Peppery Brown Sugar Salmon

I love salmon, but I admit that it can be a little… uninspiring. At our house, we tend to lightly season and grill it, which is a great way to enjoy the fish, but sometimes you want something a little different. I found this recipe last fall over at Ezra Pound Cake, and immediately thought that I would make it for my fiance sometime, since he really likes fish and almost never makes it for himself. This was probably around the time that my father-in-law to be announced to us that we really should be eating more healthy foods, like salmon, and my fiance pointed out that regular salmon-eating might be slightly out of our price range. Thanks to the magic of Costco, however, salmon actually can be on the menu around here. (Cue the legitimate, but very wearying, concerns about the sustainability of eating farmed fish from big box stores. My sincere apologies to the world. One day, very soon, I will care. That’s a promise.)

The second obstacle in our way to fish bliss (other than the actual cost) manifested itself when my fiance’s boyfriend — erm, roommate — announced that their oven was inexplicably out of commission. “We turned it on one day… and it just started smoking!! It was unreal!! I thought the whole apartment was going to burn down!!” OK, man… let’s think about why the oven might smoke. “There’s all this nasty black stuff in the bottom. It’s awful. I have no clue what it is.” Does it really matter what it is, guys? If you got rid of it, the oven would probably stop smoking, and we could eat roast salmon. And cookies. And baked french toast. And so many other good things that I would LOVE to make you, but never do, because you can’t scrub an oven.

Yeesh.

So, when I got to my parent’s house last month, and my dad announced that there were salmon fillets in the freezer if only we knew what to do with them, I jumped at the chance to make this delicious recipe I had been saving. And then I made it again this week. Seriously people, it’s that good. Sweet, peppery, flaky, and about 3 minutes to prepare. And I bet you have everything you need to make this in your cupboard right now. Except maybe the salmon, which I will definitely NOT reccommend you go buy from Costco. No sir. Don’t do that.

But you probably should go ahead and clean that oven before it smokes you out of your own house, OK?

Again, I am not going to post the recipe… I didn’t really change anything, so just go get it here at it’s semi-original home. Here are some picures of the process, though.

Getting ready to pack on the rub…

Everything all laid out and ready to go…

You’ll notice that there are only three filets and no scaling back of the recipe. There were three of us eating dinner together that night, and nobody complained about the amount of seasonings.

I didn’t really think they would

Ready for the oven:

Getting roasted:

A little more roasted… see how the sugar is baking into a glaze? It’s lovely to watch it happen in the oven! The sugar bubbling on the foil makes it seem even sweeter…

And this is when I found the macro function on my camera.

Yeah, yeah… it’s about time.

Look at that peppery, glazy goodness!

Enjoy the weekend, folks!