How to make Nourishing Traditions Salmon with Butter Sauce

You are going to love this recipe for Nourishing Traditions Salmon! It is perfectly soft and tender and tastes amazing topped with butter! It’s also pretty easy to make and is hard to mess up! I’m sure this recipe will become a regular for anyone who loves salmon and quick dinners.

What makes this Salmon recipe “Nourishing Traditions”?

This recipe comes from page 274 in Nourishing Traditions. I highly recommend you get that cookbook in your kitchen! It has so many amazing recipes and uncovers the truth about food and eating within the first few pages! If you are new to nourishing traditions, ancestral eating, or healthy eating in general, read my post all about Nourishing Traditions here. If you are a teenager (like me) and need the basics of healthy eating or you just don’t know how to eat healthy when everyone you know is eating fast food, read my post here.

Just like Nourishing Traditions instructs, this recipe uses wild caught salmon, fish stock , and lots of butter! Nothing processed or artificial, no seed oils (read more about seed oils here!), and is made of pure healthy ingredients.

Is this recipe for Nourishing Traditions Salmon healthy?

Yes! This easy Nourishing Traditions salmon recipe is so healthy for you and contains so many nutrients. Here’s some of the many benefits of including this recipe in your meal rotation.

Benefits of Salmon

Salmon is so good for you. In Nourishing Traditions, it is recommended that you eat fish every week if you can! This is no surprise given the many health benefits! Not only does eating salmon prevent heart disease and help form healthy bone growth, but it contains fat soluble vitamins. Salmon contains fat soluble vitamins A and D as well as omega-3 fatty acids.

Health benefits of Butter

You won’t believe how many health benefits butter has. Butter is a superfood if I ever saw one! It prevents heart disease, osteoporosis, cancer, weight gain, and more. Butter contains easy to absorb vitamin A, D, and E, and nutrients selenium, iodine, and the amazing vitamin K (read about vitamin K from the Weston A. price foundation here.) I could tell you so much more about butter and how amazing it is, but that would take a whole post! I recommend reading this article from the Weston A. Price Foundation here.

Health benefits of stock and broth

Nourishing Traditions prioritizes drinking mineral rich bone broth and stocks frequently. Bone broth contains so many nutrients and provides your body with collagen proteins which are great for your hair, nails, and skin. It protects against cancer, arthritis, bone disorders, anemia, diabetes, and more. The reason broth so nutrient dense is because it is full of the minerals and vitamins found in the bones, bone marrow, and electrolytes (in vegetables) that often go to waste. Traditional cultures made stocks and broths often and prized them for their healing properties and nutrient density.

Ingredients for Nourishing Traditions Salmon

You’ll only need a few healthy ingredients to make Nourishing Traditions salmon. Here’s what you’ll need;

Wild Caught Salmon

You’ll need 2 pounds of fresh salmon fillet for this recipe. I always recommend wild caught salmon over farmed. Farmed salmon are likely fed soy based pellets and other unnatural foods which can mess up the fatty acid profiles of the meat. If needed you can use frozen salmon. (see the Q&A section at the bottom for more about this)

Fish Stock

You can use store bought fish stock for this recipe. Just make sure it is from wild caught dish and only contains real ingredients. If you want to try something new and have time to learn a very valuable skill, try making Nourishing Traditions fish stock on page 119 of Nourishing Traditions! If you plan to make the fish stock yourself, you’ll need to prepare a in advance as the stock takes about an 2 hours to make and a few extra ingredients. You’ll need 4 cups of fish stock for poaching the salmon and making the butter sauce.

Butter

I recommend grass-fed butter, but any butter will do! Butter is the perfect delicious topping for salmon. You’ll need 1/2 cup butter (8 tablespoons) for this recipe.

Tarragon

This seasoning tastes great with the salmon and butter in this recipe! You could try another seasoning if you like such as parsley, garlic, or dill. You’ll need fresh tarragon for topping this dish as well as for the butter sauce.

Vinegar

You’ll need some apple cider vinegar for the butter sauce. Only a teaspoon.

All Ingredients for Nourishing Traditions Salmon

Here’s all the ingredients with measurments:

• 2 pounds filet of wild salmon
• 4 cups fish stock
• 1/2 cup butter ( 8 tbsp)
• several sprigs of tarragon
• 1 tsp apple cider vinegar

Tools you’ll need to make Nourishing Traditions Salmon

Now that you know all the ingredients, you might be wondering if there are any special tools or equipment you’ll need to make this yummy Nourishing Traditions Salmon Dish. Here’s what you’ll need:

A Casserole or Pyrex dish

You’ll need an oven safe dish to cook the salmon in. Be sure it is big enough to hold the salmon as well as the 4 cups of stock. You can get a good one here.

A Pot

Make sure you have a pot to boil the stock in! You can get one here.

A Thermometer

If you want, you can use a thermometer to be sure the salmon is sufficiently cooked. If you don’t have one, you can just check with a fork, but having a thermometer is also nice. Here’s my favorite one.

How to make Nourishing Traditions Salmon

Hopefully you have everything you’ll need! Now let’s get down to business. Here’s how you make Nourishing Traditions Salmon:

Start by preheating the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

Place the salmon in the dish

Start by placing your salmon skin side down into your Pyrex dish. Make sure you grease the dish with butter first. Then, sprinkle a few tarragon sprigs over the salmon. In the photo above I used frozen salmon and formed two layers with the blocks of salmon. This way of cooking turned out wonderfully! If you have a lot of people to serve try making it this way.

Bring the stock to a boil and pour over the salmon

Next, pour the 4 cups of fish stock into your pot and bring to a boil. Carefully pour the stock over the salmon in the Pyrex dish. If needed, add a little bit of water to cover the salmon completely.

Bake in the oven for 10-20 minutes

After that, use oven mitts to place the Pyrex dish with salmon and stock into the preheated oven. You’ll only need to cook the salmon for about 15-20 minutes. Be careful not to overcook. At 15 minutes, check the salmon with a fork to see if it looks cooked. It should still be slightly rare (110-120 Fahrenheit). After the salmon looks done, remove it from the oven.

Remove the salmon from the stock

Then, remove the salmon from the dish and place on a plate and then into a a warmer. Another option is to place the salmon on a pre-warmed plate and cover with parchment paper.

Make the butter sauce

Pour the leftover stock from the Pyrex dish into your pot and bring to a strong boil. The stock should shrink to about 1 cup. After the stock has decreased, let it cool to a simmer. Then, add the butter 1 tbsp at a time whisking constantly. Add the vinegar and more tarragon pieces to the mixture. After the butter is well combined the sauce is done!

Enjoy your Nourishing Traditions Salmon!

Serve the salmon topped with butter sauce! Enjoy!

Serving suggestions for Nourishing Traditions salmon

This Nourishing Traditions salmon tastes great on its own with just the butter sauce. However, you can make some yummy complementary side dishes to go with it if just salmon and butter sounds a little boring. Here’s some suggestions:

• Roasted Veggies (broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts…)
• Sprouted rice
• A squeeze of lemon juice
• Mashed potatoes
• Corn on the cob
• Cucumber salad
• Sautéd Spinach
• Sprouted Quinoa

Questions you might have about making Nourishing Traditions Salmon

Can I use frozen salmon to make Nourishing Traditions Salmon?

Yes! You’ll need to cook the salmon a bit longer though. Just check the doneness with a fork or thermometer. It will take about 40 minutes longer or more with completely frozen salmon.

Can I use chicken broth in place of fish stock?

Yep! The taste may be a bit different, but it will still taste great!

Can I use another type of fish?

Yes. You can use sole, turbot, whiting or another filet of fish.

Does salmon contain mercury?

You do not need to worry about mercury in wild caught salmon from clean water like the Atlantic. It is a deep sea fish and has it’s own way of removing mercury from it’s system. Farm raised fish on the other hand can contain too much mercury.

Have fun!

Now that you have this delicious recipe you can make it for friends and family and show them how delicious healthy eating can be! If you (or someone you know) are a teen confused by all the mixed signals given to us by society about food, read my post about healthy eating for teens (from the perspective of a teen who was once very confused about food!) Hope this helps you on your Nourishing Journey!

WANT TO KEEP NOURISHING?

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