How to crisp salmon skin
What separates OK cooks from Really Great cooks? Not what you might think. No, it’s not the ability to whip up a croquembouche like it’s a reflex action, or craft a molecularly gastronomic dinner party menu on the turn of a dime. It’s actually the little things. The smallest masteries of techniques. The tiny refinements. These are what give you an edge in the kitchen. The details. Details like… achieving Peak Crisp when you’re cooking salmon.
And can we just pause to get a ‘Yum’ from the crowd for crispy salmon skin? How ridiculously delicious is it? When you’re pan-frying some jolly good fish, you simply do not want flaccid skin so let’s look at how we can avoid that particular hot mess.
1. Start with even-sized, evenly thick fillets so they cook at the same rate. Our fillets are 150g each. Skin-on is a given (duh!), and pin-boned is a nice refinement but not life-death. (The pin bones are the row of small bones that poke out of the flesh; to remove them, run your fingers over the fish to locate them, then use tweezers to haul them out.) Dry off your salmon skin using kitchen paper. Wet skin is the enemy of crispness. You can also dry it off, uncovered, in the fridge for an hour or so if you prefer.
2. Salt the skin well with sea salt flakes.
3. Heat 2-3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil in a non-stick pan over medium-high heat. Add the salmon, skin-side down, then reduce the heat to medium. Press down on each fillet for about 10 seconds to make the dish as flat in the pan as possible (you can use a spatula for this). This helps the skin crisp evenly. Cook for 5 minutes, or until the salmon is three-quarters cooked through.
4. Turn the fish over, then cook for 1 minute to finish cooking; the salmon should still be a little pink in the middle. Turn it over again to blast the skin for a last 60 seconds and make sure it’s ultra crispy, then you’re set.
Salmon kindly supplied by Mt Cook Alpine Salmon. When it’s time to go salmon shopping, please show them some love. For stockists click here, for salmon recipes and more click here.