Introducing Sichuan-dressed Alaska Herring with Walla Walla onions, radish, and cucumber from Lionhead on Capitol Hill, for Alaska Herring Week 2017!
Author: Zachary D. Lyons
Buccatini Pasta con Aringhe, or Buccatini Pasta with Herring with Fennel, Golden Raisins, Toasted Pine Nuts & Saffron from Steelhead Diner in Pike Place Market, for Alaska Herring Week 2017!
Alaska Herring Tartare, with celeriac, honeycrisp apple, golden beet & pickled onion, from Blueacre Seafood for Alaska Herring Week 2017! Served with three seed crostini & horseradish cream.
Downtown’s new Café Hitchcock presents Alaskan Herring Boquerones with Pickled Vegetables, Lemon & Moroccan Olive Oil for Alaska Herring Week 2017!
Wanna make this at home? You can purchase the same Alaska Herring fillets being used by Seattle’s top chefs for Alaska Herring Week from Central Coop on Capitol Hill, Freshy’s Seafood Market on Mercer Island, Old Ballard Liquor Co. in Ballard, and Wild Salmon Seafood Market at Fisherman’s Terminal! Once you’ve done that, here’s the recipe:
Alaskan Herring Boquerones with Pickled Vegetables, Lemon & Moroccan Olive Oil
Method (a 3-day process):
Lay herring fillets face-down (skin side up) on a generous layer of a 3:1 mixture of kosher salt & granulated sugar (a.k.a., “salazon”). Cover in plastic and refrigerate like this overnight.
The following day, remove fillets from the salazon, rinse & pat dry. Submerge the salted fillets in apple cider vinegar. Weigh fillets with a plate to keep them submerged, cover, and refrigerate overnight.
The following day, remove fillets from the vinegar, pat dry, and place in sanitized pan or jar. Cover in layers with thin sliced yellow onion & extra-virgin olive oil.
These will keep in the refrigerator for a few months if the oil cap is kept over the fillets.
Use in any application which calls for boquerones.
Pickled Alaska Herring Panzanella with roasted beets, micro arugula and sweet corn shoots from Orfeo for Alaska Herring Week 2017!
Presenting Smoked Herring Salad with butter lettuce, potato, cucumber, and herb aioli, from Dahlia Lounge for Alaska Herring Week 2017!
Introducing Alaska Herring with radish and charred scallion salad, and radish green salsa verde, from Poppy on Capitol Hill for Alaska Herring Week.
Wanna make this at home? You can purchase the same Alaska Herring fillets being used by Seattle’s top chefs for Alaska Herring Week from Central Coop on Capitol Hill, Freshy’s Seafood Market on Mercer Island, Old Ballard Liquor Co. in Ballard, and Wild Salmon Seafood Market at Fisherman’s Terminal! Once you’ve done that, here’s the recipe:
Alaska Herring with radish and charred scallion salad and radish green salsa verde
Ingredients:
- 1 ½ pounds Alaska herring fillets
- 2 slices fresh ginger
- 1 scallion, coarsely chopped
For Brine:
- 2 quart water
- ¼ cup kosher salt
For Salsa Verde:
- 1 cup radish greens
- ¼ cup mint leaves
- ¼ cup snipped chives
- 1 tablespoon capers
- 2 anchovy fillets
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ cup olive oil
For Radish Salad:
- 1 bunch scallions
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 2 tablespoons champagne vinegar
- 2 teaspoons honey
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup thinly sliced radishes
- ½ cup thinly sliced fennel bulb
Brine Fish
Stir water and salt until salt is dissolved. Soak the herring in this brine for 24 hours. (Note: this is not a bone softening brine, as the pressure cooking in the next step will accomplish that.)
Pressure Cook
Put ½ cup water, ginger, and chopped scallion in the bottom of an electric pressure cooker. Lightly oil squares of parchment paper. Set a small rack in the cooker, cover with a piece of parchment and stack the herring fillets on top, placing a piece of parchment between each layer. Cook on high pressure for 25 minutes. Release steam, open the cooker, carefully pull up the rack and place in a refrigerator until chilled.
Salsa Verde
Put all ingredients except oil in a food processor. While the machine is running, slowly pour in the oil.
Radish Salad
Preheat a grill until very hot. Toss the scallions with the oil. Grill until very charred and blackened. Cool and coarsely chop.
In a mixing bowl whisk the vinegar with the honey and salt. Toss in the radishes, fennel and charred scallion.
Serving
Lightly brush the herring with olive oil. Grill the fillets skin side up until marked and warmed through. Arrange the radish salad on serving plates. Place the gilled herring skin side down beside the salad and top with a spoonful of the salsa verde.
Meet Lemon Dill Herring from Central Coop’s Deli for Alaska Herring Week 2017, available all week from their deli counter!
Wanna make this at home? You can purchase the same Alaska Herring fillets being used by Seattle’s top chefs for Alaska Herring Week from Central Coop on Capitol Hill, Freshy’s Seafood Market on Mercer Island, Old Ballard Liquor Co. in Ballard, and Wild Salmon Seafood Market at Fisherman’s Terminal! In fact, Central Coop’s Meat & Seafood Department has pre-brined Alaska herring fillets available, if you want to skip the brining step! Once you’ve done that, here’s the recipe:
Bone Softening Brine
- 1 cup vinegar, white wine, organic (org)
- .5 cup water
- 4 fl oz lemon juice, fresh
Combine liquids (enough for about 2 pounds of fillets — adjust proportionally, as needed)
Brine fillets for 3-4 hours (test one fillet for bones, if not soft enough, brine longer)
Pour off brine
Soak brined fillets in ice water for 30 minutes
Lemon Dill Herring
- 15 lb Alaska herring fillet
- 1 cup oil, sunflower/olive blend org
- 2 tsp salt, sea
- 2 tsp black pepper, ground, org
- 1 cup lemon juice, org
- 2 bunch dill, fresh org
- 4 ea lemons org, sliced for garnish
(Note: ingredients for marinade based on Deli’s 15 pounds of herring. Reduce proportionally, as needed.)
Heat up charbroiler/grill.
Combine oil, dill, salt and pepper and lemon juice.
Place brined and drained herring onto pan and brush on the marinade.
Spray charbroiler with oil.
Sear for about 2 minutes on each side, until herring is crackling.
Garnish with lemon slices.
Did you know that Alaska Herring Week 2017 features no less than eight James Beard Award winners? From James Beard Award winner, Cafe Juanita, in Kirkland, we have Alaskan herring in Saor on Hearth Bread crostini with shaved fennel for Alaska Herring Week 2017.
Wanna make this at home? You can purchase the same Alaska Herring fillets being used by Seattle’s top chefs for Alaska Herring Week from Central Coop on Capitol Hill, Freshy’s Seafood Market on Mercer Island, Old Ballard Liquor Co. in Ballard, and Wild Salmon Seafood Market at Fisherman’s Terminal! Once you’ve done that, here’s the recipe:
Recipe: Herring in Saor on Crostini with Shaved Fennel
Ingredients:
- 1 c. salt
- 1 gallon water
- 10 ea. herring filets
- 1 cup golden raisins
- 1 ½ c. Champagne vinegar
- 8 large shallots, cut into ¼” rings
- 1 c. pine nuts
- 2 Tbsp. Fennel seeds, toasted and coarsely ground
- 2 ½ cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more as needed
- 1 loaf, day old, sour dough bread, cut into 10 large slices, 1/8th inch thick
- 1 whole head of fennel, shaved into thin slices
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- 1 Tbsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice
To prepare the herring filets and place them ‘en saor:’
- Combine the water and salt and whisk until the salt dissolves to make a brine.
- Place the herring filets in the brine. Cover the container and place in refrigeration for 2 days.
- Combine the raisins and the champagne vinegar together and leave to plump, at room temperature, for at least one hour.
- Remove the herring filets from the water and pat dry with paper towels until all the filets are completely dry.
- Heat a large sauté pan on medium to high heat. Once it is hot add about 1 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil. Place the herring in the pan skin side down. Only put enough herring in the pan that they are in one layer in the pan with about an inch between filets. You will have to cook them in batches.
- Once the herring are crispy on the skin side, about 1-2 minutes, flip them over and cook them on the flesh side for about another 2 minutes. Place them, skin side up in a shallow container that can hold all the filets. It is perfectly great if you need to stack the herring fillets in a few layers.
- Once all of the herring fillets are cooked and stacked in the shallow container, heat up a clean medium sauté pan over medium heat.
- Add about 2 tablespoons of the extra virgin olive oil and the sliced shallots.
- Turn the heat down to medium low and let the shallots sweat for about 5-7 minutes or until they are translucent and soft. Stir often.
- Add the champagne vinegar, golden raisins, pine nuts, ground fennel seeds and the 2 cups of extra virgin olive oil to the shallots.
- Bring the mixture to a simmer and then pour the mixture over the herring filets.
- Make sure the herring are completely covered with the mixture. If the level of liquid does not cover the herring, add enough of the extra virgin olive oil so that all the fillets are completely covered.
- Leave the counter out of refrigeration until it cools to room temperature. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 days.
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
To make the crostini and assemble the dish:
- Place the slices of sourdough bread onto a sheet tray and brush with extra virgin olive oil. Season the slices with a little kosher salt.
- Place the sourdough slices in the preheated oven and cook until golden brown, 8-10 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool.
- In a medium sized bowl, mix the shaved fennel with 1 tablespoon of the extra virgin olive oil and 1 tsp. of the lemon juice. Season to taste with kosher salt. Keep in the bowl until ready to serve.
- In a small mixing bowl, add the chopped parsley, ¼ c of extra virgin olive oil and 2 tsp. of the lemon juice. Keep in the bowl until ready to serve.
- Right before serving, place the herring filets, in the shallow container, in the oven. Leave in the oven just until the olive oil has melted, being careful not to heat up the herring filets, 2-3 minutes.
- On a platter or on individual plates, place the sourdough crostini.
- Gently remove the herring filets from the container. Drain some of the excess olive oil off and place them directly on top of the crostini.
- Spoon some of the shallot mixture on top of the herring filets, making sure to also get a generous amount of the pine nuts and raisins.
- Place some of the shaved fennel on top of the filets and spoon the parsley mixture on top of the fennel and around the platter or plate.
The Swedish Pickled Herring Plate from Old Ballard Liquor Co. for Alaska Herring Week, features pickled herring five ways. While the perfect Midsommar treat, it is available year-round at Old Ballard, though flavors may vary. Wanna make this at home? At Old Ballard Liquor Co., you can also purchase the same Alaska Herring fillets being used by Seattle’s top chefs for Alaska Herring Week! Once you’ve done that, here’s the recipe:
Swedish Pickled Herring Plate (Allow 7 days)
Step 1: Salt the Herring
Make a 25% salt brine using the following proportions, and scale up to whatever quantity is needed:
25g Salt per 100mls of Water
Bring the solution to a boil until the salt dissolves, and then cool in the refrigerator to 35-40 degrees.
Refrigerate and brine the herring fillets in the salt brine for three days.
Step 2: Make the Herring Pickle Brine
Add the following ingredients to a large pot and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally:
- 1 C Water
- 2 C White Sugar
- 2 C Distilled White Vinegar
- 2 Tbl Allspice Berries
- 4 ea Crumbled Bay Leaves
- 1 Clove
Turn off the heat and allow to steep for 30 minutes. Do not remove spices. Chill overnight to 35-40 degrees. Brine can be refrigerated and should be used within 60 days.
Step 3: Soak and Peel the Herring
- Soak the salted herring for one hour in fresh, cold water
- Change the water and soak the herring for a second hour.
- Peel the skin off of the fillets and trim off any large rib bones or bruised portions.
Step 3: Pickle the Herring
Cut the fillets into serving size pieces
Drain the water, put the pieces into a plastic or glass (nonreactive) container and cover with pickling brine.
Refrigerate and allow to pickle for a minimum of three days
Step 4: Flavored Pickled Herring
In a clean, dry container, layer the pickled herring with spices, fruit or vegetables. Cover with fresh brine and allow to sit for a minimum of 24 hours.
- Onion Herring
- Lemon Herring
- Dill Herring
- Nectarine-Cardamom Herring
- Etc…
Step 5: Cream Herrings
For cream herrings, drain the pickled herring well and make a cream of:
- 1 Cup Mayonnaise
- 1 Cup Sour Cream
- Powdered spices to taste
Mix the cream with the herring and refrigerate.
- Sour Cream
- Curry Cream
- Horseradish Cream
- Garlic Cream
- Etc…
Alaska Herring Week 