Good Fish_ Sustainable Seafood Recipes From the Pacific Coast - Becky Selengut [41]
SEASON: Chinook: May to September, with a southeast Alaska winter season from mid-October to mid-April. Pink: June to November. Sockeye: May to September. Coho: June to October. Chum: June to November.
BUYING TIPS: A salmon’s pin bones run along the dorsal side of both fillets. Want a crystal ball into the salmon’s recent past? Look carefully at the pin bones. Think of it this way: pin bones are just like any bone, and the older the flesh gets, the more it pulls away from the bone. If you see a divot (flesh pulled back from the bone) around the pin bones, it’s a sign that the fillet is old. A fresh salmon will have pin bones that are right at the surface of the flesh or slightly beneath. Furthermore, if you see gaping or tearing of the flesh, it’s usually a sign that the fish was mishandled.
QUESTIONS TO ASK BEFORE YOU PULL OUT YOUR WALLET: Most importantly, is this salmon wild or farmed? Stick with wild. Stick with wild. Stick with wild. I feel so strongly about this I said it three times. There are some farmed salmon operations that are closed containment; that is my only current exception to this rule. Another question would be, what river did it come from?
CARING FOR YOUR GOOD FISH: When I get any fish fillet home that I’m not able to use that night, I take it out of its packaging, pat it dry with paper towels, rewrap it in plastic wrap, put it in a drip pan (a perforated pan or a colander over a bowl), and throw some ice on top before storing it in the refrigerator. This ensures that the fillet is optimally chilled to preserve freshness and is ready to cook the next day.
HOW THIS TYPE OF SEAFOOD IS RAISED OR HARVESTED: There are three main ways to catch a wild salmon.
Purse seining: Think of a purse seine as a big net that is pulled from the back (stern) of the boat into the sea by a smaller skiff (boat). Once in the water, the skiff pulls the net in a circle around a school of salmon as they swim by. Then the net is pulled up, like a purse with a drawstring top, scooping the fish into the net.
Trolling (hook and line): As mentioned previously, trolling is the commercial equivalent of rod and reel fishing: several lines off the boat, individual fish caught and handled.
Gill-netting: Gill nets trap the salmon in the mesh of a net as they swim by. As the fish try to back out of the net, their gills get caught in its holes.
SUSTAINABLE SUBSTITUTES: Salmon has a lot of flavor and, depending on which species you get, varying levels of fat. You’ll want to substitute a fatty fish such as black cod for a piece of chinook or sockeye salmon. Leaner salmon species, such as chum, pink, and coho, could be substituted with arctic char.
What’s that white stuff you sometimes see on salmon when it cooks? A lot of people think it is fat, but it is actually a protein called albumin (also found in egg whites). The goal in cooking salmon perfectly is to not see albumin form on the top of the fish. See the final salmon photograph on page 103: albumin has formed and is clearly visible between the flakes on the top of the fish. This is exactly what you want to avoid. A little around the bottom or sides is fine, but when the albumin comes out of the top in great quantity, the fish is overcooked.
THE ANATOMY OF A FLAKE
There’s a lot in a word. It seems that most of fish cookery has boiled down to five letters: F-L-A-K-E. If you are comfortable with the concept of “flake,” “flaking,” or often, “just flaking,” then proceed to the recipes. If, though, this concept is one of the world’s great mysteries to you, as it was to many of my cooking students over the years, then you might need some helpful clarification.
First, a story. I once knew someone who had a temp job copyediting recipes. She was most definitely not a cook and could burn water, bless her heart. In her one day at this job, she took out the word “just” every single time