This one is a recipe that I remember from childhood. My mother used to make it for us, and I always liked it. Some years back, I got my mother to pass on the recipe to me, and figured that I might add it to the sparse number of recipes I’ve entered in this blog.

This dish basically makes a kind of salmon “cake,” about 1″ high in a 9″ x 9″ pan (I use a glass pan). It’s a bit bready, a bit cheesy, but with a salmon overtaste with the spices adding to it… It’s a delicious dish, hard to describe; you’ll have to make it and see for yourself.

Here are the ingredients:

1 lb. canned salmon (450 g)
1 egg (large)
3/4 cup milk
1 cup soft bread crumbs
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon celery salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 cup dry bread crumbs
2 tablespoons melted butter

(pre-heat oven to 350˚ F, or 180˚ C–but not until about 10-15 minutes before baking)

The hardest part of this recipe is handled first: cleaning the canned salmon and flaking it. I get three 180-gram cans (Akebono Salmon). Now, when you get canned tuna, it’s just the good part (as I recall). But canned salmon includes parts that some may find edible, but I certainly don’t, including bones and skin. So you have to empty the canned salmon into a bowl and then, by hand, pick out the skin and bones, leaving the good, flaky salmon ready to be added to the rest of the recipe.

In the image below, I start with the canned salmon (top), pick out the skin and bones (middle right), and end up with a bowl of nice, flaked salmon (bottom).

Next, you’ll want to measure out and set aside momentarily the soft bread crumbs and cheese. You’ll note that I did not use just cheddar–I used crumbled mozzarella as well. I also use a bit more cheese than the recipe calls for. The extra cheese and the mozzarella add to the spongy, springy taste, to my liking. Actually, I use a few more bread crumbs than the recipe calls for also, but just a bit. You should compress the crumbs when measuring the cupful, by the way.

Now, put the egg and 3/4 cup of milk on a largish mixing bowl:

Add the bread crumbs, and then mix together (you can mix the egg and milk first if you like):

After you have the bread-egg-milk mixture, drop onto it the flaked salmon and cheese. Then add the tablespoon of lemon juice and the spices:

Personally, I use Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing Mix powder instead of garlic salt. I never make dressing from it–I just use it as a spice. It’s mostly garlic and onion in a salt-powder mix anyway, and I like the taste better. I also use more than just a 1/2 teaspoon of it–usually a few teaspoons. It doesn’t overpower–in fact, you can just taste it a bit, not too much, even in large amounts–but you can taste it, and I like the difference.

After you add the salmon, cheese, lemon juice and spices, then you get your hands dirty: reach in there and knead it until it’s all spread around as well as you can get it. After this and the original cleaning, you’ll have fishy-smelling fingernails for a bit–part of the cost of making the dish.

Now you’re ready to prep the pan. I use a 9″-square glass pan myself–I don’t know if the glass part is important or not. Smear some butter, margarine, shortening, or other pan-geasing item to the bottom 1″ of the pan. It’s also at about this time that I start pre-heating the oven, by the way.

Now, put the mix into the pan, flattening it out so that it’s level, but don’t compress it too much.

Next, put two tablespoons of butter or margarine into a frying pan and melt it; add the 1/2 cup of dry bread crumbs, and cook them in the butter, until they become golden brown or darker. You can use more bread crumbs than 1/2 cup if you want.

Then scatter the bread crumbs on top of the mix in the pan, as evenly as you can get it.

If your oven is now at the right temperature or close to it, put the pan into the oven and set your timer for 30 minutes. In Japan, actual ovens are a rarity; however, you can use a microwave/convection oven–it will serve as a nuke wagon, but you can also bake stuff in it. Highly recommended for living and cooking in Japan.

After 30 minutes, take it out and leave it to cool a little. I like to serve it with mashed potatoes, with some negi (green onions) mixed in.

Makes enough for at least three people, four or more if you spread it around more thinly. Serve with salad and whatever else you like. Is good reheated the next day as leftovers as well. Enjoy!