Succulent Salmon Steaks

After my sushi recipe turned out really good, I wanted to do another salmon based dish because salmon is so yummy! YouTube once again was my saviour and gave me this video, which lead on to finding this one too. I used bits and pieces from both recipes to create my own one, and the result was pretty excellent. Read on for more fishy goodness!

Ingredients needed to get started:

1. 2 salmon steaks (these lil' fellas are pretty expensive, so you could substitute)
2. Golden syrup (maple syrup would be better, but this is what I had)
3. Wholegrain mustard (Dijon mustard would be better, but this is what I had)
4. Soy sauce
5. Chilli powder
6. Butter
7. 3 cloves of garlic, peeled & crushed
8. 1 spring onion, chopped
9. Salt
10. Pepper

Step 1: Prepare the glaze


Start with 3 peeled garlic cloves and crush them up in a mortar and pestle with a little salt and olive oil to aid the process. Crush and grind until it is almost a paste, then set aside.

In a bowl, add 2 tablespoons of butter to 6 tablespoons of maple syrup and then heat in the microwave for 30 seconds, or until the butter has melted.

To the melted butter and syrup mixture, add 1 tablespoon of soy sauce, 1/2 tablespoon of chilli powder, and 1 tablespoon of wholegrain mustard before mixing well.

Taste the mixture and evaluate the flavours. I had to add a little sugar to bring out the sweetness, and also thin down the glaze with 2 capfuls of white vinegar (lemon juice would probably work well too, but I ran out of lemons).

Step 1: Cook the fish

Get a nonstick pan out and heat it up till it's just about smoking. Add a little olive oil into the pan and then pop the salmon steaks in. The idea is to seal in all the juices and cook the fish as quickly as possible.

Add in a few knobs of butter for flavour, then sprinkle in the crushed garlic.

Season with freshly crushed black pepper and salt. Go easy on the salt as we will add the glaze later which has soy sauce in it, which will make the dish too salty (see my fried rice dish as an example of over salting).

Add a little of the glaze over the steaks. BE CAREFUL! It tends to splatter like crazy if you miss the fish! Keep a fair distance away from the fish and be gentle, hot oil splatter hurts :(

After about 4 minutes, flip the fish over. Depending on the thickness of your steaks, you may have to keep them in longer. Don't overcook the fish though! Salmon needs very little cooking.

Season the other side and then add more of the glaze to it. The fish will now be bubbling away in a pool of sauce :)

Let the fish do its thing for a few more minutes. Just before serving, top with spring onion.

Plate up and enjoy!

That's it! Really simple :) Not too much has to be done to salmon because it already has a wonderful flavour. If I were to do it again, I would have used fillets, rather than steaks, because fillets have a skin on the back which gets crispy if done right.

- WeCannotCook