Easy Baked Salmon Recipe (for Dummies 101)

I really love salmon dishes, but I also know they’re super pricey so I’m loath to experiment on them because it would be such a waste to screw it up! Lo and behold however, I tried this super easy Baked Salmon recipe, and guess what? It turned out great – in fact, it tastes VERY SIMILAR to Contis’. In fairness, my family happily gobbled it up and told me this was good – I think they were as shocked as me LOL.

Anyway, without further ado – let me share this awesome Baked Salmon recipe (renaming to: Golden Baked Salmon in a Sea of Vegetables 😉), so you can also partake in the umami-ness.

 

DELECTABLE FOOD FOR THE DAY: GOLDEN BAKED SALMON IN A SEA OF VEGETABLES

DIFFICULTY: Super easy, even an 8-year old can do it

SERVING SIZE: Good for 5 hungry people

PREPARATION AND BAKING TIME: 2 hours (for beginners)

TOTAL COST: PHP 870 (PHP 174 per person)

 

INGREDIENTS:

Ingredients for the Salmon marinade

• 750 grams salmon fillet (purchased @ PHP 600 from the market)
• 5 cloves garlic, minced
• 10 pieces calmansi, juiced (or 1/3 pc of a lemon, juiced)
• Salt and pepper (2 teaspoon, but this is dependent on your taste buds)

Ingredients for the sauce topping

• 250g of cream cheese, softened (I use the Swiss Valley brand – left outside for ~6 hours so it will be nice and soft beforehand)
• 4 tablespoons mayonnaise
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 75g Parmesan cheese (I use the Anchor or Emborg brand. You can use more than 75g. I’m just not very fond of cheese)

Ingredients for the vegetables

• 100g peas
• 100g corn
• 2 pieces of medium-sized carrots, chopped into blocks
• 2-3 tablespoons of butter (I like mine veryyy buttery)
• Salt and pepper (1 teaspoon each, but dependent on your taste buds)

 

PROCEDURE

STEP 1: Marinade your salmon (30 minutes)

Do this at least 1 hour before the actual bake time so the marinade will seep into the salmon. As for me, I did it 4 hours before. I figure more time marinading can’t hurt and can only help right?

1. Defrost your salmon one day before, by placing it in the refrigerator (from the freezer)

2. Prepare a big glass tray (or anything that’s oven safe), where you’ll be placing the salmon

3. Juice 10 pcs of calamansi. The juice will be used to marinade the salmon and ensure the “malansa” / fishy flavor is overwhelmed

4. Chop up 5 cloves of garlic into fine pieces (I chopped up 8 at this step, as I needed another 3 minced garlic for the sauce later on, so I just did them together to save time).

5. Transfer the salmon onto the glass tray. Pour the calamansi juice and spread the garlic on the salmon. Afterwards, gently rub salt and pepper onto the salmon. I might have overdid this part, as my parents complained that it was a bit too salty… So maybe don’t rub salt over every single inch of the salmon LOL.

6. Place the glass tray w/ salmon into the refrigerator for the salmon to marinade properly. Do NOT leave it outside, as the salmon may spoil

 

STEP 2: Prepare the sauce toppings (15 minutes)

1. Mix your softened cream cheese (1/2 block), 3 tablespoon of mayonnaise, 3 cloves minced garlic, and parmesan cheese together. Keep mixing until the sauce starts looking smooth and you don’t see remnants of parmesan cheese in it.

 

 

STEP 3: Place everything together and bake (45 minutes)

1. Bring out the salmon and pat it dry using paper towels. I just placed the salmon on top of the towel, then pat the top with a paper towel as well. Afterwards, I transferred back to the tray

2. Spread the sauce topping over the salmon. Make sure the sauce is spread LIBERALLY and that it covers the entire salmon. This is where ALL the goodness comes in.

3. Sprinkle parmesan cheese on top if you’d like. I skipped this part HEHE

4. Bake salmon at 175 degrees Celsius for 30-40 minutes, or until toppings turns golden brown. I couldn’t tell if it was turning golden brown so I pulled it out after 35 minutes hehe!

 

STEP 4: Prepare the vegetables (15 minutes)

1. While the salmon is baking, it’s time to prepare the vegetables. I bought pre-packed peas and corn, but couldn’t find pre-packed carrots. So, I chopped up 2 carrots into small blocks. (Make sure you defrost the peas and corn beforehand as well!)

2. Time to saute the vegetables. Turn on the stove (low heat), then place the non-stick pan on top. I placed 3 tablespoons of butter onto the pan, poured all the veggies in (peas, corn, carrots), then placed 1 teaspoon of salt and pepper each. To cook, I just kept mixing the veggies round and round and round. The important thing here is to make sure everything’s moving so they don’t get stuck and burnt at the bottom of the pan

3. I kept stirring for ~5+ minutes (could be more), until I noticed that the carrots were starting to look cooked (they started out looking very raw). I just kept moving them around, then to determine if it was good to go, I grabbed a spoon and tasted one pea, one carrot, and one corn each! Tasted cooked to me, so DONE! (I’m sure there’s a better way to determine if it’s cooked, but it’s currently beyond my cooking level. Someone teach me.). Anyway, you’ll see the difference between raw and cooked in my photos

 

STEP 5: Bon Appetit!

Take out the baked salmon from the oven, and pour the buttered vegetables into the tray