How to Salt Trout

Name: How to Salt Trout: Easy Dry-Salted Trout with Herbs
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 24 h
Total time: 24 h
Cuisine: European
Ingredients: Trout (fillet) 0.5 kg; Fresh rosemary 2 sprigs; Thyme 4-5 sprigs; Lemon 0.5; Salt (regular or pink) 2 tbsp (36 g); Black or mixed peppercorns 0.5 tsp; Allspice berries 5-6; Lettuce leaves to taste; White bread, butter or cream cheese to taste

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There are many recipes and methods for making lightly salted trout or salmon. I will tell you how to salt trout the simple dry-salting way. This is how my daughter Yulia does it, and the fish always turns out excellent. For festive sandwiches we make lightly salted trout the day before the feast. It is aromatic and mildly salty, with no liquid seeping out.

Lightly salted foods have become traditional for us. Everyone knows lightly salted cucumbers – a seasonal dish, or rather an appetizer, made by briefly salting green cucumbers. It is the simplest and fastest method. It works not only for vegetables but also for meat and fish. For example, lightly salted red fish is simple to salt and is ready after just a day.

The special thing about this method is that the salting uses perfectly ordinary ingredients, and the lightly salted salmon or trout is ready quickly and needs no further processing. You can eat it as a standalone appetizer, as an ingredient for sandwiches, or to make a red fish salad.

Most often people say “red fish,” although in the old days red fish meant the delicacy and expensive species of the sturgeon family, not fish with red flesh. Now the term red fish mostly applies to the salmon family: salmon, trout and so on. And lightly salted salmon or salted trout is usually considered red fish in everyday use.

Well-made salted trout is truly lightly salted and very aromatic. The smell of quality fish blends with the delicate scent of spicy herbs and spices. The flesh is not wet, and is covered with a barely noticeable film of fat. Salted trout keeps in the fridge for several days, but the fish is tastiest a day after you start, which is worth bearing in mind before you salt trout.

9 ingredientsTo the recipe

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Ingredients

3-4 servings

For curing
Trout (fillet) 0.5 kg
Fresh rosemary 2 sprigs
Thyme 4-5 sprigs
Lemon 0.5
Salt (regular or pink) 2 tbsp
(36 g)
Black or mixed peppercorns 0.5 tsp
Allspice berries 5-6
For serving
Lettuce leaves to taste
White bread, butter or cream cheese to taste

Step-by-step recipe

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Preparing the fish and salt

Usually before holidays we buy a piece of trout or salmon fillet, enough for sandwiches. Lightly salted salmon is a delicacy and quite expensive, so it is not part of our regular diet. The fillet is sold with the large bones removed and on the skin, often with scales. That is the best option for this recipe. It is also always worth checking the freshness of the fish by simply smelling it. Fresh trout has a delicate fish smell, and any foreign odors are a reason not to buy it.
You will need food-grade foil and plastic wrap to wrap the salted trout in and keep it in the cold.
If the trout fillet was cut at the shop, it is better to rinse it and pat it dry with paper towels. In any case, before salting trout, it must be patted dry.
Crush the salt in a mortar and sift it.
We salt the fish with so-called “pink” salt, simply out of habit. It is ordinary rock salt with impurities that color it. The impurities can be mineral or organic, such as algae. So the type and color of the salt do not matter.

Curing

Rub all the crushed, sifted salt (2 tbsp) into the trout fillet.
You can’t over-salt the fish: the flesh will take as much salt as it needs. Notably, most of the salt will not even dissolve in the end.
Cut several lemon slices, not necessarily very thin, and lay them on the foil.
Place the trout fillet on the lemon, skin side down against the lemon.
Lay sprigs of fragrant fresh rosemary and thyme over the fillet.
Sprinkle 0.5 tsp of black or mixed peppercorns and 5-6 whole allspice berries on top. Press the peppercorns and herbs lightly with your palms.
Wrap the trout fillet tightly in several layers of foil. Wrap the resulting package in plastic wrap as well.
Put the fish in the fridge, preferably in the coldest compartment, where you usually keep cheese, milk and butter. Let the lightly salted trout cure in the cold for exactly one day.

Serving

After a day, take the trout out of the fridge and unwrap the package. Discard the rosemary and thyme sprigs.
Cut the salted trout fillet off the skin with a chef’s knife, which is convenient and efficient.
To serve, slice the fillet into long pieces with a square cross-section.
Put a few lettuce leaves on a serving plate and arrange a few pieces of fish on them. Add a quarter of a lemon.
Do not drizzle it with oil or any dressing, as that would only spoil the taste and aroma.
If the fish is meant for sandwiches, slice the fillet into slices of any size. Spread butter, or better still cream cheese such as Philadelphia, on a piece of soft, very fresh white bread. Put a large slice of fish on top.
Keep any leftover fish in the fridge in a plastic container for a few days. But it is better to eat it right away: the trout is tastiest a day after you start salting it.

Calories and macros

240 kcal

Serving ≈ 200 g

Protein34 g58% of kcal
Fat10 g40% of kcal
Carbs1 g2% of kcal

100 g123 kcalProtein 17.1 gFat 5.3 gCarbs 0.5 g

Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.

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