SUMPTUOUS Baked Salmon For Christmas or a Special Occasion

This baked salmon is a spectacular dish to serve at Christmas or any other special occasion. But did you know that it is super easy to make (especially so if you have a Thermomix). A whole side of salmon is baked in the oven and then served with preserved lemon beurre blanc. It is then finished off with fresh dill and salmon roe. This is a restaurant quality meal easily made at home! This is a pushy recipe Dear Reader.

Beurre Blanc is a French sauce from the Loire region in France near Nantes. Beurre Blanc is made with muscadet (a dry white wine), eschallots, wine wine vinegar and butter. It is a warm emulsified butter sauce that is usually served with seafood or vegetables.

I was inspired to make this baked salmon as you get a lot of fish dishes at restaurant that are served with a beurre blanc or champagne sauce and I thought that it could be a delicious idea for a Christmas centrepiece main. The key to this is the beurre blanc butter sauce. It's so easy to make in a Thermomix so it is great if you want to be with your friends and not in the kitchen. I added a special touch of some preserved lemon paste to add some acidity to the dish as lemon is a great natural partner for fish.

Tips For Making This Baked Salmon with Beurre Blanc

1 - I timed this so that the salmon came out of the oven as my guests arrived (they were on time and all arrived together!). Otherwise if you have canapes or appetisers you can actually just put the salmon in the oven when guests are there because it only takes 20 minutes to cook. Then rest the salmon for 10 minutes while you make the beurre blanc and the main is ready 30 minutes later.

2- Make sure to chop the eschallot up very finely so that you don't get big lumps in the sauce. You can remove the shallot from the beurre blanc by straining it through a sieve too just before serving. I didn't just because I didn't want to lose the preserved lemon but it's up to you.

3 - Beurre Blanc is a cinch in the Thermomix but you can also make it on the stovetop. The key is to not exceed 60°C/140°F when cooking it which will cause the sauce to break and once cooked do not let it drop below 27°C/81°F where the butter solidifies.

4 - I used my friend's brand If and When Preserved Lemon Paste but you can also blend up some preserved lemon to make your own too.

• Classic Wedge Salad
• Radicchio, Fennel, Orange & Candied Walnut Salad
• Sweet Potato & Kale Salad
• Beetroot, Quinoa & Blue Cheese Salad
• Braised Red Cabbage
• Glazed Dutch Carrots

This baked salmon is such a great dish for Christmas and a worthy centrepiece as it looks so striking. Every year I like to do a Friendsmas before actual Christmas which gives me a chance to have friends over for dinner and then have the recipes ready for you too. The salmon came out of the oven just as my friends arrived at the door. I had partially made the beurre blanc and was just waiting for them to arrive as I was worried that the sauce and fish would congeal but that never happened even with the air conditioning on.

This year for Christmas we had six of us (Mr NQN and I, Monica, Marco, Queen Viv and Miss America). I served up a platter of crudites on ice with truffle mayonnaise along with Candy Cane Baos. I had two mains: a rolled, stuffed turkey and this side of salmon with a side of Pommes Anna. Dessert was the burnt raspberry and peach "Peach Melba" pavlova and home made gingerbread cookies. Queen Viv brought flowers and champagne and Monica brought kingfish sashimi and a tomato, peach & feta salad.

I love that my friends get along so well even though everyone is of different generations. We pulled Christmas crackers, told their terrible jokes, wore paper crowns and talked about everything. We hardly had any leftovers as well which made me happy as I think I've learned to cater better instead of coming out the other end with a fridge heaving with congealing leftovers.

Throughout the meal Monica kept whispering to me that she wanted me to open up her present. She was so excited to see my reaction so I opened it up. There was a gorgeous Taurus silk eye mask (the elastic on mine just came loose so superb timing) as well as a dog nail file. The third item was a small, brown box wrapped in a ribbon. "This is the big one!" said Monica excitedly.

I opened it up and peered inside. "It's a Moo Deng 3D Christmas Ornament!" exclaimed Monica excitedly. She and I have been clinging onto updates on the baby pgymy hippo ever since she first burst onto the social media scene. Moo Deng is an inspiration with her DGAF attitude and she's an absolute icon.

The only thing was that the Moo Deng Christmas ornament was a little... well odd looking! Monica came over to take a look at it. She hadn't seen it herself since she ordered it and it arrived 2 weeks ago as she had it gift wrapped.

"Oohh noooo," she said at the mutant Moo Deng which looked like it was cobbled together with a low res image and a basic sewing kit. But I loved it because it came from Monica. "I love her! Look at her, she's a bit damaged - like all of us!" I said. It wasn't a cheap ornament by any means and Monica had spent a lot of time researching the best one. It was truly a case of "What I ordered vs what I received." And when she showed me the original picture I had to laugh. The one in the picture looked nothing like the one I had. And when she went to check her purchase, it had disappeared completely from her Etsy purchase list!

So tell me Dear Reader, have you ever had a present gone wrong? Do you make one main or multiple mains or lots of different plates and no main for Christmas?

Baked Salmon

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 20 minutes concurrently

Serves: 8

• 1.4kg/3lbs side of salmon
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and pepper

For Beurre Blanc

• 60g/2ozs eschallots, peeled and very finely chopped
• 50ml/1.7flozs dry white wine
• 30ml/1floz white wine vinegar
• 250g/8.8ozs salted butter, cold, cubed into 1cm/0.4inch pieces
• 1 teaspoon preserved lemon paste (I used my friend's brand If And When, otherwise puree preserved lemon)

To Finish

• 20g/0.7ozs salmon roe pearls
• 2 sprigs of fresh dill

Step 1 - Preheat oven to 180C/350F fan forced and line a large baking tray with parchment. Trim the belly from the salmon and trim the ends so that it fits neatly on the baking dish and serving tray (I trimmed off around 250g/8.8ozs from the original weight). Place the salmon skin side down on the tray. Rub the top side with oil and season well with salt and pepper and bake for 20 minutes. When it is ready let it cool for 10 minutes while you make the sauce.

Step 2 - Conventional Place eschallots, wine and vinegar in a small heavy based saucepan over moderate heat until liquid has reduced considerably and there's only a couple of teaspoons left (it will take about 5 minutes). Note: at this point you can stop and then resume making the sauce at a later stage. Reduce heat to low medium and add 2 cubes of butter while whisking. Add remaining butter piece by piece while constantly whisking (you can add new pieces before other ones have completely melted). They key is to not cook this too high, you do not want the temperature to exceed 60°C/140°F. Once it reaches a creamy, hollandaise type consistency whisk in the preserved lemon paste. You can strain the eschallots and lemon out of the sauce but I didn't because I didn't want to lose the lemon flavour. It is now ready to serve.

Step 2 Thermomix- Place the eschallots, white wine and vinegar in the Thermomix for 6 minutes/100C/Speed #2. Note: at this point you can stop and then resume making the sauce at a later stage. Remove the MC and set to 2.5 minutes/60C/speed#2. While it is running, add cubes of butter in through the MC hole. Then replace the MC and set to 3 minutes/60C/Speed #3. Add the preserved lemon paste and set to 10 seconds/speed #3. You can strain the eschallots and lemon out of the sauce but I didn't because I didn't want to lose the lemon flavour. It is now ready to serve.

Step 3 - Place salmon on a serving tray and add salmon roe and dill on top. Pour the beurre blanc over the salmon at the table.