Fellow food blogger Meatballs & Milkshakes is a good source for reliable recipes. And so I was intrigued a while ago when I saw a recipe for Ginger Glazed Salmon that she called her favorite salmon recipe, and is basically salmon teriyaki with the addition of ginger and sake substituted by red (?!) wine. But since I trust M&M I decided to give it a try anyway and I was glad I did, because it was great! Not only is the sauce very good, also the way of cooking the salmon medium rare in a low oven is given sous-vide results without actually using sous-vide equipment. I used a thermometer to get the texture just right (core temperature of 43C/110F, just like sous-vide). The texture is just amazing and just like sous-vide: very tender and juicy. A friend stayed over for dinner who hates fish, but he loved this Ginger Glazed Salmon, the first piece of salmon ever that he finished.

Since I cooked the salmon with red wine, I decided to drink the same red wine with it as well and even that went rather well. The stainless-steel fermented bottle-aged aglianico from a small producer from Campania (where this grape is usually fermented and aged in wood) was quite a good match.

Just out of curiosity I’ll have to make it again with sake or white wine instead of red wine. With all the ginger and soy sauce, I’m not even sure that I will be able to taste the difference. I think that it will also pair well with gewurztraminer or off-dry riesling.

Thanks M&M for this great recipe!

Ingredients

For 3 servings

450 grams (1 pound) salmon fillet

10 cm (4″) piece of ginger, grated

1 garlic clove, minced

60 ml (1/4 cup) low sodium soy sauce

120 ml (1/2 cup) red wine

60 ml (1/4 cup) mirin

2 Tbsp brown sugar

juice of 1/2 lime

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 green onion (green part only)

Preparation

Put the soy sauce, red wine, mirin, brown sugar, garlic, and 3/4 of the ginger in a sauce pan.

Cook over medium heat until reduced by half (about 10 minutes).

Take off the heat and add the lime juice and remaining ginger. Stir and let cool to lukewarm (35C/100F or less).

Preheat the oven to 125C/250F.

Oil a baking dish and add the salmon, skin side down.

Insert the probe of an instant-read thermometer into the thickest part of the salmon.

Cover the top of the salmon with 3 Tbsp of the glaze and let marinate for 5 minutes.

Then add another 3 Tbsp of the glaze and put into the oven at 125C/250F.

Bake until the core temperature reaches 43C/110F, basting with additional glaze every 10 minutes or so. Since the oven is only 125C/250F, this will take 40 minutes or so. By using this low temperature, the fish will be cooked evenly.

Garnish with green onion and serve on a hot plate with stir-fried veggies and rice.

Serving on warm plates is always a good idea, but in this case it is more important since the fish is only 43C/109F to begin with, so it would cool too quickly otherwise.