Miso Salmon—an Easy Weekday Meal

By David Hu
A new video for Video Friday

I love Japanese food. It can be delicate or hearty, intricate or plain, sophisticated or everyday. Often people think Japanese food is hard to make. In fact, many popular Japanese dishes are fairly easy for the home cook. Teriyaki, tonkatsu and tempura all come to mind.

But for one of the easiest Japanese dishes, try miso-glazed salmon. This is a great weekday meal: only six ingredients, prep time of about 5 minutes, very little clean up, and healthy, to boot!

This recipe requires a broiler. If you don’t have one in your oven, a toaster oven should do just fine. When broiling, remember that foods can burn very quickly given their proximity to the heat source. Keep a watchful eye on your food.

Miso Salmon would be delicious with Namasu, a simple Japanese relish-salad.

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Miso Salmon
1 teaspoon soy sauce
4 tablespoons mirin (Japanese sweet cooking sake), divided
4 tablespoons white miso, divided
1 tablespoon water
1 teaspoon sugar
2 salmon steaks, 1/2-pound each
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon minced fresh ginger

1. To make the marinade, in a small bowl, combine soy sauce, 2 tablespoons of the mirin, 2 tablespoons of the miso, water and 1 teaspoon sugar. Put salmon steaks into a gallon-size, zip-top plastic bag. Add marinade, seal bag and flip bag back and forth a few times to disperse marinade. Marinate in refrigerator for 30 minutes.
2. Preheat broiler. Remove salmon steaks from refrigerator. Place on foil-lined baking sheet and broil for 5 minutes about 5 inches from the heat source.
3. While the salmon is broiling make miso glaze by combining remaining 2 tablespoons of mirin, 2 tablespoons of the miso, 1 tablespoon sugar and ginger.
4. After broiling for 5 minutes, flip salmon steaks and continue to broil for an additional 2 to 3 minutes; remove from oven when almost done. Test by flaking fish with a fork. Salmon should be almost totally opaque, but slightly rare in the center.
5. Spread glaze on top of salmon steaks and return to the broiler for another 2 to 4 minutes. Remove when salmon is cooked through and miso glaze just begins to char. Watch carefully to prevent burning.

Makes 2 servings.

Note: To determine whether fish is cooked, gently pull apart the flesh with a small knife or two forks. Fish is cooked when it has turned opaque and flakes easily.

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