Salmon Cakes

All the four weekends since we got back from our vacation were filled with one thing or another. So, last night we decided to spend most of the Saturday at home, knowing that we are meeting up friends tonight.

Long story short, two friends dropped by to lend me some tools. I was chopping up some onions for chicken black bean soup and curry puff. Of course, I HAD to offer them to stay for brunch with us. It's kinda rude, yeah, if I didn't?

Got to improvise somehow though, cause there won't be enough food (even as light brunch) for the four of us. I have nice fresh salmon fillet, so we thought some salmon cakes will work pretty nicely.



What:
- about 400 gram fresh salmon fillet
- 1 bay leaf
- 1/2 lemon, sliced
- 1 tbs mayo
- 1 tsp horseradish
- 2 tbs dill, chopped
- juice from the other half of lemon
- 1 small potato, boiled and mashed (optional)
- salt and pepper
- bread crumb

How:
- Cook salmon by putting it inside a pot, fill water just enough to cover the salmon. Toss in bay leaf and sliced lemon. Once cooked, transfer it to cutting board or platter. Let it cool for a while.
- While salmon is cooling, mix the rest of ingredients thoroughly.
- Once salmon cooled, flake the flesh with fork. Then gently fold it to creamy mixture. Do not overmix, or salmon will break up too much. Mix just until the mixture can hold together pretty good.
- Shape it to patties. Depending on size; with 3" patties, we got 6 of them. Dredge it on bread crumb. Arrange patties on parchment paper.
- Put it inside the fridge for 10 minutes to firm it up a little bit, so that it holds nicely when pan-fried or baked.
- Transfer the patties with the parchment paper to baking sheet. Drizzle tiny bit of olive oil to patties.
- Bake in preheated oven at 400F, for 15 minutes or when it's golden brown.

Note:
Use panko (japanese bread crumb) for lighter and crunchier coating. We opted to bake it instead pan fried it. Healthier, I guess. And since we have those puff baking in the oven, we thought might as well bake the cakes too. It just taste as good, the only drawback is that baked version tend to come out less moist. But nobody is complaining. :)

Pan-fried version: Heat oil in pan. Slide patties to the pan. When the bottom side is golden brown, gently flip patties, to fry/brown the other side. Try to flip only once. Less handling/flipping = less chance of patties to break up.