Poached Salmon
Every once in a while, the spirit moves me to try something bold and daring, something I've never done before. In this case, a new cooking method: poaching. Poaching is supposed to be fast! Simple! Elegant! Why hadn't I tried it before?
So I armed myself with a recipe for poached salmon and got to cooking.
And it cooked. And cooked. And cooked. The salmon remained completely raw on top. I started to get a little tense. Eventually, I flipped those beautiful slices of fillet over and cut them in half just so they could cook all the way through.
As it turns out... when you poach something, you are supposed to cover the pan. Apparently. Not that any recipe actually TELLS you, of course, you're just supposed to... know. Sigh. Chalk up one more learning experience for the books.
Oh my gosh, it should only take 5 minutes. Much more than that and the salmon is way over cooked. See: http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/000041poached_salmon.php
Posted by Elise | December 16, 2004 07:07 PMSure, YOUR recipe says to cover the pan. :) You're right, it was terribly overdone, and honeslty pretty bland. I'll have to give it a shot again sometime, now that I have a vaguely better idea what I'm doing...
Posted by Andrea | December 16, 2004 07:44 PMThe poaching liquid is supposed to completely cover the item(s) being poached. The liquid should barely bubble. It's not really necessary to cover the pan. To make the liquid more flavorful, find a recipe for "court bouillon".
Posted by bb | December 17, 2004 12:14 PMYou know, I did suspect about the liquid needing to cover... except all of the recipes I found list a very specific amount of fluid.
Man. Alton Brown is right, recipes are way too vague.
I think you're right on flavor -- I think next time I'd go for a combination of wine and broth. In the photo, the stuff you see is frothy salmon fat, and not all-out boiling. It was in there a long, long time. :)
Posted by Andrea | December 17, 2004 12:38 PM