Sous vide salmon has an amazing, succulent texture. Pair it with fresh vegetables and some pantry staples for an easy yet satisfying dinner.

Time: 3/5
There’s no way around waiting for the salmon to cook sous vide, but you could do that ahead of time.

Effort: 3/5
To be honest, the hardest part was the thinking. But if you follow along, I’ve done that part for you already!

Thinking (and cooking) on your feet

Ever since I got my sous vide machine, I’ve only ever used it for chicken breast and pork loin. Sous vide is a foolproof way that allows me to reliably cook lean protein without drying them out, and it’s been a real game changer for making fat loss meals. I owe the idea of cooking salmon sous vide from a conversation with a colleague who couldn’t recommend it more. I gave it a try, and now I’m hooked too!

Sous vide salmon has a texture that regularly cooked salmon just doesn’t. The flesh is barely flaking, still super moist and incredibly tender. Pair that with salty, crispy skin that I crisped up with a kitchen torch, and the result is a simple yet supremely satisfying dinner.

I originally planned to serve the salmon with potatoes roasted in duck fat. To my disappointment, the potatoes turned green during their long stint in my pantry, and I was out of a main! Fortunately, my SO was there to the rescue.

This became an exercise in throwing things together. We managed to put a meal together after rummaging through the pantry and freezer to scrape together some ingredients – the direction of the dinner pivoted from a Western theme to a Japanese one.

An ancient can of cream of mushroom soup got pair with udon noodles. The remnants of a bottle of sesame salad dressing turned cherry tomatoes into something more interesting, and the broccoli got stir fried with soy sauce instead of roasted in the oven. This is also not the first time (and not the last!) time I’m thankful for having some pickled daikon radish around to add colour and contrast to a meal.

The moral of the story is that even though you may come across setbacks, a delicious dinner is never far away with a well-stocked pantry and some creativity! Keep your eyes peeled for when I finally get around to writing that Asian Pantry Guide that I’ve been procrastinating on for quite some time.

Dramatis Personae

Unlike most of my work on this site, this isn’t a meal prep recipe. I just wrote down the amounts I used to make dinner for two. However, it is entirely feasible to sous vide a whole bunch of salmon fillets and keep them in the fridge to sear off for a quick weeknight dinner.

Salmon – Two 120g pieces

I had some skin-on fillets. The thicker the pieces, the more that special sous vide texture can shine, The skin is still important though! It can be crisped up to give some crunchy, savoury contrast to the moist and succulent flesh. I crisped it up with a kitchen torch, but you could also do it in a very hot pan so that the skin is done before the flesh becomes overcooked.

I seasoned the fish very simply with salt and pepper, a bit of olive oil (to stop the delicate fish from sticking to the bag and each other) and some dried mixed Italian herbs. I want the salmon to be the star, after all.

I went with 46C / 115F for 45 minutes with the sous vide, but of course you need to play around with the time depending on how thick your fillets are. You could cook them from frozen, but you’d need to add about 30 minutes or so to the cooking time to allow for that.

Udon noodles – 100g

I used to stock shelf stable packets of udon in the pantry, but ever since switching to frozen udon I don’t think I can ever go back. I find frozen udon to have a toothier texture, and doesn’t taste as sour.

When cooking udon, it’s good practice to make the broth separately and add the cooked noodles to them (or vice versa) as the water that you boil the udon in can take on some of the acidity of the noodles.

Cream of mushroom soup – 1 can, rinsed out with a can’s worth of water

Nothing fancy here, just a quick and easy soup to have with the udon. Feel free to substitute any soup or broth you so desire.

Broccoli – one head

Always eat your veggies! I stir fried the broccoli with a couple cloves of garlic, and finished by pouring a splash of soy sauce into the pan and letting it caramelise a bit before stirring to combine.

Tomatoes – about 50g

There weren’t a lot of tomatoes, but I’m not planning for them to be the main vegetable. They’re there for some visual contrast, and to bring freshness and acidity to a meal that would otherwise be quite rich and heavy (cream of mushroom soup is very substantial, after all). Besides, once you cut them up they appear to take up more space than they really do.

Executive summary

1. Season the salmon and seal up the bag. Leave a small corner open as you submerge the bag into water, sealing it completely after most of the air inside is displaced.
2. Sous vide salmon at 46C / 115F for 45 minutes. Prepare the rest of the meal while you wait.
3. Wash, halve and toss cherry tomatoes in salad dressing.
4. Wash, cut and stir fry broccoli with some garlic and soy sauce.
5. Cook udon noodles in boiling water according to package instructions. Drain well and divide into bowls.
6. Heat up canned soup and water according to package instructions, and pour into the udon bowls.
7. Once salmon is done, pat dry and broil the skin with a kitchen torch until crispy and lightly charred.

Play by Play

I’ve never felt the need to get a vacuum sealing machine because the water displacement method works so well. Get the seasoning in with the salmon, mix it up real well, leave a corner open and submerge the rest of the bag into the water, the air will get pushed up, where you can squeeze it out of the opening and pinch the bag shut.

Vegetables … transform! There aren’t many cherry tomatoes, but that’s fine because I want them mostly for adding some bright colour to this meal.

A very quick, two ingredient salad. This bottled sesame dressing is also good with shredded cabbage or cucumbers!

Operating in parallel over both stoves here. Udon and soup being done in the pot, while broccoli gets a stir fry in the wok. Wait until the broccoli is almost done before giving it a drizzle of soy sauce around the sides of the wok – the soy sauce will caramelise a bit before coating the broccoli and giving it some nice colour as you stir.

Here’s the salmon skin after a date with the kitchen torch. I patted it dry and put it in a foil lined baking sheet – I was surprised that the kitchen torch burnt through the foil. Let this be a lesson to always go for the heavy duty foil.

Dinner is served, from brainstorm to table in an hour! A simple meal will just a few components, but each plays a role within the whole.

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