Festive Fish - A Feast for all Senses
Who doesn’t like a healthy lunch for the holidays? Whether you celebrate Christmas or not, this recipe is bound to be a showstopper! The combination of colors and textures - crunchy toasted almonds, red pomegranate seeds, plumped cranberries cooked in jus d’orange, all come together so exquisitely in this dish.
This recipe isn’t one of my easier recipes, only because you have to remember so many things. This is a 3 step process, and it starts with the fish. Then comes the dill sauce, and the almond/pomegranate tapenade.
Here’s what you will need for this recipe:
4-5 salmon filets (fresh or thawed)
125 grams of garlic butter
1/2 cup of honey
1 cup of cranberries
1 cup of orange juice
1 cup of slivered almonds
1 bunch of parsley
1/4 shallot diced up
2 table spoons of orange zest
1 cup of sour cream
1 cup of pomegranate seeds
Step 1: Fish
Heat up the oven to 425F. While the oven is heating up, line up the salmon filets on a large baking dish. Make sure you add several sheets of foil because the butter may run and spill onto the baking dish. Sprinkle salt and pepper on to the fish.
In a small bowl, heat up the 125 grams of butter in a microwave for 30 seconds until its melted. Pour in 1 /2 cup of honey and mix it all up.
Pour the honey butter mixture over the fish filets.
Cover the baking dish with a sheet of foil - try to cover it well because the fish will cook within the foil and retain the juices
Once the oven is ready, place the covered baking dish into the oven and bake for 15 min at 425F.
After 15 minutes, remove the top layer of foil and bake for another 10 minutes uncovered. The salmon needs to cook at high heat uncovered so that it can caramelize.
Once the fish has caramelized, take it out of the oven and set aside to cool for 15 minutes.
Step 2: Dill Spread/Sauce
Sour cream: Add1 cup of sour cream into a small serving bowl
Shallots: Dice up 1/4 shallot and mix them into the same bowl
Lemon Zest: Grate one lemon and add 2 teaspoons of lemon zest in the bowl
Salt: Add salt to taste and a squeeze of lemon
Dill: Chop up a bunch of dill and add it in the bowl
Mix the dill, lemon zest, and shallots in the sour cream mixture. Taste and add salt/pepper if needed.
Cover the bowl and refrigerate it for at least 30 minutes
Step 3: Almond/Pomegranate Tapenade
Heat up 1 cup of orange juice in saucepan on medium heat. Once the juice is hot (do not let it boil), add in the 1 cup of cranberries and turn off the stove right away. Set aside for 15 minutes. This technique is called ‘plumping the cranberries’ - they come out juicy and plump!
Heat up 1 cup of almonds in a small skillet on medium- high. Almonds take only 3-5 minutes to roast, so keep an eye on your skillet. Once you hear a crackling sound, the almonds are ready. Turn off the stove immediately and transfer the toasted almonds into a small serving bowl. I would not use any oil or any kind of butter to heat up the almonds. Just a skillet on it’s own is plenty fine.
In a medium serving bowl, add the 1 cup of toasted almonds, 1 cup of plump cranberries (strain the cranberries and set 1 cup of jus d’orange to the side) 1 cup of pomegranate seeds. Pour in a few teaspoons of jus d’orange for texture. Avoid a lot of liquid because the tapenade will be soggy.
Mix everything really well and add in a few pieces of chopped parsley. Mix again. Set aside, and ready to serve.
Now, it’s time to prepare this layered dish. I used a large serving dish for this recipe - so if you have one, definitely use it. Carefully transfer the filets onto a serving dish. Spread a thin layer of the dill sauce evenly over the fish. With a table spoon, scoop up the tapenade and top it up. The pomegranate tends to spill over and that’s fine. It doesn’t have to be perfect because the best dishes are all a bit imperfect in the end. Serve the salmon at room temperature with a side dish of potatoes or green beans. More on that in future recipes! Bon apetit!