Gravadlax and dill sauce
I adore gravadlax and would choose it over smoke salmon every time. It can be cure anything between 24 hrs to 8 days depending on the size of the fish. A 24 hour cure is not what I would call gravadlax, more of a light cure with a texture of raw salmon. This short period of time is not sufficient to draw out much of the salmon’s water content. For the tail piece I used here weighing around 1kg / 2lbs, curing for 4 days was enough, producing the texture I was looking for but it would happily have cured an extra day.
Mix the sugar, salt and peppercorns together and press half of it over the flesh of one fish fillet. Add the fresh dill, now top it with the rest of the salt mix, put second salmon fillet on top to make a sandwich.
Put cling film over the fish and weigh it down. Leave the fish for 4-5 days in the fridge, turning the fish over once a day. You can remove the liquid it produces.
Scrap the salt mixture off and slice it it thinly like smoke salmon strips.
Gravadlax
- 1kg / 2lb salmon cut into 2 fillets, skin left on
- 6 tablespoons of granulated sugar
- 4 tablespoons of coarse sea salt
- large handful / 1 cup fresh dill chopped roughly
- 2 tablespoons of black peppercorns roughly crushed
Mix the sugar, salt and peppercorns together and press half of it over the flesh side of one fish fillet. Add the fresh dill, now top it with the rest of the salt mix, put second salmon fillet on top to make a sandwich, flesh side in contact with the salt mix.
Put cling film over the fish and weigh it down. Leave the fish for 4-5 days in the fridge, turning the fish over once a day. You can remove the liquid it produces. When the time is up remove from the fridge, scrap the salt mixture off and slice it it thinly like smoke salmon strips.
Dill Sauce
5 floz , 150ml flavourless oil like sunflower
1/2 tablespoon of caster sugar
1 tablespoon of dijon mustard
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg yolk
1/2 tablespoon white wine vinegar
2 tablespoon of finely chopped dill
Mix the egg yolk, sugar, salt, mustard and gradually dribble a thing flow of the oil whilst whisking the egg mixture with a balloon whisk, do it quite quickly and you should see it beginning to thicken. When all the oil is mixed in stir in the vinegar and dill.