Salmon in My Style
Submitted by buba
Restaurant-style salmon, sliced thin and gently butter-cooked until silky, draped over greens in a pool of reduced white wine and mushroom cream sauce. An elegant chef’s plate made at home.
YIELD
6 servingsPREP
10 minCOOK
40 minREADY
1 hrsThis is a dish plated like something from a fine San Francisco dining room, and it cooks like it too. The salmon is sliced thin on the bias, pounded gently between plastic, and cooked with real restraint, sliding the pan on and off the heat so the fish barely sets and stays silky.
The sauce is the true labor of love. Shallots and mushrooms sweat in butter, then white wine and fish fumet reduce down before a cup of cream goes in.
Twenty patient minutes of reduction later, you strain it through a fine chinois and reduce again until it coats the back of a spoon, glossy and pale.
To serve, spoon the sauce into a pool, set a little salad in the center, and drape the salmon over the top. A few red basil leaves finish it. It’s restaurant cooking, scaled down to your own stove.
Chef Tips
- Pound the salmon thin and even so it cooks in a flash and stays tender, never dry.
- Watch the sauce color. It should read more white than gray, so don’t let the mushrooms overtake it.
- Reduce the sauce until it naps the back of a spoon, then strain it for a silky, lump-free finish.
- Lean on the off-heat method to control the gentle cooking. Salmon goes from just-right to overdone in seconds.
Variations
- Stir a squeeze of lemon or a spoonful of capers into the finished sauce for brightness.
- Swap the salmon for halibut, trout, or another firm fillet.
- Fold fresh dill or tarragon into the sauce in place of the basil garnish.
Ingredients
Directions
In a sauté pan heat the butter, then add the shallots, and mushrooms.
Cook briefly for about two minutes.
Add the wine and 1 cup of fish fume, cook about 5 minutes more.
Add cream to thicken (sauce should be more white than gray).
Reduce for 20 minutes, then strain through chinois.
Reduce again for 3 to 4 minutes more.
Sauce should be thick enough to coat a spoon.
Whip, add salt and pepper and reserve.
Slice the salmon from the boned fish at an angle, about 1 to 1½ inches thick.
Pound the fillets thin under a dampened plastic paper and store in parchment paper until ready to cook.
Salt the salmon lightly inside and out.
In a non-stick pan, heat 2 tablespoons of butter.
When the butter is hot, take the pan off the heat, place the salmon in the pan, return the pan to heat, and cook briefly.
Remove from heat, turn once, and place back on the heat.
Cook for three or four minutes more.
Take the pan off of the heat and turn the salmon one last time for the “cool side” to absorb some of the juices.
To serve, spoon sauce into a pool on a serving plate, place salad in center of the plate, and arrange salmon on the salad.
Garnish with red basil leaves.
Comments
