I massacred this fish. It was shameful. As a person who hates over-cooked seafood, snuffs her nose when bones are left in a fillet at a restaurant, and figures that if she’s going to eat a generally unsustainable thing it had better be the best thing she ever ate, I currently despise myself. My dinner guests were kind, and it was still edible, but it’s like over-cooking a steak. And Personally I think any kind of beef that isn’t sliced paper thin and eaten raw is overcooked, but for fish there really is a clear cut-off point between lovely and “this cook should be shucked like an oyster and left to dry in a rack like a salted cod.”
The problem was that I got the fish frozen. Well, that was part of the problem.
I never eat Atlantic salmon. Never. Everything you can buy at a poissonerie/fish market/grocery store is farmed. That means it’s pumped up with antibiotics and all sorts of nasty drugs that get both into the fish and into the water through the fish’s excrement. And since the antibiotics are in the fish feed, tons of the stuff just falls uneaten to the ocean floor where it either pollutes the water or gets swept out to sea to pollute other fish and other waters. Not to mention the fact that those salmon eat lots of other delicious and edible fish which are probably fished unsustainably, dragging up precious ocean floor in the name of a North American heart-healthy dinner.
But I met someone who catches landlocked fish (“Ouananiche” in Quebecois) trapped in Quebec lakes after the last glacier period. He says they run from the lakes into rivers around Lac St-Jean, QC as well as Maine, Vermont and New York state. It’s probably hard to get a license, and you don’t catch a whole lot in a single go, but it’s super sustainably caught (it’s fly-fishing, certainly not dredging or anything involving nets after all). The downside, he says, is that the fish aren’t always that flavourful. They’ve been eating a lot of smelt this year, he says (maybe since there’s no other fish around to eat anymore…), so they’re oily but bland. Fair enough. I’ll smother them in red wine sauce…
…Which would have been fine except I wanted to fillet the fish to cook it faster and more evenly (and to follow the recipe), but I didn’t have time to defrost it. So instead I followed the frozen fish rule of throwing it in the oven for twice as long. It didn’t work for me. After about 20 minutes some parts were starting to look cooked but some clearly weren’t. I got nervous. It was already cleaned, at least (the insides taken out), but the head was left on and it was folded over. I figured I should cut it open and lay it out flat so it’d cook more evenly. I’d coated it in oil to help, and a little salt and pepper, but because of the uneven cooking I was fooled into thinking it wasn’t done, and undercooked seafood at a dinner party is scary.
So I chopped off the head and tail to get that out of the way and threw the rest back in the oven. I even tried to quasi-fillet it when it was half done cooking. Getting the vertebrae and all the bones out at that point was pretty dumb, though. I wanted to either take the skin off or get it crispy, but it wasn’t coming off and the fish was already over-cooked so I couldn’t get it crispy without a second massacre, if that’s even possible. It would essentially have been beating a dead horse.
But, you know what? It was okay. The red wine sauce was just a bottle of so-so red wine boiled down until it reduced by half with some water, shallots, garlic, thyme, salt and pepper. Couldn’t have been any easier. If I’d had vegetable or chicken broth I would have thrown that in instead of the water, but I think we’ve already established that I’m a disastrous cook, so I clearly didn’t do that…
In an effort to never let anyone in the world make the same mistakes I did with a treat of sustainable fish, here’s the recipe for how you’re supposed to make this dish:
For the red wine sauce:
1/4 minced shallots
1 tsp fennel seeds, lightly crushed with the side of a knife (or a mortar and pestle)
1 star anise pod
2 tsp honey (not sure if this is really necessary…the wine will probably be sweet enough, especially if you use Cabernet Sauvigonon or Malbec or Shiraz instead of pinot noir)
1 bottle of pinot noir (or other red wine. Pinot Noir just sounds so chi-chi, doesn’t it?)
4 cups vegetable of chicken stock (or water. I used water and feared for the worst, but I thought it was great and I’m usually picky about that sort of thing in other dishes)
For the fish:
1 lb wild king salmon fillet, skinned, pin bones removed, and cut into 4 equal portions. Please, please, please don’t use Atlantic farmed salmon for this dish, or “organic” farmed salmon from BC or Ireland or Norway (the latter two of which are also still “Atlantic”).
2 tbsp olive oil
pinch of salt
1 cup cold unsalted butter (or less. It’s pretty decadent to add an entire cup. I used coconut oil, which is my butter replacement of choice, and I used about 1/2 cup. It was more than enough)
Directions: Any idiot can make this sauce, which is why I didn’t mess that part up, at least. Not even by using water instead of broth and by using cabernet sauvignon instead of pinot noir.
Put all the sauce ingredients in a medium saucepan over high heat. When the liquid comes to a boil reduce the heat to between medium and medium-low and simmer, uncovered, for about 40 minutes, or until you have about 1 1/2 cups of sauce remaining. You can’t cover it, so it’s going to splatter all over your stove but it will be delicious. If you turn the heat down too far it won’t simmer and it’ll never reduce. So expect some light cleaning after but expect to be full and happy.
That is, as long as you don’t completely destroy the fish. If you follow Becky Selengut’s actual directions below you’ll be just fine. Don’t pull a me and just roast it in the oven from frozen to over-cooked…
While the sauce is simmering down, turn the oven to 250 degrees Fahrenheit for the fish. Have you ever set your oven that low?
Put the salmon pieces on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper. Spread the oil evenly between the fillets by pouring 1/2 tbsp of oil on each and lightly rubbing the tops of the fish with your fingers to coat the flesh.
Roast the salmon for 10-12 minutes, or until a “gentle push” (writes Selengut) on the top of the fish flakes it. It’s supposed to be served a little rare. (Oops…)
Not a LOT rare, but a little. Tent the baking sheet with aluminum foil to keep it warm. This is why you wanted it rare, since it’ll keep cooking slightly while you finish the sauce.
Strain the sauce through a fine mesh sieve to remove the spices and minced shallots (or don’t. Just don’t eat the star anise. It’s fine to eat the shallots and fennel and it saves the hassle of straining). Put the sieved sauce back in the saucepan over medium-low heat. Whisk in the cold butter (or coconut oil…) about a tablespoon at a time. You could also just plop it all in and it’d probably be fine, too…
How to serve:
If you used 1 cup of cold, unsalted butter as instructed: scoop about 2 tablespoons of sauce onto each plate and top with the salmon. Or spoon the sauce on top of the salmon. Your call.
If you used 1/2 cup butter or coconut oil: Generously scoop 3 or more tablespoons of sauce onto each plate and top with the salmon. Or spoon the sauce on top of the salmon. Serve the remaining sauce on the side. You can have more since it’s not quite as ridiculously heavy or luxurious. The question is, how French do you feel today? I like adding more and not going over board with the butter or oil because I like how the sauce soaks into roasted vegetables or crusty, fluffy bread. I also like not feeling like I just ate a pound of butter. I, apparently, do not like feeling particularly French and portion-conscious.
Leave a Reply