Cook this: Home-cured lox — cured salmon — from Bagels, Schmears, and a Nice Piece of Fish

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Our cookbook of the week is Bagels, Schmears, and a Nice Piece of Fish: A Whole Brunch of Recipes to Make at Home by Cathy Barrow. Tomorrow, we’ll feature an interview with the author.

To try another recipe from the book, check out: The pumpernickel bagel and balaboosta cream cheese.

“I always like to remind people that people have been curing meats and fishes for hundreds and hundreds of years. And for the most part, they didn’t die,” says Cathy Barrow, laughing. “So, it’s not that hard. Just jump right in.”

If this is your first time curing fish, you’ll likely be shocked by how easy it is to make lox at home, adds the Frederick, Md.-based writer, recipe developer and teacher.

Unlike cold- or hot-smoked salmon, lox isn’t smoked at all. Rather it’s preserved in a salt mixture for several days before being thinly sliced and piled on bagels.

It only takes a few minutes to remove any pin bones, press the salt mixture into the fish, wrap it, weight it and put it in the fridge. Then, in no more than 72 hours, you’ll have lox.

“I love home-cured lox because you taste the salmon and not the salt,” says Barrow.

Because she’s in a small household, Barrow prefers to cure one pound (500 g) of salmon at a time. You lose 15 to 25 per cent of the weight in the cure, she explains, leaving you with about 12 ounces (340 g) of lox.

Barrow then divides the lox into two-ounce (55-g) packets and puts them in the freezer, so she always has cured salmon on hand.

“Two ounces is the perfect amount for two halves of a bagel,” she says. “And if you take it out (of the freezer the night before), in the morning while you are reheating your bagel, it’s ready in just a few minutes.”

HOME-CURED LOX (CURED SALMON)

1 lb (500 g) skin-on, centre-cut salmon fillet
1/4 cup (50 g) granulated sugar
1/4 cup (32 g) kosher salt

Step 1

Place a long sheet of aluminum foil on a clean work surface and cover it with a long sheet of plastic wrap. Set the salmon skin-side down on the plastic wrap. Inspect the salmon for any pin bones and use a pair of tweezers to remove them.

Step 2

In a small bowl, combine the sugar and salt. Press the mixture into the flesh side of the salmon. Use the plastic wrap to snugly enclose the fillet, then double-wrap it with the foil.

Step 3

Place the packet flat in a shallow glass or ceramic dish. Place another dish on top of the wrapped fish and add cans of tomatoes or jars of pickles or whatever weight will balance securely in the refrigerator and provide significant heft. (I keep a foil-wrapped masonry brick in the pantry and use it only for this purpose.)

Step 4

After 24 hours, dispose of any juices that may have gathered in the bottom of the dish. Flip the fish packet over and reapply the weight.

Step 5

Unwrap and check the fish after 48 hours; it should be firm all the way through. Press with your fingertips to check the thickest part of the fish to see if the texture has changed from tender to firm, raw to cured; there should be some resistance and the colour will deepen. If it seems to need more time, rewrap it, flip it over, and replace the weight. Check again in 12 hours, and again 12 hours later, if needed. The fish will never take more than 72 hours to cure.

Step 6

Unwrap the fish and brush away the salt-sugar mixture. The fish should be firm and deeply pink. Pat the fish with a paper towel to remove any remaining cure. Slice off a little of the lox to taste because you earned it.

Step 7

Serve, thinly sliced (see How to Slice Cured Salmon, below), at room temperature or very slightly cold.

Step 8

Lox will keep for 1 week in the refrigerator. I often slice and portion the fish, wrapping it tightly and freezing it in 2 oz (55 g) portions, just enough for a bagel. Defrost the lox in the refrigerator overnight and be rewarded at breakfast. Lox will keep for 3 months in the freezer.


Serves: 6

HOW TO SLICE CURED SALMON

Place the fish, skin-side down, on a piece of paper towel on top of a cutting board; the towel will keep the fish from sliding around. Using a thin, flexible slicing knife, cut long, slim, translucent slices at the deepest angle possible. You should be able to read a newspaper through the slice, according to my grandfather Allan. Save any trimmings to add to scrambled eggs or stir into your homemade Lox Cheese (the recipe is in the book).

Recipe adapted from Bagels, Schmears, and a Nice Piece of Fish: A Whole Brunch of Recipes to Make at Home by Cathy Barrow, photographs by Linda Xiao © 2022. Reproduced by permission of Chronicle Books. All rights reserved.

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