This plum salmon is seared in a herb-butter sauce and is literally ready in less than 30 minutes. When you add this to rice and sliced cucumbers with extra plum sauce, it tastes like a sushi-inspired dish. Because of how easy this recipe is, it is now in my top easy weeknight recipes!
Making the marinade
Get a generous portion of salmon fillets with the skin on. I used a pound’s worth of salmon. The marinade for the plum salmon consists of salt, garlic, crushed red pepper, ginger and plum sauce. You can make your plum sauce from scratch but I got a bottle from the grocery store. I mixed it into a thick paste and spread it generously over both sides of the salmon fillets. You can actually refrigerate this for a few hours prior to making this plum salmon recipe so that the marinade sinks deeply into the fish. Or you can season the salmon and fry it right away.
Searing the plum salmon
So you will need to melt about 1/2 a cup of unsalted butter in a hot frying pan. You can use less butter but I wanted to have enough sauce around the salmon so I could baste it with no issues. Basting is basically like splashing the meat/fish with the sauce around it as it cooks. I used my 10-inch cast-iron skillet so all the salmon fillets could fit in comfortably. Get some fresh herbs (I used dill) and fry it in the meted butter to add flavor to the butter. Then push it aside and add the salmon, skin facing down on the pan.
This plum salmon takes 10 minutes in total to get a nice sear on both sides-that is, 5 minutes on each side. Keep basting frequently throughout the cooking process so that the buttery taste seeps into the salmon. Discard the herbs you used in frying the salmon and serve the salmon warm.
I added boiled rice, sliced cucumbers and plum sauce with this plum salmon and it tasted amazing. Leftovers tasted incredible even three days later because I used it for meal prep on the weekday. If you love pan-fried seafood recipes, check out my bacon shrimp scampi!
Ingredients
0.5 kg/ 1 lb salmon fillets
1 tablespoon table salt
2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 tablespoon garlic powder or minced garlic
2 teaspoons ground ginger or ginger paste
2 tablespoons plum sauce
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup fresh dill (or other herbs of choice)
Extra plum sauce to serve
Sliced vegetables to serve
Instructions
- Mix the salt, pepper, garlic, ginger and plum sauce in a bowl and spread it over the salmon. Let it rest to room temperature.
- Melt the butter in a large frying pan on medium heat that is at least 10 inches in size and fry the dill in the melted butter for about 3-4 minutes. The herbs should look shrunken.
- Push the herbs aside and add the marinated salmon, skin side downwards on the pan.
- Fry the salmon for 5 minutes, basting constantly, and gently flip. Fry for another five minutes.
- Serve warm with your favorite carbs, veggies and extra plum sauce.
- Store any leftovers in the fridge for up to 4 days.