Salmon With Toasted Hazelnut Herb Butter

Wild salmon is a well-known Pacific Northwest ingredient, but hazelnuts are just as local so why not combine the two of them into one dinner along with some herbs? I keep it simple with a seared salmon with toasted hazelnut herb butter.

The salmon is the simplest part of this recipe

You just have to take out the pin bones and season it with salt and pepper. I'll get back to the salmon in a bit.

Movin' on to the toasted hazelnut herb butter ...

Toasting the hazelnuts is as simple as tossing them into a dry skillet and heating them over medium to medium-high heat. Keep them moving around by stirring or swirling the skillet so that they don't burn. They only need 3-5 minutes. Set them aside to cool. When they have cooled, put them in a food processor or the jar of a blender and pulse until finely ground.

It's important to use softened butter. If you buy butter in sticks, you'll use a whole stick, which is 8 Tablespoons, ½ cup, or 4 ounces.

Use a microplane to zest a lemon and chop some chives.

Finally mix the ground hazelnuts with softened butter, lemon zest, and chopped chives. Sounding good, huh?

Let's cook our Salmon with Toasted Hazelnut Herb Butter

After you've seasoned the salmon, press on some toasted hazelnut butter. I say "press" because "spreading" it doesn't work! The slickness of the salmon and the fattiness of the butter just don't mix well.

Place the salmon in the skillet butter side down and cook till the flesh is browning, about 5 minutes. Carefully turn it over using a fish spatula and cook it till it is still translucent inside, but flaking easily. How long this takes is fully dependent on the thickness of the salmon so you can test the internal temperature using an instant-read thermometer. Look for about 140 degrees.

Add more hazelnut butter to the top and serve it with lemon wedges.