by routine filleting. Press your finger down the center of the flesh and you will feel them; remove them, one at a time, with needle-nose pliers or similar tool.

This mysterious, dark extraordinarily delicious sauce is a kind of gastrique, a relatively simple sauce based on caramelized sugar. Note that if the sugar turns black and begins to smoke, you have burned rather than caramelized it. Throw it out and start again, with lower heat and more patience this time. And if the caramel sticks to your pan and utensils when you’re done, boil some water in the pan, with the utensils in there if necessary. The caramel will loosen right away.

The process for making these salmon burgers is simple as long as you have a food processor. A portion of the salmon is finely ground, almost pureed; the machine takes care of that in about thirty seconds. Then the rest of the fish is chopped, by pulsing the machine on and off a few times. The two-step grinding process means that those flavorings that you want finely minced, like garlic or ginger, can go in with the first batch of salmon; those that should be left coarse, like onion or fresh herbs, can go in with the second batch. The only other trick is to avoid overcooking; this burger, which can be sautéed, broiled, or grilled, is best when the center remains pink (or is it orange?)—two or three minutes per side does the trick.

This is a dish that is almost too simple to believe, one that combines wonderful textures and flavors with a minimum of ingredients, no added fat, and almost no preparation or cooking time. Like the best minimalist dishes, everything counts here: the fish, the leeks—which remain crisp and assertive thanks to the quick cooking time—and even the wine or stock. The Dijon mustard provides a bit of a kick. You need a tightly covered container to preserve all the liquid and flavors inherent in this dish, but that can be as simple as a pot with a good-fitting lid or a heatproof glass casserole—anything that prevents moisture from escaping.

A choucroute need not be meat, as is the more familiar one on page 404. Alsace, where the dish originated, has a long tradition of combining sauerkraut with fish. As is always the case, buy sauerkraut that is either sold in bulk or packed in plastic and contains no more than cabbage and salt. Serve with boiled potatoes.