Wild, Wild West II

When I was a child, we received flaked salmon in bottles from family friends in Japan. They were delicious, but quite expensive (~$35/bottle).

That delicious memory resurfaced when I saw the salmon furikake recipe posted on JustBento.com. I've been itching to make this for months...and we had 11 oz of fresh salmon filet sitting in the fridge.

Salmon Furikake from JustBento.com

This makes about a cup. Increase the amounts proportionately to suit the amount of salmon you have. It can be frozen.

1 raw salmon filet with skin on, about 150g / 4 1/2 oz
Salt
Sake (as in rice wine, not salmon)
1 Tbs mirin
2 tsp soy sauce (light soy is preferred)

If you are starting with some premade salted salmon, skip this step: salt both sides of the salmon filet well, and leave in the refrigerator for at least an hour, preferably overnight. This not only salts the fish but draws out some moisture as well.

Wipe off any excess moisture from the fish. Put skin side down in a dry non-stick frying pan. Add about 1/2 cup of sake. Put on a lid and let cook over medium heat until the fish is completely steam-cooked and the sake has evaporated.

Take the fish out of the pan, let cool and take off the skin. Flake the fish finely with a fork and your hands. While you work, remove any fine bones.

Wipe out the frying pan and put the fish flakes back in the pan. Add another tablespoonful of sake, the mirin, and soy sauce. Stir around to evaporate the moisture. At this point you can leave the flakes fairly moist, or continue stirring until they are quite dry and finely flaked. The more you dry it out, the longer it will keep. Just do not let it burn or color too much.

Let the flakes cool completely. Store in the refrigerator for about 1 week or so if it’s quite moist, and 2 weeks if it’s drier.


Our result...

Salmon Furikake

We used almost triple the amount of salmon and only doubled the liquid amounts, since we ran out of shoyu and mirin. I was hoping that we could get it finer and fluffier like the ones I used to get in the bottle. This is still delicious. I think letting it sit in the fridge for a day makes a positive difference by drying it out a little.

One of my, I hate to say "resolution" since I do not make resolutions, goals this year is to cut down on my rice consumption, in particular, white rice. I did well for a bit, but this has made me fall off the wagon temporarily.

Of course, since we made this, I bought yamaimo, fukujinzuke, and kyuurizuke. I've been gorging on grated yamaimo (tororo) over everything before it goes bad, along with my pickles, and furikake.

Oishii!

- Cassaendra