Simple Recipes Best Preparation When You’re Cooking Fresh Fish

In Alaska, salmon is a way of life. Everywhere I look in downtown Anchorage, I see the sleek silver fish: salmon on T-shirts, salmon earrings, plates, paintings, rods to catch salmon and tantalizing feather flies to lure them to the line.

What will the future salmon trends be? I hope to find out as I fill a request to judge a “Symphony of Salmon” contest with 37 different salmon products, each representing a new “value added” idea to diversify sales.

Most of my fellow judges are burly industry veterans of distribution and marketing. Their talk is all of shelf-life, package appeal and head-to-head competition. I pipe up and say that my expertise is in taste, and they look rather taken aback; taste seems low among their priorities.

It appears there is a glut of salmon, due partly to a huge increase in the numbers of wild fish. The situation has reversed dramatically since the late ‘8Os, when stocks were so low that crisis loomed.

Wild Alaska salmon now competes with farmed Atlantic salmon from Norway, Chile and Canada. Atlantic salmon is a separate species, delicate and fragrant, excellent for smoking and a favorite of chefs. Up here, mentioning it is the equivalent of saying a bad word.

Before coming to Alaska, I was aware of the five Pacific salmon species, but now the dramatic differences between them are clearer. The fresh fillets and steaks offered in the lower 48 retail markets typically come from either king or silver salmon. The prized king salmon makes up only 1 percent by weight of the commercial catch, though in value the figure is much higher. King offers the best sport, and the best eating.

Silver or Coho is slightly paler but equally tasty and comprises 5 percent of the catch.

We rarely see rich, meaty sockeye or red salmon even though it makes up about 35 percent of the total harvest (almost all goes to Japan).

That leaves pink and chum salmon, which account for almost 60 percent of the catch. The pink is small and mild, a humble cousin of the splendid king. Even at the end of a line it offers little resistance to the sportsman. Chum has earned a bad reputation from its native name, “keta,” which means dog.

Naturally, pink and chum salmon are the ones that purveyors are eager to market, and it is basically these two that I am here to taste.

“Don’t worry,” says Linda Sievers, food editor of the Anchorage Daily News. “You’ll start out with the easiest, the retail and gift items; it’s the last, food-service section that’s tough.”

She finds the contest’s search for innovation quite a challenge: “Salmon flavor is pretty strong, and it needs powerful treatment like smoking or pickling to balance its richness. There’s a limit as to what you can do with it, not like halibut, which is mild, a blank canvas.” Sievers is right. Rating such retail items as salmon spread, a jumbo seadog and Cajun smoked king salmon nuggets is indeed amusing. The retail winner proves to be a more than respectable smoked salmon chowder studded with vegetables.

Gift ideas such as honey-smoked salmon and a lively salmon jerky prove equally impressive. I am disappointed when my favorite chum salmon caviar, lightly salted with golden eggs that pop on the tongue, does not earn a mention from the judging panel.

But I am hard hit when it comes to food service. The lineup of salmon burgers, salmon franks and anonymous salmon crumbles, salmon strips and salmon shreds seems unending - nourishment reduced to the lowest common denominator. Here my fellow judges thrive, discussing annual volume and cost-per-serving with gusto.

Packaging is all part of the game and I have to admit that a handsome silvered plastic pouch catches my eye (cumbersome cans will soon be a thing of the past). The contents of this particular pouch, “processed for a mild taste comparable to tuna,” are less than enticing. It wins, of course; how could it fail, with a projected price of 28 cents per portion?

I leave Alaska still sticking to my preference for fresh fish cooked in the simplest ways, as in the following recipe. But I’ll be looking out for alternatives. There’s more than one way to skin a salmon.

Crisp-Skinned Salmon Fillet With Coulis of Tomato and Basil

Why did no one think, until recently, of sauteing the skin of a fish fillet until crisp, a delectable background to the moist flesh? Be sure the salmon has been scaled before it is filleted.

Coulis:

1 pound tomatoes, peeled, seeded and diced

Salt, pepper

1 medium bunch basil

1 garlic clove, finely chopped

Juice of 1 lemon, or more to taste

Salmon:

1 to 2 salmon fillets with skin (about 1-1/2 pounds)

Salt, pepper

2 tablespoons olive oil

Sprinkle tomatoes with salt and pepper and stir gently. Leave to drain in strainer 15 to 30 minutes. Strip basil leaves from stems, reserving several sprigs for decoration. Shred remaining leaves. Transfer drained tomatoes to bowl. Stir in garlic, lemon juice and shredded basil. Taste and adjust seasonings. Cover and chill.

With tweezers, pull out pin bones running along center of fish fillets. Cut salmon into 4 portions. Sprinkle both sides with salt and pepper to taste.

Heat oil in large skillet with flameproof handle. Add salmon, skin-side down, and fry without moving pieces 2 to 3 minutes or until skin is crisp (when ready, it will shrink and loosen from pan surface.)

Transfer pan to oven. Bake at 425 degrees until cooked to your taste, 2 to 4 minutes for rare, 5 to 8 minutes for well done (cooking time depends on thickness of fish).

Transfer fish to warmed serving plates, skin-side up. Stir coulis to blend and adjust seasoning if necessary. Spoon chilled coulis beside hot fish. Garnish with basil sprigs and serve at once.

Yield: 4 servings.