The Celtling has lately been going on and on about wanting “Melted Salmon” for dinner.
I can’t for the life of me figure out what she means by this, and am looking for recipe guesses to try. When I ask her to describe it she just waves her fingers over the plate and says “you know, all melty and yummy.”
In general she likes things fairly plain, with maybe a cream sauce or butter. I’m picturing somehting I had once years ago in a cafeteria style place, which I could only describe as a browned cream sauce (I think it was actually on haddock.) But I have no idea how to recreate that.
I had a bagel with lox a few weeks ago at a local deli, and I swear it tasted like I was eating salmon-flavored butter, it was that good and rich and . . . melty.
Try this simple recipe. Chuck the onion in at the start instead of dirtying another pan and don’t add the fluid from the salmon immediately wait to see if you want to thin the sauce. Serve over anything really - good bread toasted would be better than pasta. I’d probably go for a small mound of vegies.
Of course you could use flaked freshly cooked salmon or smoked salmon as the whim takes you.
Reminds me of a recipe I had in Vegas once. The salmon was just about melt in your mouth. I’m thinking it was done with a sous vide and the fat coated the meat - almost like a good brisket.
Pate - Could be - it must be something she had at school or a friend’s house. We eat salmon a lot but it’s nearly always just poached, with maybe some lemon juice.
Just remembered: she did at one point mention putting it over spaghetti. ?!?
I think I’ll try the bechamel tonight. It’s funny how obvious it seems that that’s what I had all those years ago. I think at the time it was served to me, I probably didn’t know what it was called, so just never made the conenction until today. Brains is weird.
Could it have been a salmon-cream sauce over pasta? The way I make it, you cook some onions till soft, make a roux, add cream and parmesan cheese, and flaked salmon (smoked or plain).
I have had poached salmon with Hollandaise sauce - that was pretty melty and yummy. Warning: Hollandaise sauce is tricky to make, and it wants to kill you.
I gave her salmon with browned bechamel over spaghetti and she was quite disappointed. She asked if I could “rub the salmon over the spaghetti to make it yummy.” So I warmed up some of the juice and poured it over and she was happier but definitely not what she was hoping for.
Hello Again: I think the salmon cream over pasta may be the one - recipe please?
We used to make a similar dish with dry-smoked salmon, parmesan, dill, and a bit of nutmeg in a cream sauce. Butter, too. Extremely rich, very ‘melty’, and delicious.
haha, the whole recipe was in my previous post but I’ll lay it out more clearly.
Dice some onion small (depends how much you like onion, from 1/2 to 1 fist-sized onion).
Cook onion in some olive oil or butter over medium heat until its translucent and soft
Add to the pan: 1 TBSP butter and 1 TBSP flour per cup of liquid you plan to add. Stir em together (with the onions, it doesn’t matter) into a paste – a roux --and stir it for a minute or two in the pan. (Don’t let it brown, as you would for gravy).
When the roux is pale yellow, add 1/2 cup milk, light cream, or half-and-half and whisk smooth. Add a fistful of shaved Parmesan or Romano or Asiago cheese and stir until combined.
Add some black pepper, and a little nutmeg (a teensy pinch) and simmer about 10 minutes. Keep topping up the liquid until you have a texture that’s good for you.
Empty a 5-oz pouch of boneless salmon into the sauce (sold near the canned tuna). Stir around until it’s warm, salt if needed, serve over cooked linguine.
You can also use smoked salmon, diced lox, or leftover salmon from last night’s dinner. It’s all good. You can add a 1/2 a box of frozen chopped spinach, defrosted and squeezed of all water. Then you have salmon cream sauce Florentine. Fancy!