5 Christmas Salmon Recipes, From Baked Fillets to Rice Bowls

Parsley and lemon on baked salmon, a fine pistachio crust, a glossy honey-garlic sauce: these five choices start with what you’d like on the plate. There are also golden fresh-fish cakes and rice bowls for a more casual meal during the Christmas season.

Choose the preparation as well as the flavor. Two dishes start with oven portions; one finishes in a skillet; the cakes need cooking before shaping; the bowls bring rice, fresh toppings, and sauce into the same meal.

This is the oven option I’d choose when a crumb topping would feel like too much. The fish remains the main attraction, with herbs and a lemon round on each portion.

Leave the lemon coating until you’re ready to bake: Natasha’s recipe calls for baking promptly after applying it. A long or overnight lemon marinade belongs to a different preparation. Save her complete recipe before planning the shopping list.

The nuts belong in a fine crumb mixture; a few whole pistachios scattered on top would miss the point of this recipe.

Its texture is the reason to choose it over the light garlic-Dijon coating above. London’s complete recipe supplies its own topping mixture.

A cornstarch-and-water mixture thickens that sauce. I’d pick this one for the sauce itself, especially if spooning a little over each portion is part of the appeal.

Keep the pan-cooking and sauce-making stages together in your plan. Coating raw fish for the oven would give you a different preparation. Sara’s complete recipe takes you through both stages.

Natasha’s recipe makes 13–14 cakes and labels them an appetizer. That count doesn’t mean 13–14 dinners. For a casual shared meal, decide what else will be served before using the recipe yield to plan your shopping.

Keep Natasha’s complete tartar sauce recipe with the cakes. Its pickle-and-herb sauce can use bought mayonnaise, so there’s no need to add a homemade-mayonnaise project. The companion link below takes you to the full recipe.

Rice deserves a place on the preparation list before you start the fish. The salmon cooks in a single layer, with batches when needed; that short air-fryer stage doesn’t account for the whole bowl.

Use the olive-oil version with garlic powder, onion powder and smoked paprika. Edamame, sesame seeds and sesame oil are optional. This is the choice for an individual bowl with fresh toppings, rather than a fish portion waiting for separate sides.