Thai Salmon Fishcakes, Coconut Sweet Potato Chips and Soy Dipping Sauce

Another recipe for Peterhead Fish Company, this time using delicious salmon fillets. This is a relatively healthy dish but can be made even healthier by baking the Fishcakes instead of frying…they won’t have the caramelised look but will taste just as good! Adjust the spicing to your liking and remember to taste a little of the raw chilli before using it and that way it is easy to know how many to use. With Thai food, I always think you get the best flavours using Thai ingredients, for example galangal instead of ginger…

RECIPE

SERVES 2

Difficulty Level: Home Cook

Ingredients:

• 2 salmon fillets
• 2 bird eye chillies
• 1 stick of lemongrass, peeled and bashed with a knife to release the oils.
• Fish sauce
• 1 lime
• 2 small shallots or spring onions
• Garlic
• Galangal or ginger
• Palm sugar
• Sesame oil
• 2 large sweet potatoes, cut into chips
• 1 egg
• Plain flour
• 50g desiccated coconut
• Sunflower oil
• Salt and pepper

For the Dipping Sauce:

• Soy sauce
• 1 spring onion
• Palm sugar
• thumb size piece of ginger
• 1 clove Garlic
• 1 birds eye chilli
• fish sauce
• Lime juice

Method

1. Heat the oven to 200C. In a food processor, place the shallot, chillies, 2 cloves of garlic, 3 tablespoons fish sauce, 1 teaspoon of sesame oil, the lemongrass, a thumb size piece of galangal, two teaspoons of palm sugar, a tablespoon of soy sauce and the zest and juice of half a lime. Blitz to a paste.
2. Taste the paste and adjust the flavourings until it is to your taste. Add spice with another chilli or a little chilli powder; sourness with a little more fish sauce, sweetness with palm sugar or saltiness with soy.
3. Add the salmon into the food processor and blitz to a paste- will only take a few seconds.
4. With wet hands, mould the salmon mix into around 6 small patties. Place in the fridge until ready to cook. This will firm them up.
5. Heat a large roasting dish with a couple tablespoons of sunflower oil.
6. Toss the sweet potato chips in flour. Beat the egg in a bowl. Put a handful of coconut on to a plate and mix in a tablespoon of flour. You can add more coconut/flour if you run out.
7. Dip each chip in the egg and then into the coconut to coat.
8. Once they are all coated, place in the hot oil and toss gently to coat. Bake in the oven for around 25-30 minutes.
9. Make the Dipping Sauce. In a jug, add 100ml soy sauce, 3 tablespoons fish sauce and the rest of the lime zest and juice. Grate in the ginger and garlic and stir through. Finely slice the spring onion and chilli and add to the sauce.
10. When the chips have been cooking for 20 minutes, heat a little olive oil in a frying pan over a medium high heat. add the Fishcakes and cook for around 3-4 minutes on each side- don’t overcook as they will be really dry.
11. Serve the fishcakes on a little salad leaves with the chips and dip on the side!

TIPS

• If you fancy another dip, simply mix equal amount of fish sauce, lime juice and sugar. Add sliced spring onion, chilli, ginger and garlic.
• Make with white fish such as cod
• Use white potatoes instead of sweet potatoes
• Serve with a salad topped with the soy dressing instead of the chips, for a low carb meal