Salmon missing its tan


 
Kristof Jozsa

Kristof Jozsa

TVWBB Fan
So I gave salmon a first ever try on the grill today. It was a filet of over a pound, with its skin on, so I brought it to room temperature, oiled its skin side and greased the top slightly with some herb butter about 15 mins before cooking. It was grilled over lump charcoal at around 400F over direct fire with its skin down, aimed to a core temperature of 130F (turned out to be around 135F when measured and finished) in about 18-20 minutes. No rotation, no moves, no action during the cooking.

Now the taste was perfect, it was very soft and had a nice char in it, but I missed all the colour I expected at the end. Its top looked quite white - thought it'll get deep orange or brownish, but no such thing has happened.

What can I do next time do get some color on a salmon filet? Was it okay to grill it skin down or I should have had turned it over at some point? How do you do it to also achieve the perfect look? Thanks!
 
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Kristof, I don't get much of a "tanning effect" either, it's partly because the fat in the fish is driven away from the heat and it rises to the top and gets a "whitish" appearance. I don't oil the skin side, I leave it and allow the skin to stick and lift serving size pieces right off the skin.
 
Thanks Timothy. Honestly, I doubt oiling the skin side added much to the story, when I picked it up with my spatula, it actually went over the skin accidentally not under it as I intended, and it came off beautifully from it's skin. (I could remove the skin after too without much problems).

About the color, I made the unprofessional move of googleing "salmon charcoal grill" and looked and the pictures. Now mine was nothing like those - so I wondered if I can do anything to achieve those results.
 
The most foolproof method for grilling salmon that I have found is to use a cedar plank. Soak the plank for several hours (all day is ok), remove the skin from the fish before cooking, and cook it indirect at 350 until 125-130F internal. The plank keeps the moisture in and lets the fish cook more evenly. For some reason (alchemy?) the plank removes all of the "fishy" taste as well. We usually coat the top of the filet with dijon mustard and a layer of brown sugar. I toss a chunk of pecan wood on the fire, too.

Grill stays clean in the bargain.

Jeff
 
Jeff is spot on. Whenever we grill fish, we use a cedar plank and the results are really good. Would not do it any other way.
 
I can think of two ways for salmon to get that tan color, either by smoking or with a glaze or rub containing sugar. I don't think there are enough natural sugars in salmon to give it that color.
 
Thanks guys, I must try this next week.

Do you think honey also works instead of brown sugar? I have a nice bottle of dijoni mustard with honey at hand, I could try topping it with some additional honey but would skip the sugar in this case.
 
I didn't mention the B sugar point, I use that too and it does help. Not so sure that honey will caramelize as well, in the time needed to cook the flesh. Worth a try, you might drop the Dijon step and try dry seasoning too.
The last one I did didn't get brown but, that was a smaller tail piece for just the two of us. For that, I dusted with my version of Emeril's "Essence", let it grill a touch more than half the time and gave it a butter bath.
My doctor is not allowing me the use of much sugar (it's really my body not,the doc's, fault) but I used to do that all the time.
 
When I do salmon on the grill I wait until the grill is up to temp and hot, then a quick spray of canola oil and the salmon goes on meat side down first for a couple of minutes to sear it and get color, then flip to the skin side to finish.

The family is not a fan of cedar planks, so that's an automatic no-go round these parts. :(
 
Kristof;
My favorite way to grill Salmon and Steelhead, is on a Cedar Plank:

http://tvwbb.com/showthread.php?41879-Steelhead-on-the-grill&highlight=salmon+plank

However, I have done direct grilling of Salmon with the skin on. I used to be a SERIOUS fly fisherman I had a great guide in Michigan and we caught salmon on light tackle that weighed as much as 30 lbs. The guide took us back to the Lodge where we were staying a gave us a method of direct grilling that worked quite well.

The salmon filets, skin side down, were place on a hot grill (gas in this particular case) skin side down after being given a light coat of olive oil plus a simple rub. We were told to carefully time the cook (uncovered) until the fish released from the skin (using a large spatula) by slipping the spatula between the skin and the filet. We then flipped the filet and were told to cook it EXACTLY the same amount of time on the second side. It works quite well for both steelhead and salmon. By timing it, it levels the differences in grills, heat output, etc. You get great color and excellent flavor. You DO want to carefully oil the grill grates before putting the fish on to help in the release after the flip.

NOTE: My favorite way is to use a plank as we truly LOVE the flavor that the Cedar smoke imparts.

I can recommend this book (I have both this one and an earlier edition) for those that want to explore the plank grilling technique beyond salmon (their meatloaf on a plank is beyond comparison):

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/157061900X/tvwb-20?tag=TVWB-20

Keep on smokin',
Dale53:wsm:
 
Erik Tracy said:
When I do salmon on the grill I wait until the grill is up to temp and hot,,,,,,, and the salmon goes on meat side down first for a couple of minutes to sear it and get color, then flip to the skin side to finish.. :(
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Same here, I learned that on America's Test Kitchen, very easy to handle that way. Personally, I wouldn't eat salmon, or any fish for that matter, but 'whats-her-name' doesn't eat meat, so I grill salmon often and she loves the way it comes out. No IT readings, just grill it until the center is past MR Pink.
 
Kristof Jozsa said:
Thanks guys, I must try this next week.

Do you think honey also works instead of brown sugar? I have a nice bottle of dijoni mustard with honey at hand, I could try topping it with some additional honey but would skip the sugar in this case.
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Taste-wise the honey will be fine, but it will be hard to keep it on the filet -- it will run off as soon as it gets warm and thins out. The brown sugar helps the dijon stick to the fish and give it a nice color.

Jeff
 
Here's a couple other ways to try salmon - try the "brined appetizer style" sometime

http://virtualweberbullet.com/cook.html#fish

I didn't notice what kind of smoke wood you used if anything. I notice a definite color change from the smoke adsorption when I do my wings. I was going to say go light with smoke wood if you use it, but I love smoked salmon and have yet to oversmoke one so....... I was on a jerk salmon kick (just a jerk rub) about a decade ago but haven't done that for nearly a year.

Planks are good, I've only done a few cooks on one. Since you don't eat much if any of the skin/scales you could put the skin on the grate. People swear by planks, I have a stack of them, and have even nabbed a plank cookbook :) I've only cooked on planks a couple of times though.


edit: sounds like you've got it figured out!
 
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Same as others I cook it high high heat flesh down and then flip. Also throw in a couple of chunks of alder wood
 
It may have more to do with the KIND/Species of Salmon and where it came from than your technique:

I grill-up quite a bit of Salmon - and note the following observations:

Some kinds (King Salmon & Sockeye) seem to start-out more red and end-up with more pink
Some kinds start out with more yellowish flesh and end-up lighter

Also - farm-raised vs wild caught:
Farm-raised seems to be higher in fat / oil - cooks-out with more white-color stuff rendering-out on top of the flesh
Wild-caught gets less of that on top & natural flesh color gets covered-up less by the internal fats & oils

My usual technique =
- get a double-layer foil pan (fold-up edges) hot before laying-on the fillet
- Lay the fillet on the foil skin-side down (skin will burn/char a bit and stick to the foil)
- Rub gently with a light drizzle of Olive Oil, Salt, lightly pepper and maybe a few broken-apart rings of onion slice
- Grill on Medium heat for about 20 minutes
(until flesh "flakes" can be separated gently with a fork, with nearly no translucent between the flakes)
- Lift flesh off skin with a sharp-edged spatula / leave the skin stuck to a foil
- Rest for a few minutes & enjoy
- Toss the foil and skin after the grill cools down
 
I use my chapa (cast iron griddle) for skinless fish over the fire - cook one side only with a little oil, then flip it over onto the plate so the golden crusty side is face up.
 
Ron G. said:
It may have more to do with the KIND/Species of Salmon and where it came from than your technique:

I grill-up quite a bit of Salmon - and note the following observations:

Some kinds (King Salmon & Sockeye) seem to start-out more red and end-up with more pink
Some kinds start out with more yellowish flesh and end-up lighter

Also - farm-raised vs wild caught:
Farm-raised seems to be higher in fat / oil - cooks-out with more white-color stuff rendering-out on top of the flesh
Wild-caught gets less of that on top & natural flesh color gets covered-up less by the internal fats & oils
Click to expand...

This.

Lots of lower quality salmon being sold these days. It can taste great but often doesn't have the color you might expect.
 
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