Ingredient

Salmon

Salmon is fatty for a fish, which makes it forgiving compared with cod or sole — but it still goes from silky to chalky faster than most people expect, and the white curd that appears on the surface is the visible sign that it has.

Why fish cooks so fast

Fish muscle is built quite differently from land-animal muscle. The fibres are short, arranged in sheets separated by very thin layers of connective tissue, and that connective tissue converts to gelatine at a much lower temperature and in far less time than beef collagen does.

So fish needs no long cooking to become tender — it is tender to begin with — and the sheets separate into flakes very readily. The consequence is that the whole cooking process happens in a few minutes and the difference between perfect and overdone is a matter of a minute or two.

The practical rule is to take salmon off the heat while the centre still looks slightly translucent. It carries on cooking.

The white stuff

The white, slightly curdled substance that seeps out of cooking salmon is albumin — a protein that is dissolved in the fluid inside the fish when raw. Heat makes it coagulate, and as the muscle fibres contract they squeeze it to the surface where it sets white.

It is entirely harmless and entirely edible. It is also a reliable indicator: a little is normal, a lot means the fish is being cooked too hard or for too long, because the more the fibres contract the more they push out.

Two things reduce it. Cook more gently — the single biggest factor. And brine briefly — ten minutes in salted water before cooking noticeably reduces how much appears, which is a trick worth knowing if you are serving it to people who mind.

Crisp skin, every time

1. Dry the skin thoroughly with kitchen paper. Any moisture has to boil off before crisping can start.
2. Salt the skin and leave it for a few minutes, then blot again. It draws out more moisture.
3. Put the fillet skin-side down into a hot, lightly oiled pan and press it flat for the first twenty seconds with a spatula — fish curls as the skin contracts, and lifting the flesh off the pan is what gives you pale patches.
4. Leave it alone. Most of the cooking happens on the skin side, over three-quarters of the total time.
5. Turn it for the last minute only, or finish it under a grill.
6. Serve skin up, so it does not steam and soften against the plate.

Methods

Pan-fried, skin on

The best texture contrast — crisp skin, soft flesh. Needs a hot pan and patience.

Roasted, low

Around 120 to 140°C for a large piece. Very gentle, very even, and much harder to overdo than a hot oven.

Poached

In barely-trembling liquid, or turned off entirely and left to coast. The classic treatment for a whole side served cold.

Grilled or barbecued

Skin on and skin down, or it falls through. Oil the grill, not just the fish.

Cured

Gravadlax — salt, sugar, dill and time, no heat at all. If you are curing fish to eat raw or lightly cured, follow the food-safety authority's advice on freezing it first.

Farmed and wild, and safety

Farmed salmon is fattier, milder, paler-fleshed unless coloured, and consistent. Wild salmon is leaner, firmer, stronger-tasting and far more variable. Because it is leaner, wild salmon overcooks faster — a recipe timed for farmed will dry it out.

FoodHQ does not publish cooking temperatures or keeping times for raw meat, poultry, fish or eggs. Those are safety guidance and need qualified review this site does not have. In the UK the Food Standards Agency publishes them. That includes anything eaten raw or lightly cured, where their advice on freezing before use is the relevant guidance.

Common questions