Slow Cooked Salmon – The only way to eat it!

The other week I was out at some restaurant and ordered the salmon. It was over cooked, over seasoned and I was so OVER IT!  All I could think about, as I fought my way through the sahara of salmon splayed petulantly on my plate, was that the succulent texture of the slow roasted salmon I had made once after reading about it on Steamy Kitchen was so much better than what I was eating. My mouth was offended that a chef could so murder the natural goodness of such a great fish! Salmon should be rich, juicy, meaty, and taste like..FISH! 

This very simple method lets these qualities of salmon stand out, while also giving you the love child of roasted salmon and fresh sashimi – You get a little bit resistant crisp on the edges from the roasting, that quickly gives way into unfolding silken petals of firm flesh that melt in your mouth…oh my!! :-)

There’s nothing better to complement this fresh tasting salmon than a freshly made mango salsa. The sweet mango provides the perfect counterpoint to the fresh fish flavor.

Definitely try this method out. It’s too easy and tasty to pass up!

Ingredients:

Salmon:

• 2-4 pieces of salmon filet cut up into single servings
• 1-2 oranges
• salt, pepper
• honey

Mango Salsa:

• 1 very ripe mango – I prefer the champagne mangos!
• 1 small red onion
• 1/2 bunch cilantro
• 2 tomatillos
• 1 jalapeno or 2 small red chilis
• 10-12 basil leaves
• 1/2 tsp salt

Steps:

1.  Heat the oven to 250

2. Season the salmon with salt, pepper, and honey by rubbing each all over the meat. Let the fish sit and come up to room temp for about 15-20 min while you prep the rest of the stuff.

3. Slice 1/4 inch thick rounds off of 1 orange. Place these slices in the bottom of an oven safe pan big enough to fit all your salmon. I used my cast iron.

4. Slice 2 more slices for each piece of salmon off the 2nd orange  as thin as you can possibly make them.

5. Place the salmon on top of the orange bed in the pan. Take 2 thin orange slices and place on top of each piece of fish. Place in the oven and cook for 30 min.  You can cook it longer if you want the fish a little more well done in texture – the low temp makes this a very flexible, forgiving dish. 30 minutes resulted in a very rare/medium-rare texture.

6.  While the salmon is cooking, dice the mango, tomatillos, and red onion.Finely dice the jalepeno/chili. Roughly chop the cilantro. Chiffonade the basil. Toss all in a bowl with some salt and the juice of the remaining orange and mix to combine. Taste and add more salt as needed.

7. Once the salmon is finished, remove it from the oven and top with mango salsa to serve. The fish will look like it might be raw, but it is actually cooked through. This fresh, tender result is definitely the BEST way, in my opinion, to eat salmon!